All In

Last year, I made a promise to God that I would not turn down any opportunity that He gave me to share my testimony with people. I don't remember exactly when it was, but a year or more later, and it honestly just makes me laugh at how many opportunities He has just dropped in my lap since then.

Thanks to the beauty of the internet, I've had several occasions to send my testimony out to random strangers. My guest post for that blog I mentioned touches on my testimony. I'm getting on a plane to Texas in less than 2 months to share my story with a bunch of people I've never met.

All those are great, don't get me wrong, but what really touches me the most is when I have the opportunity to talk and share with people that I know in person. Today, it came about in the form of one of my Reformation "brothers". It started out that I was just messaging him because I was bored (and procrastinating), but very quickly, it turned into talking about God and faith and representing Christ through our actions, and then we were talking about my doctor appointment, and that led into me being able to tell him my testimony. He shared his, too, claiming it was "underwhelming", but I could see God working in his life just as he saw Him in mine. Our reactions really aren't all that important. What matters is that this is the first real conversation he (Clayton) and I have had, and it was centered around our testimonies and the Gospel.

It's amazing how you can feel God move when the first real conversation two people have is about our stories and the Gospel. @elyodnotyalc
— Mallory Jones (@_callmemal) October 13, 2013

God was moving. By the end of that conversation, we were both feeling very honored and thankful that we had just walked into an opportunity to get to know each other better and share with each other. Clayton said he "needed" this conversation, as well as my words of encouragement to keep sharing his story, as "normal" as it feels to him. In return, all I could really tell him was that this is what I love to do. I love to talk to people. I love to know their hearts, and encourage them, and let them know that they are never alone. It's to the point where sharing and talking about my testimony is actually fun for me. I don't know that I ever get more joy out of this world than when I feel I am helping people.

Conversations like the one I had with him, and later with my friend Paige, are what strengthen that curiosity in the back of my mind if the future I thought was my end goal may turn out to take a backseat to God having something completely different for me. I know that my story has changed and affected people, and as humbling as it is, that is the kind of thing that encourages me to keep telling people, even the parts that I'm ashamed of. Hearing from people what something as simple as my willingness to talk has done for them seriously makes me wonder and pray if God's plan for my future includes missions and ministry and something vastly different than the life I'd had pictured for so long. I believe that He has given me this love of talking to people and knowing and connecting with them for a reason. I'm just not sure what that reason is yet.

I don't know what my life is going to look like after college. All I know is that just as God opened up the door for me to go to Austin, and the door for me to join this Reformation class and meet brothers that have touched me, cared for me, and humbled me, if He wants me to become a public speaker and tell my story to even more people, then He'll open up that door, too.

And if He does that, I am in. I am all in. There is way too much joy to be found in telling people about the God that saved my life and my spirit again and again again for me to pass up the opportunity. This is another promise that I definitely do not regret keeping.