Heather Anderson, somewhere in the world

 

You know those cute little things you put at the end of your emails? You know, like your name, some fancy professional title, your place of work, its address, your address, your hometown, your mom’s name, your grandma’s name, and all your sixteen degrees?

I struggled for a long time, staring at a blank space, trying to come up with a signature to put at the bottom of my email.

I finally settled for simply my name and my email address. The only real things I could say at the time. I was unemployed and un-enrolled in any kind of program, or school, or even any missions trip. I was living somewhere un-permanent, so even an address or city was not really an option to add.

Nothing really to define me other than my name.

Hey world! My name is Heather. And….

Hm. Awkward.

But not really. I laughed. 

That is, until I was talking to the lady at Chase Bank. Poor lady.

 

Fast forward to when I was signed up to squad lead for this thing called the World Race. 

A week before we were about to leave the country, I realized that my debit card would be expiring half-way through the nine month trip.

I’ll call the bank and get them to send me one early. No problem, right?

False.

I was on the phone for over an hour, talking in circles with a poor connection and no solution.

The problem was that my address had been changed on my account for the international credit card I just got shipped to me. It shipped to Georgia, my home for the last year. I cannot still say what exactly the problem would be with sending me a new debit card to the same Georgia address.  But nevertheless, they would not do it, as my address up until then was always in Ohio. Something about processing for a month and verifying my identity…. Minor details. Basically I was caught in between two addresses that were both true at different times. The bank did not like that, and there were no loop holes around it. I could not get my debit card shipped to me within the seven more days I would be in the States.

I was growing frustrated. I just needed a debit card so I would have money when I travelled around the world.

Now granted, there were probably other ways that this could have been solved. My coaches could have brought my card to me at a debrief when they visited us on the field. But that was not the point. I was stuck on having this done the way I wanted it to be done. The way that proved I still had a real purpose, real value.

At the time, I did not know this. All I knew was that this frustration was building with each passing minute on the phone, and it was turning into something ugly real fast.

“If you could just tell me what your home address is, ma’am,” she insisted in her accented voice, trying to mask impatience like a polite customer service representative. Really, I was being a pain, and the problem wasn’t really her fault. It was just the way of the bank. She could only do so much to bend the rules.

“I DON’T HAVE A HOME ADDRESS!” I yelled through the tears that now brimmed my eyes. My voice broke, and she softened.

“I am sorry ma’am…” She said gently.

Moment of shame. Of realization, really.

I was not frustrated any longer because of a card. I was broken because of the place I was in.

No home base, about to leave it all. Leaving the home I was raised in all my life, Ohio. Leaving the new place I had worked to cultivate as home, the place that I had grown to love: Georgia. 

And going to…. who even knew where. Sure, I knew the countries. But as a leader, I was surrendering my life to the ways of a wanderer. My pack would be my new best friend. And the things I would acquire had to come with me wherever I moved, week to week to week. I couldn’t ‘nest,’ or set up my favorite candles and pictures wherever I went. I could have nothing shipped to me. Where would they send it? Family would look different each week. And somehow, I was supposed to find home in all of this? For nine months.

It was a lot. A lot for me, the ultimate home body. The one who attaches and adapts to rhythms and ways of life. To the people I see day after day. I love seeing my same banker, my same barista, the familiar faces at the gym, my co-workers. The familiar feel of a morning routine and the second-nature route to work or school, or home. I like finding a rhythm. But what rhythm was there to be found in scenery and surroundings that would change nearly every week? A new city, different people. Different food and different grocery stores. Unfamiliar transportation. Not just once, but countless times. While the rest of my squad would settle in and find what it meant to do life in one location for three months, I would never find that settled place in these next nine months. I would always be the visitor, the one who stays for a brief visit and then is off to another town, another city. 

I was feeling the weight of just what I had given up to follow this call on my life.

But did I really trust in the One who called me? Did I trust Him when He promised that he would take care of me, provide not only for my physical needs, but the needs of my heart as well? 

When He said He would show me what home really is, did I believe Him?

The tear in my heart testified to the fear that really held me in the tension between obedience and trust. I was obeying, because I loved Him. But to have faith in this area was actually terrifying.

So much of myself could be lost… what I had worked for and where I had once flourished could be destroyed by this leap of faith. I had no real guarantee that my heart would flourish in this lifestyle, in the way of the wanderer. It was so unfamiliar. All I had was faith in the One who had always been faithful to my heart. All I had to testify to my heart was the way that the Lord’s will for my life and my supreme satisfaction were always one and the same, even if I didn’t see it at first.

This was one of the deepest parts of my heart that the Lord was asking for.

If I gave it up, He said, He would fill it again. With something better. I had clung to my idea of what home should look like. I labored for it. But He said He would show me what a real home was, all along, really. A home that never would go away, that would never be destroyed. But a place that would last for eternity, where my heart would always be safe. It was in Him. Beyond time and beyond location, my true home had always and would always be in Him. In His love. And in this leap of faith, He said, I would soon see how sufficient He really is for my heart. 

With nothing else to accredit for my heart’s peace, no bed to call my own, no familiar rhythm of doing life every week, it truly would be Him who is my home. My security. My joy. My freedom. My peace and my rest. 

And nearly two months in, I can attest that everything my Lord said would come true, has. I have never felt more peace in the strangest of circumstances. I have found rest, family, joy, and freedom. I have found that I want for nothing. I am so taken care of, in the most unlikely of circumstances. I have slept in six beds, showered in five showers, and hauled my pack from city to city on more jam-packed chicken buses than I can count. 

It’s not been perfect. I didn’t particularly love being squished up against a very sick drunk man on the hour and a half bus ride to the city. Sometimes as I am hauling my pack around the country, I wish I brought less than 45 pounds worth of things. But even so, His grace is sufficient. Day by day, He shows me how to trust Him more. And each step I take in faith, He meets me with a glory worth more than anything I could ever hold on to. 

 

And what ever happened with my debit card, you ask? Well what do you know, as soon as I got off the phone with the Chase Bank lady, my house mentor, Bill, walked into my room with a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie (only my favorite food in the whole world). And soon after, my roommate offered to drive me to the nearest Chase bank, about an hour away, where I was able to verify my identity and get a new debit card shipped to my Georgia address in two days. (Thanks, Taylor!)

Funny how things work out when you trust the Lord.

 

Yours truly,

 

Heather Anderson,

somewhere in the world