So here it is... my first blog.  I guess this means I'm really doing it; I'm really part of the FYM program!  Well, I still need to send in my deposit to make it completely official, but still...

I'm going to ENGLAND in September!

That thought completely excites me and totally scares me all at the same time.  I was in the Dominican Republic over Thanksgiving, and that was my first time out of the country (except for Canada, which doesn't really count... sorry, Canada).  It was also the first time being more than a car ride away from my family.  I survived, but that was only 5 days.  This trip is 9 months!  I know I get to be home for Christmas and everything, but it's still weird to think about being away from home for that long, with the entire Atlantic Ocean (plus New Jersey and half of PA) between me and my family.

But the ironic thing is that all of that stuff-- the stuff that scares me-- is also the stuff that excites me.  I feel like I've been in this bubble for most of my life (kinda like the movie "Truman Show").  I'm realizing what a tiny portion of the world I have experienced, and I think that translates into experiencing only a tiny portion of God.  I know Him only as I have experienced him in my geographical, socio-economical, and cultural location.  In the DR, I started experiencing Him in a different way because my eyes were opened to new perspectives.  I want more of that, and I think... no, I
know I will get that during these 9 months of being away from everything I look at as being "normal".  I've spent the last 22 years being so completely comfortable that I've become complacent.  I'm looking forward to being so uncomfortable (on a number of levels) as to be challenged out of that complacency into an unquenchable desire to know more of the God who loves me with an everlasting love and continues His faithfulness to me (Jeremiah 31:3b).