It's so surreal, but this season on the World Race is officially winding down. As of right now, I will be home and in my bed in one week. I've been to 12 countries and been gone for about 11 months. In some ways it feels like an eternity ago since I was at home and in other ways like it was just yesterday.  I promise that the World Race is truly some sort of time warp. 

 With the reality that this race is coming to an end very soon, I am feeling a whole slew of bittersweet emotions. I am so excited about coming home, I can hardly stand it! I can't wait to see my family and play with my niece (who is an extremely different little girl from when I left), sleep in my own bed, eat some good food, have some real sweet tea, have some alone time, and take the next step in what the Lord has for me (the World Race is truly on the beginning and a mere step). I fully believe that the Lord prepares you to move out of a season and into a new one, and in my heart I'm excited about this new season that is ahead.

And while I'm feeling this excitement, I know that I am going to miss these O squaders that I've called family for the last year desperately once I make back to the states. It's funny to remember back to training camp when I was first meeting this group, and I couldn't even dream of the possibility that I would love every single one of them as much as I do right now.

Thank you so much for all your prayers this year. I covet them. I would ask that even as I come home, that you would continue to partner with me in this way. I've heard the re-entry process can be a tough one. So  I ask for your prayers for readjusting and strength and boldness to walk out at home what I've learned this year, as well as, asking the Lord what's next for me. 

What's next for me????  That's a great question! At this point I'm not sure. My plan as of right now is to come home and give myself time for my body to heal, to process what all just happened in the last year, and to pray into what the next step is for me. So as of right now I will be home at listening to what the Lord has to say about this next season.

Tomorrow I will be heading to Antigua, Guatemala for O squad's last hurrah, final debrief! It will be a time for us to talk about and celebrate what the Lord has done in and through us this year, not to mention just have some fun and spend time with each other! 

Can't wait to see ya'll, oh so soon!

LOVE YOU!

Tyler

PS. Big shout out to all my supporters. I absolutely couldn't have gone or made it all the way through the World Race if it wasn't for your sacrifices. Thank you for all the prayer and monetary support. There is no way for me to convey to you how your contributions have changed me and countless others. I wish there was some way for me to reward or thank you besides these words. But I know Jesus is going to reward you far better than I ever could!!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!! And if you want to get together when I get back to catch up let me know...

This is just a quick updating letting you know what I've been up to over the last two months:

Nicaragua

   In Nicaragua, my team along with a couple other teams had the opportunity to work in Jinotepe. We worked with Glenn and Lynne, who were awesome. We also got to stay at Casa Mateo, a nice hotel that they run. As far as actual ministry goes we were all over the place.  Here are a few of the things that we got to do last month.  We got to visit a senior center and love on the elderly who for the most part are neglected by their families.  We got to go to a school for children with disabilities, for the most part we just played games and hung out with those awesome kiddos. We also went to the hospital and got to pray for the sick. Also, one of my favorite parts of the month happened at the hospital. One day during our visits we were in the children's ward and we met a little girl named Avilla. She was in for some stomach pains, but she seemed seemingly fine. She was hoot, man did that little girl have a personality. After playing with her for like 10 minutes this little 3 year old took me by the hand and led me around the hospital for like 35 or 40 minutes. We had a ball. I saw all kinds of parts of that hospital. All the time she was calling me "Hermano( or brother)." The rest of our ministry consisted of visiting two different neighborhoods and helping out with some church services.   In the neighborhoods we would go and just talk to the people that were hanging around, play soccer, pass out food, it was sweet to even see a few people come to the Lord during some of our house visits. We also had the opportunity to work with two teams of Real Life girls.   Real Life is a sister program of the World Race that is also through Adventures In Missions, and it is for college age students and they go to one location for like 3 or 4 months. These ladies were super legit, we loved having them around. Also, probably one of the craziest travel moments on the race, was when we fit 19 people in a normal pick-up truck as went down some extremely bad quality dirt roads (sorry mom!).   The weather was also beautiful. The city that we stayed in is known for its winds. I would say there was a constant wind of at least 20 mph. What a blessing that was. As the rest of our teams burnt up, we were enjoying some really sweet weather. I Loved Nicaragua!

