I love the church that I have found here in Johnson City! It resembles the body of Christ beautifully, it perfectly paints how marriage between man and woman should be, and it fulfills the Great Commission with love and generosity. The other night we all prayed LIKE CRAZY (as usual) asking, begging, pleading, that God would make known to us what He desires for us to do. It was BEAUTIFUL! God told several people to start Bible Studies with non-believers, to join our Church, to disciple specific people, to give more in generosity, and to be baptized! Yet, I didn’t hear or feel anything….what’s wrong with me? So, I went home last night and started praying and praying and praying! Then His desires just WASHED over me to the point where I felt like I was drowning. He desires for me to become a man. Not just a man, but a man of God, a man after His own heart!
He was saying that of course I am His child! I will always be His child with whom He loves! But currently I am only a child, not a man - not a man of God. And now I have this feeling in my heart, this FLAME that I just can’t control! I desire sooooooooo much to be a man of God! Not so that I may boast in myself and look down upon those who are still just children, for God has unconditional love for all of His children! I desire nothing more than to be obedient to God, and He is telling me it is time to climb the mountain with my hands wide open, to hold on to nothing, to see the promised land, and become a man of God! I want the armor of the spirit so that I may descend from the mountain into that valley that is blanketed in death and dry bones unafraid, for we have already won! I desire to be a man of God so that He may use me to raise these dry bones! I desire to be a man of God so that all glory goes to Him!
I desire to be a man of God for the possibility of a wife! I know I am only 21, but I desire to be a man that grows with his wife in the Lord, not a man that holds her back…that is no man. I desire to be a man whose marriage truly symbolizes the relationship Christ will one day have with us! With complete joy, passion, contentment, respect, faith, generosity, and above all love. I desire to be a man of God so that even if I do not get married I may realize that I do not need sex in order to experience perfect love, His Love! I desire to be a man of God so that my friends, family, and other loved ones may come to know Him as well.
I need you to understand how difficult this is for me to write. I am admitting that I am still a child, not something I really enjoy admitting. Now I will have to be VERY disciplined in my walk with Him. So I beg my brothers and sisters in Christ to call me out when I do not uphold His will; again, being called out is not something I enjoy. I feel like I just threw my pride into a burning furnace; yet, I feel so content right now. God tells us that no one enjoys being disciplined, but when it’s over it is SOOO worth it! Again, not easy for me to write…
So I BEG of you to be praying for me as God works in my heart! Pray for the World Race for I believe this will be a HUGE tool that will forever define me as a man of God. Pray that I am beyond obedient and active in the will of God instead of being passive before the Race. Every day is a mission. Pray that I abide in His love, mercy, grace, and faith- that I abide in our Dad, so that I may have His heart! It is time that I become a man of God, so pray.
As you know by now my name is Grayson Fleetwood and I leave for the World Race in about 4 months. . . hahaha 4 MONTHS!!! However, before I leave God continues to wreck my life in ways that constantly blow my mind! Recently, I just got done working at SOS (Service Over Self) in Binghampton, TN which is a non-profit that specializes in urban home repairs in the inner city of Memphis- Binghampton.
God blessed me with an amazing team from the University of North Carolina, and an amazing homeowner Tim Moore. God used this group of people to just humble me so much with their stories, their sincere relationship with our homeowner Tim Moore, their unbelievable desire to serve Him at any cost, their love for everyone they met, and most of all their humility. There was no upper class or lower class during this week, just a community of God that suffered together, laughed together, worked together, and loved together.
This past week God humbled me and I love being humbled!!! In Psalm 25 it says that God reveals Himself to those who are humble. Proverbs 29 talks about how honor will uphold the humble in Spirit!
Matthew 23:12 reads,“And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.”
It just goes on and on and on about how God only reveals himself to the humble, and I just read in Luke 10:23 that the only things we know about God are the things He reveals to us! So in a nut shell I have earnestly been praying that God humbles me beyond belief so that He will reveal Himself to me in ways I never thought imaginable.
Hahahaha, and let me tell you He has been answering this prayer. So here I go, the point of this blog, the reason why I will need your prayer, the reason why my family will think I am absolutely crazy! God has put it on my heart to go on the World Race with more or less nothing…yup, nothing. As I prayed for humility God gave me the passages Luke 9:3-6 and 10:4 that illustrate how Christ sent people out saying “take no purse, bag, sandals, etc!” And, well, that’s what I am doing.
