Hey guys,
I have officially finished World Race, and after a couple weeks now, just wanted to send out my final World Race newsletter. In this last newsletter, I want to share a bit on my final moments, reflect on some lessons learned along the way, and share about my future mission work. While I’ve been able to connect with some of you in person to share these things, others I haven’t been able to yet. That said, let’s get into it.
On Monday November 17, after approximately 10 months of being in the field, I traveled from Uganda to America. It felt so nice to be back in America! After coming back, our squad had a couple days for debriefing which included processing through things, final teachings, fun activities, and final moments with my squad. Then on Sunday November 23, I officially completed World Race and am currently back in NJ.
Throughout my time at World Race, I have learned and experienced so much. While I can share so many things that I learned, I’ll share 4 things that I learned which I hope can help you as well:
1. Transformation begins with making a conscious choice to renew yourself in the truth which is found in the Bible. Romans 12:2 tells us to not be conformed to the world but to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Along the race, especially towards the first half of the race, there were many times my physical body struggled. Some things I experienced include insomnia, vertigo, irregular heartbeats/ trouble breathing, headaches, stomach issues, etc. In Malaysia, which was my second country traveled to, I got to a point of desperation. After praying and having another leader pray for me, I came up with a list of conscious mental things I was struggling with. I wrote down the lies I was believing, what the truth is, and what the Bible says and spoke these things over myself morning and night for weeks. I had to not just know the truth, but I had to believe the truth and know what my identity in Christ was to see the results. While I still struggle with some of these things and struggled throughout the race, the process I started in Malaysia made me see results, which started with a conscious choice to meditate on truth and eventually caused my subconscious and physical body to be healed and transformed.
2. Replace fear with trust in God. One of the biggest things I struggled on throughout the race was with fear. While fear was not even something I even recognized in myself at first, after praying to God in Malaysia, God showed me that this was the root to many of my problems. The more I thought about it, I realized I had fears including but not limited to: fear of not being control, fear of how my body was reacting, fear of failing, fear of falling into sin, and fear of not getting better. For many weeks, I quoted Isaiah 41:10 daily, which says “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” I learned to trust God in a way I had never experienced before and try to remind myself daily to continue doing the same.
3. God’s strength will get you further than you can in your own strength. There were so many times over the last year where I felt like I didn’t have enough energy or strength to keep going on. I had to lean into God many times and trust that He would get me through it. Looking back, it is beautiful in our times of weakness needing to lean into God because in these times we need to be so dependent on God. God helped me during various physical and mental struggles to keep moving forward.
4. God requires full surrender. I thought giving up my job and doing full time mission work was pretty sacrificial, but I learned there are so many more things to surrender to God daily. Romans 12:1 tells us to present our bodies as living sacrifices which requires daily having to die to one’s own flesh. In the field, I learned to surrender things even if I didn’t want to such as what my day would look like, what I would eat, when I would sleep, who I would be with, etc. As I’m back home now, it’s something I need to remember to continually do as it’s so easy to get caught up with our own personal desires above God’s or others around us.
From these 4 lessons, I hope you reading can relate throughout your own life struggles and hopefully use some of the things I learned to help you as well.
Finally, I want to briefly share about my next steps. Next year, I will be doing mission work in Asia in 2 different countries starting in February until June (or September latest). Because this newsletter is public, I must be very vague in sharing details for the protection of myself and the ministries I will be working with. After my time in Asia, in later 2026 or early 2027 depending on when I am able to raise the sufficient funds, I will be serving with Engineering Ministries International (EMI) in Uganda for at least 3 years as a civil engineer to further their mission of design, discipleship, and diversity. I am excited to help design Christian facilities in need with my professional trade as a civil engineer and disciple and be discipled along the way in Africa. I am so excited to be continuing in mission work and doing what I believe God has called me to do for the next several years. If you would like to hear more about my upcoming mission work, I am trying to connect with people in person/ over call to share more. With that, I would ask you to consider further partnering with me financially and prayerfully for my upcoming mission work. I will also have a new platform to send out my further newsletters since this current one is specific for World Race. Whether you desire to become a further ministry partner or not, I would still love to connect with those interested in connecting before I leave America again.
For the final words of this newsletter, I just want to thank all of you who have followed my journey over this last year and supported me along the way! Whether you have given to me to help me get here or prayed for me along the way or stayed in contact with me throughout the year or were just interested in seeing what I was up to, I am grateful to have had you along for the journey and hope you follow along for my next steps. It’s been a hard journey but an amazing one with many good memories and moments along the way. God bless you and hope to talk to you guys soon.
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