El Salvador

As we drove into San Salvador, I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing.   It looked like a normal American city. The roads lined with malls and fast food restaurants. After leaving Nicaragua which is one of the poorer countries in Central America, we arrived in El Salvador which has one of the better economies.  This month we have been working with a church in San Vicente, which is about an hour east of San Salvador.  Our main ministry this month has been to help out with some evangelism campaigns that have been happening in some surrounding towns. That generally looks like us going and passing out fliers and telling people about the campaign before it begins, doing dramas, and then praying for people at the end of the service. One cool thing that happened is that we went to one church to do a drama; we knew it was a large church, but we did not expect to find TV crews their filming the church service. We were definitely on TV in El Salvador. At the campaigns we have seen some sweet stuff happen , such as people getting saved and healed. I also had the opportunity to preach at a youth service earlier this month. I thought about just using a sermon that I had done in Africa a few times, but as I began to pray about it the Lord just kept saying speak on my love and share the gospel. So although my thoughts were very scattered that's exactly what I planned to do. As I entered the service, there wasn't a ton of youth there. I would say 20 or 25 max, with probably about that many adults. Immediately, I start thinking about going back to the already written sermon. And then the Lord spoke clearly, " stay true to what I've already told you to say." And that was that. I got up there and spoke on love and shared the gospel. I can assure you that it wasn't eloquent, in fact I felt scattered. If you didn't know this about me, public speaking is not my thing. But I did it. Lesson learned, stay true to what the Lord says even when it makes no sense in your natural mind. Trust me, he will use it!!!   So ministry will wrap up here in the next couple of days and we will be headed to our last country---Guatemala.   My team will be in Puerto Barrios which is on the northern coast across from Belize. Not really too sure what we will be doing, but when do we ever?  

Hopefully this gives you a little insight into what's been going on.

Love you all and Look forward to seeing your faces soon!!!!!

tyler

    It's hard to believe that we are done with our 3^rd continent.   But as of today we are packing up and heading out.   Here is a quick recap of this month and some other housekeeping things you should know. 

So this last month we have been back in Chiang Mai, Thailand working with Lighthouse in Action.   We have spent the month going into the bars and befriending not only the women who work there, but also the many tourists who frequent the bars. It has been a sweet but hard month. For me the ministry was really difficult either I would be going out to bars(which make me uncomfortable) or talking to strangers (which makes me uncomfortable) or staying up while others from my team were out in the bars interceding (which was hard because if you know me, staying up till 1 or 2 am is hard anyways, much less trying to stay focused and pray). With all that said it was sweet to be able to lavish the broken people who work in the bars and roam the streets with the unfailing love of Jesus.   One thing I learned this month as that the people who are here involved in the sex industry, whether working or as a client, are just people like you and me, who are searching for love and hope. People who have no other way to make money.   The sex trade isn't quite as "in your face" as in other parts of the country, but the atmosphere is still heavy and there is some horrific things going on. With said it was honor to be able to go into the bars this month and shine light of Jesus. We had many people confused, because of the way we acted and interacted with one another and the people in the bars. The love of Jesus is confusing and mind boggling sometimes isn't it??? 

So today we are headed out on our most intense travel dayS of the race.   We will be flying from Chiang Mai > Bangkok > Tokyo > LA > Miami > Managua then a bus to Jinotepe ( where my team will be working with a New Life Youth Center). Probably the best part about this travel is that we have a 12 hour layover in LA and my cousin Kassie and her husband Trent are going to come up from San Diego so that we can hang out for most of the day. I am soooooooo pumped to see some family. 

So this month we got some big news, our travel home info. Our last day on the field is.......drum roll... May 12^th. I should arrive at RDU at about 9pm that evening. It's kind of crazy to think about.

BIG THANKS!!!! I can't over emphasize how much I cherish all of the prayers that are being said for me and my squad.  Every time I talk to my parents they are telling me of people they have talked to who have asked about me and are praying for me. Oh what a blessing this has been.  I can truly say, I have felt covered from the time I have left until now. Thank you for not only sowing into my life and my ministry financially, but sowing in prayer is well. From the bottom of my heart THANK YOU, THANK YOU , THANK YOU!!!!!! Please keep them coming..... and if you have anything that I can pray for you for please send your prayer requests my way.

I love you all so much and can't wait to see you face to face!!!!!!!!

                                                                                                                                                Tyler

PS. Don't be afraid to ask questions, It's hard to sum up my life in a blog, but I would love to answer anything you would like to know!!!

There has been a long silence on my blog over the last couple of months, which could have left you with some questions such as, where I am, how's the new team, how's my health etc.  Hopefully this blog will answer some of these questions. Sorry if it's a little long.  Grab some popcorn and a drink and catch up on my life.

