I went through this in San Diego #1, but the story I wrote there was fragmented. Not inaccurate, but I left a few parts out, whether by choice or by accident. Since I've told several people here on project my story behind coming to San Diego, I figured I'd write about it for anybody to read.
This past year, through being a Bible study leader at UNL's Cru, God taught me several things, including the fact that being steadfast in my own plans might not be the greatest idea knowing that I was claiming to follow God. Still, I didn't see myself going on a summer project because, as a pre-med guy, I wanted to do undergraduate research for the summer. I applied to a program at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in February. By that time, the last deadline to apply for summer projects had passed.
But, as project people know, that last deadline is a very soft deadline. People can get accepted to summer projects even if they apply in March. What made me consider San Diego to start was one of the UNL Cru staff people, Beth, casually bringing it up with me. I wasn't going to say no right away (remember, being steadfast in my own plans = bad idea), so I put it in the back of my mind. Having not heard back from UNMC, I applied to the San Diego Summer Project in early to mid-March.
In late March, I got a phone call from Aaron, who's on Cru staff at Colorado. That's when I found out that I'd been accepted to SDSP. Having been a late entry, I knew that I was in a bit more of a time crunch when it came to support. I was added to the SDSP Facebook group, and I saw that about 100 people were in it, and they had been networking with each other, introducing themselves, and talking about support and jobs before I was even there.
I started to raise a little bit of support, and I filled out the job survey that was posted in the group. Still, a couple things were holding me back from putting forth my best effort into these.
For one, I had applied for the project behind my parents' back, not feeling confident that I'd get accepted for undergraduate research. It took me until mid-April to finally tell them that I'd applied for and was accepted to project. On top of that, the reasons I applied were a little selfish - I wanted to live away from home and try living more independently. Not a bad motive, but I wanted that for myself more than anything.
Finally, the last roadblock - in late April, I was told that more opportunities for undergraduate positions at UNMC came up. I originally wanted to do that, so I threw my name in the hat. At that point, very little support had come in, so I didn't feel too bad about doing this. Still, it was decision time. What was I going to do?
To start, I hashed things out with Ethan, one of the SDSP project directors and a Cru staff member at UNL. That was followed by a lot of prayer and God pointing me in a certain direction. This period of time also included a halt in my support raising - in hindsight, not my smartest move.
In retrospect, I ignored a lot of God's nudges, such as the fact that everybody I gave a support letter to reacted with excitement for me. But, there were two big things that I couldn't ignore that told me that God wanted me in San Diego:
1) Support really started coming in, especially from extended family.
2) A lot of my project teammates, none of whom I knew besides the UNL students, added me as a friend on Facebook (1).
(1) Yeah. That second one might sound a little silly, but God definitely knew that I'd find it awkward to either 1) have a ton of friend requests just sitting there, 2) decline a ton of friend requests if I didn't go, or 3) accept a bunch of friend requests, not go, and not ever get to know any of them because I didn't go. God knew that I'd be fine with contacting my supporters and telling them that I'd be shredding their checks. He also knew that I'd just find it mind-numbingly weird to be in any of those three situations on Facebook, and Facebook only. I probably ignore it if I get followed by a lot of project people on Twitter. But Facebook? That was the one platform that made me pause and think. That being said, I can't help but wonder if I put too much of myself into Facebook. Then again, my Facebook account was all that my then-future project teammates knew of me, and if they were going to add me as a friend, I definitely wanted to meet them in person. Yep, God definitely knows me better than I know myself. Just thinking about the way God used Facebook to get me to go is crazy. I actually thought about this during project, as I was telling several people my story and why I ended up going on project. That's why this part wasn't in my San Diego #1 post - I hadn't even thought about it at that point. Wow, my footnotes can get insanely long. Why again did I feel the need to write like a Grantland writer when I started blogging?
I'm serious about the Facebook thing. If you didn't read that extensive footnote, basically, I was convinced to go on project by a bunch of people I didn't know. Isn't it crazy how God can work?
I re-committed to SDSP about a week before it started, so around mid-May. Still, I wasn't able to sleep for more than 3 hours a night; there was a lot of lying awake out of anxiety. I was wondering - why San Diego, anyway? I'm not big on the beach, getting lots of sun, the ocean, or crowded areas. I'm a land animal. On top of that, because of my long pause, I went into project about $1,200 short of my support goal of $3,100, and I never got a jump on the job search, while several of my teammates had already landed jobs.
But, God has been providing for me in huge ways - he won't bring you as far as he's brought you in life and blow it at the end. He has provided support, partially through an absolutely insane way during our ministry partner event - a completely different story. On another note, I'm about 95% sure I won't be able to land a job here, but who knows if God will provide a job or not. It's been too crazy a ride for me to shut any possibility off. All I can do is persevere and walk with God.
I love hearing stories about how people ended up on project. There are plenty that have twists and turns very different from mine. Others applied in December and knew they were doing this all along. In spite of that, no matter where any of us came from, we're here on the same mission. I just happen to have a better bonfire story than a lot of my teammates!
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