What I Learned About Adventure in New York

As you all know, I visited New York recently and got to see and do some amazing things. I’m looking forward to sharing a lot of photos about the trip and more details about what we did (and what we ate, cause that’s just as important ;). But for now, I wanted to write about something else that happened on this trip. A realization I had that, weirdly enough, only made me more excited about doing missions in the future.

I took this trip to New York with a friend, and we spent the first four days constantly together. But the real purpose behind my friend's visit was a special family celebration, which would be happening on Sunday. I had only tagged along to do some sight seeing. And since Sunday also happened to be the day I was flying back to Houston, that meant we would have to split up. So that Saturday night, my friend and I parted ways. She, to stay with family and get ready for the next day and me, to a hotel in Chelsea that I had booked only the night before (the story behind that is a whole different one…)

To be honest, it was a little strange to know I was going to be spending that entire Sunday on my own. Since my flight wasn’t until 6pm, that meant I’d have half the day to go to church and Central Park for a few hours (because how could I not go back to Central Park?). But even though I was slightly nervous about being on my own in an unfamiliar city, I was also kind of excited. One of the things on my 30 Before 30 bucket list is to travel somewhere on my own. And even though technically the majority of this trip had been done with a friend, the last day sort of qualified as a solo adventure. So I was excited to see what it would bring.

The thing is, this trip to New York hadn’t been exactly what I had expected. My friend and I had met some unforeseen obstacles in terms of the place where we were staying, which had created a pretty stressful situation for us on our first nights there. By Saturday, everything had been worked out. But as I stepped into the unfamiliar shower of my hotel room that night, I couldn’t help but be relieved that in only 24 hours I’d be back in my own room, away from the unfamiliar and the uncomfortable.

In that moment, I remember thinking how adventure really does come with a price. Sure, adventures look beautiful and majestic on Instagram posts. They seem effortless and relaxing in travel magazines. But the reality is that so often adventure - truly worthwhile and life-changing adventure - comes at a cost. And that cost is almost always our comfort.

On that Saturday night, it wasn’t my unfamiliar hotel room that made me uncomfortable (quite the contrary, I actually had an amazing night sleeping in that huge bed). It was just the fact that I was away from my own room. From the comfort and safety of being familiar with my surroundings and not having to exert much effort to feel at home in them. It was the lack of certainty and control that made me most uncomfortable during my trip to New York. It was those obstacles that I had to fight the greatest to conquer. And it was in those that I also had to trust God the most.

I had to trust God when we took the wrong subway train late one night. I had to trust Him when our hotel room didn’t turn out to be what we’d hoped. And I had to trust Him when booking my final room that Saturday night (it ended up being the perfect hotel in the perfect spot by the way. Cause God is just that good). And even though this was a leisure trip in one of the most industrialized cities in the world, all this just made me think of missions, and made me realize what it would be like to live out on the field every day, having to trust God for every need.

Would it be hard? Would it be uncomfortable? Would it sometimes make we wish for home so badly? Yes, yes and yes. But it would also require me to trust in God. Over and over again. Day after day. It would require a completely new kind of lifestyle. One where God would be the only guaranteed comfort and safety in my life. Risky? Scary? Dangerous? Yeah, it would be all those things. But I think it would also be amazing to live like that, with God being literally all I have.

Even now though, this is something I can put into practice. I can get uncomfortable in my daily life now, in ways that would require me to trust God completely. Maybe it’s going to serve at a homeless shelter or stepping up to lead at my church. Maybe it’s offering someone a ride somewhere, or serving my family at the expense of my plans. Getting uncomfortable is inconvenient and unpleasant but so often, it’s worth it. So worth it. Because it can lead to the greatest adventures.

#2016 #travel #christian