Before you call me INSANE, just hear me out. I will bring things with me don’t get me wrong. As I pray like crazy God is revealing to me the things I need to bring. I so far feel led to bring my chrome back pack that will have just enough room for my laptop, a few clothes, a Bible, toothbrush, camera, a liner, and that’s about it. No hiking backpack, no tent, no sleeping bag, no sleeping pad, no extra clothes, no souvenirs, no food, no extra shoes, etc. Just me, one little bag, my teammates, and above all God for an entire year.
I will have no choice but to completely rely on God which will radically humble me! I GREATLY emphasizes that I am not doing this to prove a point, I am not doing this to boast in myself (Ephesians 2:8-9), and I am not doing this to test the Lord (Luke 4:12). By no means am I telling my teammates to do this, He has put this on my heart and as far as I know not theirs! I am doing this so that I may radically grow in God, so that He gets all the glory as people see how He provides, and because I desire to obey what He puts on my heart. Also, I will truly be able to relate to my brothers and sisters around the world which will help them receive the hope and love of Christ. So many doors will open that will allow me to graciously glorify God in ways that won't be possible if I have 50 pounds of gear. There is so much more I can say, but this blog is long enough and I know my God will provide. I am beyond content with this. Instead of spending so much time freaking out about what gear I should buy I can now spend that time abiding in God before I leave. I just ask all of you to pray for humility, for discernment, and pray that I trust in God.
This song has nothing to do with this blog, I just love Lecrae and this song rocks so enjoy. Sorry if you don't enjoy rap....
So if you see the blog below this one about me waxing my legs and you are wondering where is the video of it so we can all laugh at your pain, I tell you no worries, I waxed my legs and the video will be up shortly. However, before I upload the video I have an amazing story to tell ALL of you about God’s craziness.
In the past two weeks I have recently been getting involved with an amazing group of people who all attend the same house church and who all love to spend their time at the John Sevier Center in downtown Johnson City. What is the John Sevier Center you may ask? From my experience and explanations that have been given to me it is basically an old hotel that is now a like a halfway house where the mentally and physically disabled live. These people are given checks by the government through a complicated process that I do not understand; regardless, to put it lightly these people are very much alone and they desire relationships, or better yet- Love. So, this awesome house church has been cooking meals every Sunday delivering them door to door to the residents of John Sevier for about four years now. While delivering the meals we talk with them, laugh with them, cry with them, pray for them, and love on them through Christ. Even though I’ve only been involved for two weeks these two weeks have been miraculous!
The first week I was there I met this crazy dude by the name of Andy. I, along with my new friend Ethan, knocked on Andy’s door only to hear an EXTREMELY loud, rusty, and worn out “HELLO?! WHO THE CRAP IS AT MY DOOR?!” “It’s me, remember its Sunday? We are here with a lunch for you Andy, could you let us in?” responded Ethan. When the door opened it was not at all how I expected this man to look. He was definitely an older man with crazy grey hair and a long beard stretching down to his chest. He had tattoos on his arms and was in a wheelchair for he had but one leg. Still, what stood out to me the most was his skin, the blistering red skin covered in white looking scales that blanketed his entire body.
See, Andy has had this terrible skin rash/disease for over a month now that is incredibly painful and it drives him absolutely insane! To make matters worse the doctors said that it was incurable and the best he can do is put cream all over his body in order to slightly relieve the pain for an hour or so. Even worse! Andy was done, I mean done with life. He was so miserable he kept telling us that he just wanted to die and go home to God, that life was over for him, that there was no more hope. Ethan and I mourned with him and prayed for him so that he may find some sort of peace.
All day he was on mine and Ethan’s mind, and so we along with several other men prayed for Andy later that night at the house church.
Dear Lord, we pray for our brother Andy. That you may touch him and heal not only his skin but his heart. Reveal to him that you still love him and desire for him to spread your kingdom. Just heal him so that all glory may go to you. May this healing take place so that Andy may rejoice and abide in you Lord. Amen.