Leadership/ Team Roar

            After spending November in Tanzania our squad met up in Nairobi, Kenya for 5 days for debrief.  If you ever want to go to Kenya, go in December the weather was absolutely gorgeous. We spent our 5 days worshipping, spending time as a squad, meeting with our teams, getting refreshed after 3 months in Africa,  getting refocused, and one of the main events was team changes.  We found out about a week before debrief started that our teams were changing yet again.  Instead of being devastated at the news as I was at the first team change, I was actually kind of excited.  I love team Shekinah sooo much, but I knew if the Lord gave me two great teams, He was obviously going to do it again.  I was also asked to be a team Leader, both for "Manistry" where all the men are together for the month and for the remainder of the race.  This isn't a promotion, but an increase in responsibility.  I think a place where the Lord has the last couple months, and will for the next few months continue to grow me and teach me to lead as He leads.  So Team Roar is Chad Riley, Logan Kaynes, Alissa Rich, Anna Matthews, Jennifer Miele, Sydney Sample and Me!! These names might not mean anything to you, but this team is kind of loaded if I do say so myself.  All of these individual are ridiculously awesome on their own account.  Also if you didn't notice we have Sydney Sample on our team!!!!! What a blessing this is.  We heard Sydney would be back on the field at the beginning of January while we were in Thailand and the buzz around the squad was which team is she going to be on?  We got lucky to land her.  She is awesome and a very important part of our team/squad. I'm super blessed to have such an awesome team and look forward to pressing deeper into the Lord and bringing some kingdom with these guys.  It's going to be a sweet! 

 "Manistry"/Thailand

                Last month was our long awaited "manistry" month.  This is where all the  men of the squad got to come together to serve and fellowship as men.  We had the pleasure of working in Chiang Mai with Remember Nhu (who is undoubtedly my favorite organization that I've worked with on the race thus far).  Remember Nhu takes in girls who are in high risk of being trafficked and sold into prostitution.  The girls range from 5 years old all the way to high school.  Our ministry was to do manual labor during the days and then hang out with the girls in the evenings.  We would generally play, eat dinner, maybe do some homework, and then play some more.  Those little girls shine the joy of the Lord on their faces.  It was such a blessing to get to be there.  And if that wasn't enough Ron and Peggy Roloff (parents of Matt Roloff from little people big world) were our host.  They kept us fed well and are just fun to be around. I am absolutely in love with Thailand!  A few of the things I love about Thailand are the food, the people, the girls at Remember Nhu, I got to ride an elephant and a bamboo raft down a river, they have ice( a big deal after being in Africa for 3 months), the culture in general, the night markets, the King- he's a great man, the 7-11's on every corner, and soooooooo much more!! Recommendation if you ever have a chance to go to the "Land of Smiles" jump on it quickly, you won't regret it. Undoubtedly on of my favorite months on the race thus far!!!

Health

  While in Thailand, I started to notice these bumps that we're starting to form under my left arm pit.  Honestly didn't really think much about.  I just thought they were pimples.  I have never had pimples under my arm pit, but well, it's the world race, things show up that you have never seen or would never expect to happen at home.  So we arrive in Cambodia just before the new year, and the bumps are not only still there, they are spreading.  At this point they are big, sore, and oozing infection.  After 4 or 5 days (Yes it took me that long, I might be somewhat slow) I realized that they were not pimples and that something was not right.  So luckily I have an awesome woman on my team named Alissa Rich who also just happens to be a nurse.  After lunch on Jan. 5 (my dad's 50^th birthday) Alissa took a look at my arm pit.  As she began to look at it she legitimately seemed concerned.  So I asked," On a scale with 1 being low and 10 being highest, how concerning is this?"  She responded with an answer of ,"7."  I was somewhat taken back.  What I thought was no big deal, was now pretty concerning to a registered nurse.  I thought a 10 would mean you can go ahead and buy my casket and she ranked it a seven.  She clarified saying that her answer was taking Cambodian health care in to mind.  Our contact in Thailand told us that Cambodian health care was horrible and that if anything happened you might as well come back to Thailand to get it done.  So with many infectious abscesses on my under arm we decided to make a break for Phnom Penh (the capital) the next day to try and find a decent doctor.  The Lord is sooooo good.  One of my friends on the squad had been in Phnom Penh for a few days already and had seen a doctor that he said was pretty legitimate.  He said that it was very western.  At this point, this sounded like my best option.  So me and Aly Beeler ( squad leader, ER nurse, and my team leader on Jubilee) headed to the doctor.  As we walked in the front doors I felt like I was in some kind of portal.  It literally felt like I was in the doctor's office in the states, praise Jesus.  So I went in and got looked at, and immediately the doctor said that they were going to have to cut open the abcesses and get all the infection out.  But before they could do that I got to have my under arm shaved.  After I was prepped the doctor began by numbing the areas so I couldn't feel the scalpel and then proceeding to cut little incisions in each of the infected areas.   It didn't feel good, but I was sooo happy even amongst the pain that I didn't have to go back to Thailand to have this done.  After about an hour or so he was done and they bandaged me up and hooked me up to an IV for antibiotics.  I got to go back to the doctors the next 2 days in a row as well for another IV and to get re-bandaged.  The doctor told me that I had a good wound and that I was healing up nicely.  So he told me I could stop coming everyday and come back in a week.  After a week of oral antibiotics and keeping the incisions clean, I returned to the doctor for a follow up.  He gave me a big thumbs up and Cambodian smile and said that it looked good.  "No more infection." Amen! It's still a little bruised, but I'm good to go!!

