Set Your Life on Fire

      "Our willingness to wait reveals the value we place on what we're waiting for..."-Charles Stanley

      It seems that I have spent the majority of the last few months in anticipation. I decided to apply for Young Adults in Global Mission (YAGM) in early October, but the application wasn't available until December 1st, so I had to wait until then to apply. I applied on December 1st, and got my references lined up, and then I had two interviews. One in the middle of January with an alumna of Young Adults in Global Mission, her name was Kelly Bergman, and then at the end of January I had an interview with the Program Director of Young Adults in Global Mission, Julie Rossate.

         I felt like both interviews went really well, but I also knew that I was probably up against between 150-200 applicants, and that about half of those would be accepted, and I was pretty sure that I wasn't going to get chosen. One of my friends though, was an eternal optimist every step of the way, thank you Bree Wallace! I was told that whether or not I was accepted into the program that I would be notified between the middle and end of March.  So then there were a lot of weeks of waiting, and waiting and waiting, and doubting that I would be accepted, and Bree telling me that of course I would be accepted, and just continuing on in that cycle for weeks.

       On Thursday, March 23rd, I got the e-mail. I said "Dear Jasmine, we are pleased to invite you to Woodstock, Illinois for the Discernment, Interview, Placement (DIP) Event April 20th-23rd." Or some variation of that, I can't remember the exact wording at the moment. In the e-mail it said that I would be interviewing with Jerusalem/West Bank and also The United Kingdom. So I had been accepted to continue on in the process, so I was excited about that, because it meant that I was most likely going to end up getting a placement, but the e-mail also said that there was a small chance that I would end up not getting a placement, so, me being me, I prepared myself for that possibility.

      So my flight left at 6:14 a.m. on April 20th, so Bree, rock star that she is, drove me to the airport at 4:00 a.m. I got to the airport in Chicago at 12:30 p.m. Chicago time, had lunch at McDonald's in the airport, got confused for a moment by the price of my food, because I have lived in Montana for most of my life and I always forget that other states have sales tax, and then I found my way to the Bus/Shuttle area of the airport, because that was where the buses were picking up me and the other people participating in YAGM to take us to Woodstock, Illinois. Also, Woodstock, Illinois, is not the location of the music festival thing that happened in 1969. That was in New York. We got to Woodstock at about 5 p.m., had introductions, had dinner, checked into our rooms, had a welcoming ceremony,  had worship and then the rest of the night was free. My roommate, Danielle, was interviewing with the same countries that I was, so that was cool.

    Friday morning started out with breakfast, then devotions, then a presentation on what YAGM was all about, and then I had to go to the country presentation on The United Kingdom, where I learned about the program in The United Kingdom. Then we had lunch, and then I went to the country program on Jerusalem/West Bank. The alums of YAGM talked about their experiences with YAGM, and the interviews started. Everyone had different interview slots, so we had a lot of downtime when we didn't have interviews. My first interview was with The United Kingdom at 4:00 on Friday afternoon, and I thought it went pretty well. We had dinner on Friday night with our country coordinators if we hadn't interviewed with them, so Danielle and I and a few other people had dinner with Josh, who is one of the country coordinators for the Young Adults in Global Mission in the UK, because that was the night everyone had dinner with one country coordinator or another,  and then I had to get my picture taken at 8:32, then we had Prayer around the Cross, and then the rest of the evening was pretty free.

    Saturday morning started out with breakfast, and I had my interview with Jerusalem/West Bank at 10:00. I thought that went pretty well, then we had a session on raising support, and then we had lunch with country coordinators, and I had lunch with Colin, one of the country coordinators of Jerusalem/West Bank,  then the rest of the day was spent on other people finishing up interviews and getting pictures taken, learning how to set up a fundraising page on the YAGM website, then learning about the specifics of paperwork that we would have to do for applying for a visa and such, then we had dinner, and I was invited to a special dinner for participants that identify as people of color, then at 7 Pastor Rafael Malpica Padilla, who is the Executive Director of Global Mission in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, talked to us about Accompaniment and Mission. After that, we had to turn in our comment cards, which we had been asked to fill out with our names, the countries that we interviewed with, and anything that we wanted the YAGM staff and the country coordinators to consider while they were in their meeting to decide where each of us was going to be placed. I simply wrote that there were things that excited me about both country programs, and things that made me nervous about each country program, but that I would be equally thrilled with either program, and that I was leaving it up to God, and to them. We were told that in the event that they decided to not give someone a placement, that person would be notified sometime on Saturday night. The YAGM staff and the country coordinators went into their meeting, and the rest of us had worship. We then had free time, so I went to check out the bonfire for a little bit, and then spent most of Saturday night hoping that no one would come to find me to tell me that I wasn't getting a placement.

     I woke up pretty excited on Sunday morning, because no one had come to find me on Saturday night, so I knew that I was getting a placement. We had worship, then we had breakfast, we packed up, did a group photo, then at 11:00 a.m., we had our placement announcements. They announced us in alphabetical order by last name, so I was second, and when they said "Jasmine Allen-United Kingdom", I was thrilled, and ecstatic, and every other good feeling. My roommate Danielle also got placed in The United Kingdom. Then we had boxed lunches that we took to our country meetings where we got more information about our placements, and then we got on buses back to the airport. I then spent about 4 hours hanging out in the airport and calling people and updating people on Facebook, and then I got on the plane, and landed in Kalispell at a little before midnight, and then Bree picked me up at the airport and took me home.

      So now, I am fundraising, my grandma made a quilt that we are selling raffle tickets for, and I have a fundraising page through YAGM, and I have some other fundraising ideas up my sleeve as well. I will be finding out my specific site placement within the next few weeks, but I will definitely be somewhere in England, Scotland, or Wales. So wish me luck on this next adventure, and if you would like to support the cause, feel free to do so, the link is posted below 😊

Help Me Get to The United Kingdom!