Right then I don’t know how to explain it but I just heard “He is healed. Do not worry Andy will be fine.” I was very unsure of what I just heard, but then it came again, “Yes, Andy is fine. Do not worry.”
I kept this to myself for I was thinking I was just crazy. Later that night I prayed for Andy again and there was that voice again! “I told you Andy was healed! Do not pray for healing but for thanks. The deed is done now rejoice!” So I told Bill, the pastor of the house church, that we must go see Andy next Sunday and explained to him why!
I prayed all week that I may run into Andy at the John Sevier Center next Sunday. So, today, which is Sunday, we walked over there with numerous lunches and all I could think about is how I hope to see Andy. Hahaha, right when we walked through the front door of the John Sevier Center we noticed there was a circle of people around someone. It was Andy!!! He trimmed up his beard and hair and had this HUGE smile on his face as everyone looked at him, at the miracle that was in front of their eyes. . . the incurable skin disease was gone! Just gone, no more, CURED! Do you get it?! God cured something incurable, God did the impossible, and He let us partake in such a loving miracle! Hahahaha, I'm just laughing at how crazy God is!
Andy is an entirely new person. He now glorifies God with every breath, he is so happy to be alive, he loves everyone, and he is now ministering to me. Prayer is powerful. This is just a glimpse of how God will use us on the World Race and I am super stoked. I truly don’t know what else to say but praise the Lord.
"I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it."
John 14:12-14
If the title of this blog intrigued you don’t worry, all will be explained through the video below. Now, I made this video because preparing for the World Race is just so much fun and exciting, so I decided why not have some fun with this blog and allow all of you to have some fun with me. So, if you feel like making a generous donation (which I hope you will after watching the video) just go to the “Support Me” link button on the left of my blog, and if you would like to send in a check instead just let me know and I can give you all the information. Also, if you are just now checking out this blog and are unsure of what the World Race is just scroll down and read some previous blogs to understand better what it is I am doing, or you could just ask me. Nonetheless, I would like to thank all of you who are supporting me and my team through prayers and donations, you guys are amazing! So with no further delay, enjoy the video.
A passion of mine would have to be reading, I love reading everything from Harry Potter to Dostoevsky, experiencing the occasional nostalgic feeling as I flip through the pages of Go Dog Go, and of course His Word. This might possibly be why I enjoy my major so much, being “forced” to read about three books a week only to look forward to analyzing the beauty behind every word. Thinking thoughts I never thought I would ever think.
Thankfully, over these couple of days of Thanksgiving break I able to read a book and not have to write a paper by a certain day, a book I picked myself; Through Painted Deserts by Donald Miller. I absolutely love this man’s writing; I love Blue Like Jazz and A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. So I figured I would read another one of his books, easy to read and yet so powerful. Needless to say, it only took the “Author’s note” at the front of the book to capture my mind in the same way God has captured my heart. So, below is an excerpt from this book, the excerpt that got me thinking about that word.
“I bought the lie that academic life had to be separate from relational experience, as though God only wanted us to learn cognitive ideas, as if the heart of man were only created to resonate with movies. No, life cannot be understood flat on a page. It has to be lived; a person has to get out of his head, has to fall in love, has to memorize poems, has to jump off bridges into rivers, has to stand in an empty desert and whisper sonnets under his breath.
It’s a living book, this life; it folds out in a million settings, casting with a billion beautiful characters, and it is almost over for you. It doesn’t matter how old you are; it is coming to a close quickly, and soon the credits will roll and all your friends will fold out of your funeral and drive back to their homes in cold and still silence. And they will make a fire and pour some wine and think about how you once were. . . and feel a kind of sickness at the idea that you never again will be.
So soon you will be in that part of the book where you are holding the bulk of the pages in your left hand, and only the thin wisp of the story in your right. You will know by the page count, not by the narrative, that the Author is wrapping things up. You begin to mourn its ending, and want to pace yourself slowly toward its closure, knowing the last lines will speak of something beautiful, of the end of something long and earned, and you hope the thing closes out like last breaths, like whispers about how much and who the characters have come to love, and how authentic the sentiments feel when they have earned a hundred pages of qualifications
And so my prayer is that your story will have involved some leaving and some coming home, some summer and some winter, some roses blooming out like children in a play. My hope is your story will be about changing, about getting something beautiful born inside of you, about learning to love a woman or man, about learning to love a child, about moving yourself around water, around mountains, around friends, about learning to love others more than we love ourselves, about learning oneness as way of understanding God. We got one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and the resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn’t it?
