Why FCA?

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Today was the first day of school for Loudoun County Public Schools and for the first time in 8 years, I am not at Potomac Falls High School, setting rules and expectations for the year with a new group of students.  It’s a very strange feeling.  I knew it would hit me sooner or later, this big change in my life.  But to be honest, most of the summer just felt like a normal summer.  As I watched the school buses out on the roads this morning, reality set in a little more deeply.  I will really miss being in the classroom this year, getting to know a new group of 150 or so students, coaching them through the inner workings of the Unit Circle, many minor dramas, and perhaps a few major ones, along the way. 
So, if I’m getting so sentimental about not being there, why did I leave?  In a word, OBEDIENCE.  Although I made the decision to follow Christ with my life when I was eleven, I still lived much of my life following the steps to my own plan.  I’d pretty much always wanted to be a teacher.  I remember lining up my stuffed animals and dolls when I was a child and making up “math worksheets” for them to do while teaching lessons on my Fisher Price easel.  So when I started feeling a bit restless a few years ago, I tried to brush it off.  The feeling wouldn’t go away, though, so I started praying about it.  “Lord, if teaching isn’t what I’m meant to do the rest of my life, please give me some direction here!”.  I even went on a global impact trip with my church to Uganda almost two years ago, wondering if maybe the Lord was calling me into full time missions.  As amazing as that experience was, though, it only confirmed in my heart that the Lord had me in Loudoun County for a reason.  As the restlessness continued to grow, though, I wasn’t really sure what that purpose was.
Fast forward around nine months, to the fall of 2015.  I was at a Potomac Falls football game with my sisters and our friends, Justin and Jenny Kleiner, when they told us that they would be leaving Loudoun County at the end of the 2015-2016 school year to move back home to Central Pennsylvania.  Justin, who was working for Loudoun County FCA at the time, had felt a call to bring FCA back to the area where he grew up.  It was during that conversation that I first felt the Lord nudging me towards FCA.  Again, I tried to brush it off.  Anyone who knows me knows I have a bit of a stubborn side.  Time and time again, though, God kept bringing FCA into my focus until finally, in January of this past year, I set up a day to do a “ride along” with Justin, as I wasn’t even really sure what his day to day job looked like.  I had no idea why I was even shadowing Justin that day, but we met with a few volunteers, donors, and coaches before returning to the Loudoun office.  That was when Derrick Ellison, multi-area director, told me about a new women’s ministry role they were praying about for Loudoun County.  Even though it took me another two months to say yes, looking back, I knew as soon as I heard about the role that this was the change I’d been praying about.  It combined my love of sports and my heart for Loudoun County students with my desire to make an impact by serving the Lord. 
So, as nostalgic as I’m feeling today, and as scary as it is to step out of my comfort zone to work in ministry, I know that I am being obedient to the call the Lord has placed on my life for such a time as this.  I am so excited to get into the schools, pour into students who have a heart for the Lord and the lost in their schools, and make an impact for the Kingdom.  I still need help to get there, though, because I cannot start this new position until I am fully funded.  If you haven’t already, please consider joining my Home Team at www.loudounfca.org/donate and partner with me as I reach students in Loudoun County.  If you’re already partnering with me, thank you!  Please keep praying for God to nudge more people with a heart for students and coaches in Loudoun in my direction.  I can’t wait to keep posting here throughout the year to tell of all of the amazing things God is doing in Loudoun!

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