 So on Thursday I will head to Siem Reap to have debrief with the whole squad, it's going to be a blast, I'm kind of pumped about that.  After debrief, we will start our "ask the Lord" month.  After much deliberation my team, as well as, another team will be headed back to Chiang Mai where I spent my month in Thailand.   We will work with a ministry called Lighthouse, where we go into bars and love on the prostitutes and their clients and during the days work in a coffee shop.  We will also have the opportunity to visit our wonderful contacts and girls at Remember Nhu.  I couldn't be more excited.  I'm healthy and ready to finish the "race" strong!  Thanks for all the prayers, they are greatly appreciated!

              Love You all!!!

                        Tyler

 

 Greetings from Busia, Kenya!! We have been here now for a couple of weeks and have settled in nicely.  Pastor Gideon, Pastor Steve and Busia Deliverance Church have welcomed Team Shekinah(my new team's name) and Team Redemption in for the month and are treating us like family. 

      So far the ministry has consisted mostly of doing church services for different area churches and doing door to door evangelism.  At first neither of these seemed like something I would enjoy.  If you know me, standing up in front of a large crowd or going into someone's house and sharing the gospel, were not things that I would generally do or most likely enjoy.  However, being here in Busia has really taught me to embrace both of these, and actually start to somewhat enjoy them.  Take door to door evangelism for example, just this last couple of days we were out visiting houses.  It sounds like it could be awkward or weird.  I mean what am I going to say to these people, the Lord knows I am not a man of eloquence.  But the Lord is teaching me and showing me that He just asks us to be faithful and speak the truth of who He is and what He has done.  Salvation isn't dependent on me, Thank goodness!!!  I don't have to come in with persuasive words of human wisdom.  All I have to do is be dependent upon His Spirit and let Him do the work.  I have seen on quite a few occasions where we go in and share the gospel, and without hesitation they want to accept Jesus as their Savior.  What a sweet experience it is to witness people coming to know Jesus.  Salvation, I am convinced, is the greatest miracle of all.   We serve a God who is overwhelmingly good!  He has also being giving me peace as I stand up in front of congregations.  This past week I got the opportunity to preach on the Nearness of God,  how in the beginning God was with His people in the garden, and in the end God is coming back to dwell with His people.  Nothing can stop that not even sin.  He sent His Son to conquer sin and death so there would no longer be separation between us and Him. What great Love is this, that would drive the God of the universe to desire to be near me.  It has always been His desire and plan to be with you!!! Isn't that a glorious thought?  Anyways I got up and for some reason the usual nerves that I experience weren't there.  He has started giving me peace when speaking! That might seem small, but to me it is huge.  I'm the guy who sits in the back row and tries not to get called on or called out, and now the Lord has me in the front declaring His truth.  Praise the Lord he lets us be a part of what He is doing.  I think the plan is to continue door to door evangelism and church services for the next week, as well as, we will visit the hospital and maybe a prison.  Thanks for all of the Love, Prayers and support, Keep it coming.

A few Random Thoughts

-Tropical fruit just taste better here (pineapples, bananas, etc.)

-I always know that the group I am with is being addressed when I hear the question, "How are You?" in a childlike voice.

-Internet is lightning fast......hopefully you caught the sarcasim

-Paw-Paw Bob would be proud. Right before we left Ireland, I finally finished learning the Rubik's Cube, and solved it successfully.  Big shout out to Jenny Hill for taking the time to teach me.  Hopefully I won't forget it.

 -I thought we would be eating poorly in Africa, But Chef Lucas, who cooks us breakfast and lunch everyday, has us eating like African Kings and Queens.

-I have had the first of hand washing all my clothes, and taking bucket showers.  We get all of our water drawn by hand out of the well in the yard.