The infamous training camp blog. To follow suit with what all my other squad mates are doing, they are summarizing their training camp experiences. This was extremely difficult for me because how are you supposed to only share only a couple things that I learned or did within a 10 day span?! I guess I have also been putting this blog post off because I have not only been busy with my fundraiser (which I raised 3,000 dollars from! Thank you for all the support and love! God is good!) but also because I just don’t want to accept the fact that training camp is over. My heart already hurts for my brothers and sisters in Christ and for the bonds and moments shared in our little tent village.
- You are accepted as you are
This is a crazy concept because as an American culture we are always striving for acceptance or approval. It may be the way we dress, how much money we have, trying to fit into social norms, etc. But what I learned at training camp from the other 149 individuals I had the privilege of sharing living quarters with (I mean a giant tent village where there is basically no privacy and you can hear everything that is said). The love for Christ amongst us is the reason why we were able to live peacefully among each other. There were no harsh judgements or for the most part “clicks.” I mean sure there were moments that we got on each other’s nerves but because we love like Jesus loves we were able to create such a tight community filled with unity, laughs, and dance parties. I just try to imagine a world that was as unified, loving, and tight knit as the whole campus was. What would our world look like then?
- There will be hard times
Although our hard times were completely created by the staff in order to test us, there will be lessons learned from hard times. I have experienced this in my personal life that lead to the race in the first place but what I learned at camp was that misery does love company. One of the nights, the staff bused us to a local forest preserve and we were given some tarps, a couple of ropes, and some food. They told us that they would pick us up in the morning. Did I forget to mention that it was down pouring the ENTIRE night? When I say down pouring, I am actually referring to buckets upon buckets, monsoon season in the amazon forest rain. Somehow out of our misfortune, we came together and sung songs, shared testimonies, lifted each other up with shout outs, and I learned how to swing an axe. I ended up only sleeping a total of an hour that night and it was on the road with nothing but a rain jacket and shorts but I remember looking at the sky and feeling so blessed that everyone else was there with me. I thank God that no one was complaining or saying how much this experience was awful because it wasn’t, it was a gift to have shared it with one another.
- You are worthy
One of the biggest things for me to accept within my life is that I am worthy. I find it hard to say that I am a woman of God because I see so many other people being “better Christians” than I am. When I was broken up with, I didn’t think I was pretty enough, nice enough, giving enough, worthy enough etc. I have a hard time telling people that I am a missionary because I don’t think that title accurately suits me. Guess what? I am worthy. I am a child of God. I belong to not that of the world but to Abba father. He made me strong, independent, goofy, and FUNNY. Those ten days that I spent only taking four bucket showers (you get one bucket for your water, you dip your hair in the bucket put some soap on your body and toss the freezing cold water on you) I have never felt prettier in my life. This sounds crazy because I was so dirty.. Trust me we were so sweaty and smelly you couldn’t tell whose smell was whose. I have never felt prettier in my life because it didn’t matter what I looked like on the outside because everyone was concerned with what God was doing in your life and where your heart stood. This was refreshing. Again, what would our world look like if our generation explored the inner beauty of people and quit focusing on Instagram filters, kylie jenner lips, and selfies.
- There are other ways to worship than singing.
This was eye opening to me because I always thought of worship as singing. I am not a singer at all but God has given me many other talents. When overseas, we won’t have a band play and a super awesome vocalist but we will have our own gifts. In times of worship, I started to paint and write things down that I thought God was speaking to me. This has restored my soul and opened my eyes to new avenues of expressing gratitude for what God has done in my life.
- Don’t have a poverty mindset
Am I fresh out of college with copious amounts of student debt? Yes. Am I raising money for an 11 month missions trip? Yes. Am I having to buy lots of gear for this trip? Yes. You know what? God blesses a cheerful and loving giver. I was actually shown this before training camp because one of my OWN squad mates donated to my trip instead of her own. You know what blows my mind? I have more money raised than she does, so why did she give her money to me instead of her own trip? She felt that God wanted her to do it. Her sacrifice and giving heart broke mine into pieces when I saw it come up on my donations report. Not only did this encounter teach me sacrifice but when I got to camp it was reinforced by the giving spirits of my other squad mates. It doesn’t have to be money but it can simply be peanut butter, compliments, hugs, words of encouragement, taking their chair for them, etc. There was also another moment of deep conviction at camp. We were fed very little in terms of an average American meal so it was difficult the first couple of days for most of us (mostly the boys and well of course me). But one meal, I was still very hungry and I didn’t say anything but he must have known because he gave me a lot of his food. I scrambled to give it back but it was “non-returnable.” This again ripped me apart because why would someone bigger than me and A MAN give me his food when he CLEARLY needed it more? Because we are rich in God’s glory and this is shown by giving.
- You don’t need as much as you have
This was abundantly shown to me during camp. First it was shown by how much we feed ourselves for each meal. The amount of food that we eat is grotesque compared to what is actually needed for our body to function. I can honestly say that I was only full after ONE meal at camp but my body didn’t need to be full in order to be sustained. When we came to camp, the battery that we came with on our phone is the battery that we had to make last for the next 10 days. Phones became a little more lax-ed towards the end of the camp and it wasn’t a firm rule but it was to teach us that constant communication isn’t needed. As a society we love instant gratification and to be in contact at all times. We send text messages or snapchats and wait for an immediate response. It’s not needed. People who are genuinely there for you need very little communication. Quality conversation is better than quantity, like most things in life. You don’t need dressers and closets full of clothes in order to be clothed. We only had what was in our backpacks to wear and you know what? It is more than some people own. Some people only have one outfit in this world, just one. We sit here and complain about how we have nothing to wear to this event and that event, etc. That night I slept on the road, a squad mate had shared her experience in Rwanda that people sleep on dirt, muddy grounds. I stood there grateful for a tent, sleeping bag, and a paved road.
In closing, I cannot wait to be striped of this first world, American life that we have constructed for ourselves. These 6 things that I learned at training camp amongst other fun things we did such as squad wars, capture the flag and dance offs will never be forgotten. I can only imagine what the Lord will show me in third world countries and what kind of abandonment will shape me into a new being because he has already started to mold me in a ten day Georgian grunge fest.
“I will climb this mountain with my hands wide open… I lean not on my own understanding, my life is in the hands of the maker of heaven…I give it all to you, God. I Trust that you will make something beautiful out of me” –Climb this Mountain
