Hello beautiful people and welcome to my story. Please bear with me as this blog thing is all very new to me. Though I’m a hot mess living in a broken world, my prayer is that through my adventures and experiences you will see how indescribably perfect and whole the love of Christ is. The name of my blog, The Traveling Mustard Seed, was inspired by the verse Matthew 17:20

“ He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”

Though my faith feels nearly invisible at times, I am reminded that all God requires is a mustard seed because HIS strength is always enough for HIS purposes.

To kickstart I thought I would talk a little bit about why I decided to move to Brazil in the first place. In the summer of 2018, I took a two-week trip to Teresina, a city in the northeast state of Piaui. While here for mission work through my church, I had the privilege of visiting the nearby rural village of Miguel Leāo, which has a population of about one thousand people. I could write an entire book about my experiences there but to sum it up I fell in love with the hearts of the people and they have been on my mind ever since. I was especially sobered by the lack of healthcare resources for the rural populations of this country and immediately made plans to return in 2019. Fast forward to 2020 where I was going to spend the summer in Teresina and Miguel Leāo shadowing medical professionals because of my shared interest in healthcare and serving international and rural populations. A stupid pandemic decided to get in the way of those plans and by the time things opened back up it was my senior year of college. Come June 2022, I had just graduated and was planning to enter a nursing program at UT in Memphis feeling pretty content about finally having a plan. Meanwhile, my mom and friend Lauren were just getting back from a trip to Brazil and Lauren captioned her Instagram post “next time I am going to buy a one-way ticket”. It began to make the wheels of my brain turn round and round upon which I jokingly texted her and said “Wanna quit your job and move to Brazil with me?”. That Sunday I was sitting at church listening to my mom and Lauren talk about their trip and for worship that day we sang the song Fade Away about letting everything of the world fade way. And just like that I knew what my next step was going to be. I wasn’t sure how it was possibly going to all work out but couldn’t have been more sure that I would be moving to Brazil. After that Sunday every single thing that could have fallen into place did with God opening and closing doors left and right. From placing me in an imaginably perfect short term living situation with my two Christian mentors to giving us the ideal English teaching job in Teresina and everything in between, his provision was evident. I could not be more excited to build lasting relationships and experience the culture first-hand. Though I will be teaching English and doing ministry as a part of my everyday life I am confident that the people here will teach me so much more than I could even imagine bringing to the table. This has already been a reality in the few short days I have been in Teresina. To help you all get a grasp of this, I am going to share the story of a sixteen-year-old girl that lives in a city about thirty minutes from here called Timon. I met Emily the last time I came to Brazil and she immediately struck me as courageous beyond her years. Emily lives with her grandmother, Socorro, who is the missionary of the local church we encourage in this town and whose light is truly seen by all she comes in contact with. Emily walks to school every day, which is very common, and was recently robbed of her belongings while on her way one morning by two gang members looking to sell her phone for drugs. Not only does she now have to worry about how she will get school supplies before school starts after break but must also walk the same path every day praying this will not happen again. Despite these circumstances, she told me that she has no choice but to be strong because her education is that important to her and because she trusts the Lord will protect her. This is only one of many stories that puts things into perspective. I have truly had the most impactful few days already and can only imagine all the Lord is going to teach me in my time here. Thank you to everyone who has been praying for my travels! I will do another post about my time in Rio de Janeiro soon:)

Tchau!!