Jescherela Holey

I was fifteen and on an eight-hour flight over the atlantic ocean.  My mind was filled with wonder, dreams of what the next ten days held.  I had only been out of the country once before, and that had been on a vacation with my family.  This time would be different, the only family I had with me was my thirteen year old sister, the rest of my companions were adults I barely knew.  One thing held us together, and that was our love of Jesus.

We each would be assigned host families, grow in incredible ways and fall in love with the incredible people in the small town of Dohna, Germany.  Little did I know, that missions trip would still pull on my heartstrings five years later.  One girl in particular would encourage, challenge and strengthen me, not only then, but also, now.

That friend, is Jeschi.  Jeschi and I were both the same age when we met, fifteen and full of life.  We loved Jesus, we loved life and we loved living it to the fullest.

The missions team I was with spent our time restoring a small castle that served as Jeschi’s Church building.  It was beautiful, and has since grown abundantly in attendance.

When we said goodbye, I had never dreamed that one day, we would say hello again, and she would be in my country…. and now, she is.  Jeschi got offered an internship with a company in thirty minutes from where I live.  Instantly we contacted each other, and are now inseparable.

I’m so blessed by this gorgeous girl.  She is an answered prayer in so many ways.  I have been praying for Godly girl friends that are my age a lot recently.  She is that and so much more.  She challenges me, uplifts me with scripture and reminds me of my purpose in Christ.

We come from different cultures, we have different languages.  We both are worship leaders, we both are leaders in our church’s youth group.  She’s married, I’m not.  These little things make us so different from each other… and yet… so much alike.

Isn’t she gorgeous?

Her friendship has shown me that no matter how different you are, no matter what your background, language, or culture, you can still be as close as ever.  Jesus is so good to me for giving me a friend like Jeschi!  I can’t wait to see what the future holds for us both.   She’s leaving Virginia today and flying back home to Germany, but I know one day soon we will say hello again.  And who knows… maybe next time it will be in her country 🙂