It might be time for you to go. It might be time to change, to shine out.
I want to repeat one word for you: Leave
Roll the word around on your tongue for a bit. It is a beautiful word, isn’t it? So strong and forceful, the way you have always wanted to be. And you will not be alone. You have never been alone. Don’t worry. Everything will still be here when you get back. It is you who will have changed.”
Leave. . . why am I leaving? It’s not because I am depressed, or because I am having a crisis in my life, and not because I am trying to escape something or someone. If anything I am very happy with where I am, I love my school, my classes, my friends, my family. . . I am very comfortable.
Comfort…hmmm, I am not sure if Christ every said, “The storms will stop and you will be comfortable if you follow me.” Sure my faith is strong in Him, but how easy it is to have faith when you have all you desire, when your weekly sacrifice for God is going to church instead of watching football, when you are comfortable; how easy. Even the Devil recognizes this in the book of Job. Maybe that’s why the least are the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Love, I go for love, for the cross, to bring Him glory. I am not the older brother for my motive is not the reward, I am so madly in love and people do the craziest things for the ones they love. My desires and dreams are NOT a 40 hour work week, are NOT based on money, and are especially NOT built around my comfort. My dreams and desires are His desires, the desires He has placed on my heart, and His desire is that all glory be brought to Him through love and worship from all people of all nations.
I AM SUPER EXCITED ABOUT THE WORLD RACE! I feel like this is an obvious statement, so I decided to make a video about a couple of things I am pretty pumped about! ALSO, this video is an experiment to see what what happens to me when I don't shower for 5 days and wear the same clothes for 4 days (preparing for the World Race!!) Thanks for taking your time to check this out!
I would like to thank my brother Eli for putting this video thogether for me.
Welcome to my World Race blog!!!!! First off, I would truly like to thank you for coming to this blog and helping me take on this beautiful endevor. Secondly, I understand you are busy so this blog post about the World Race will be summarized some, so if you have any more questions please feel free to contact me.
So, what is the World Race you may be asking? The World Race is a year-long mission to 11 different countries in 11 months; a month per country. I will serve as missionary through an organization, Adventures in Missions (AIM), in their World Race program. I will be going with a team of about 40 people spreading the hope and love of Christ to India, Nepal, Thailand, Challenge: Asia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, Latvia, and Estonia/Lithuania.
Through adventure, ministry, community, and self-discovery, World Racers develop broken hearts that propel their hands to act for God’s kingdom around the globe. On the World Race, my team and I will serve in partnership with churches and ministries in local communities to preach the Gospel, plant churches, work in orphanages, minister to women and children who are trapped in prostitution as a result of human trafficking, and bring the restoration and hope of the Father’s love to many tribes and nations.
As I am planning and praying for this trip, I understand how blessed we are to live in a country that the knowledge of Christ is everywhere. This realization reminds me that we are blessed for a reason and given a great responsibility- to share with others. That is why I have such a strong desire to travel to places where poverty and spiritual darkness abound. In Christ we have found a love that brings light to darkness, meets the needs of the poor, and brings abundant joy. I desire to share this overflowing joy to all Nations.
I realize that while God calls us to “make disciples”, not everyone is capable of leaving the country for short or long-term trips such as this. I also realize how important it is for different members of the body of Christ to join together to complete tasks such as this one. Therefore, I ask something of extreme importance from everyone; that you pray for me, my fellow Racers, and all the nations we will be traveling to. Pray that hearts may be moved, that hope may spread across the world, and that all glory is brought to God. I also ask that you prayerfully consider supporting me financially. Every little bit helps! I trully mean that, five dollars can go a long way. So, if after prayer you feel lead to support me financialy, you can click on the "Support Me!" link on the left of the page and make a donation.
Thank you again for all of the support, encouragement, and prayers. I look forward to having you on my team. I would also love to have you follow me on my blog so that you may continue to pray as we racers go to each country. I will keep you informed of what God is doing in and through me and others from the World Race as we bring the good news of Christ to the people of all nations.
