I am sorry it took so long for this blog to happen but I wasn’t sure where to begin. SO MUCH HAPPENED AT CAMP! And so much has happened since. As I sat reflecting on everything that happened in that week the common theme was that God showed up. He showed up in such a tangible way in the exact way that I needed him in the moment.
He starting showing up before I even got to camp. When I got on the plane from Louisville to Atlanta I pulled out my Bible. Why? Because I become I huge baby on planes I am TERRIFIED of them. The woman God placed next to me noticed my Bible and then began talking to me. Turns out she was a believer who had recently been learning about divine encounters with others. She asked me about where I was going and what I was doing and I was able to tell her all about the World Race. She then wanted to know about my personal story and I was able to share my testimony. It was a beautiful time experiencing how I could bond with a total stranger because of our identity in Christ. I gave her my blog address and she said she will be praying for me. I had no idea in that moment how much foreshadowing this would be on my week.
When we landed in Atlanta I rushed off to meet the rest of my sQuad (the ones that had flown anyways). And it was the same thing. The Holy Spirit in each of us began to draw us together. On the bus ride to camp I had the opportunity of sitting next to who we would later find out would be my team leader. I immediately felt comfortable with her. We started talking about how we got on the race and again I was able to tell the story of how God through some kind of crazy twists and turns brought me to this point. It was a really deep conversation for our first ever interaction. I believe God did that on purpose. Before I even knew she would be my team leader she knew about my story in a nonthreatening environment.
Throughout the week God spoke to me through people, music, teaching, and speaking over me himself. He had so much to say to me. I would love to tell you each individual story on here but we would be here for a week! So I’ll just give you some highlights.
Identity:
I have struggled with my value for as long as I can remember. I can never imagine why people like me and I actually ask them often. This struggle crossed over into my spiritual life all the time. If I am not worth very much how can God use me? Why would he bring me into his kingdom in the first place? After all he KNOWS all of the ways I lived in rebellion of him for twenty years. I was in the mindset of the prodigal son still. When he came to his father he was willing to be a slave to his father and not be counted a son. At training camp God showed me that even though I had been brought into his family as a DAUGHTER, the feast had been thrown, and I was loved and accepted, I was still acting as though I was just a household slave. Through the music “You Make me Brave”, through one of our squad coaches Tim prophesying God’s love saying “He is so PROUD of you.”, and through various other words God gave me through reading or time spent with others, I finally saw that I AM HIS DAUGHTER. I have more value than I could ever imagine because the son of God DIED in order to give me the status of daughter. Since training camp ended this has been one of the ways Satan has tried to attack me the most. See Satan doesn’t like it when we realize just how valued we are. So many of his lies only work when we don’t realize how much we are loved already.
Gifting:
I wasn’t really sure before Training Camp what kinds of gifts I had or how in the world God was going to use me on the Race. As camp went throughout the week I realized a few ways God uses me in our groups. I am very much an encourager. I guess some of it bleeds over from my background in education but if we are doing a task as a group nine times out of ten I am encouraging the others in the group that they are doing a great job or encouraging them to keep trying.
Another gift God showed me he is going to use no matter what is my gift for languages. I am fluent in ASL and trying to learn a few other languages currently. On the day that we found out who our teammates would be we got to go off campus :). Remember the divine meetings from before? God arranged one just for me at our first stop. As we entered Starbucks I saw a woman signing! I was so excited! At school I am constantly surrounded by sign language and I absolutely love it! At camp the only sign language I had seen all week was my own. I waited until the woman looked up at me and asked her if she was Deaf. It turned out she was! and in the traditional fashion of the Deaf community we started a very long conversation. At first I was a little worried that I was ignoring my team but it soon became evident that this conversation was more important. The woman was not a believer and she had been going through a really rough time. She had just moved to Gainesville, Georgia from Pennsylvania and it was a rough transition. One thing after another just kept putting her down. I was able to pray over her and exchange contact information with her. I hope that God will use that encounter to bring her to himself. Everyone on my team afterward was in awe when I explained what had just happened. They encouraged me by saying that none of them would have been able to do what I just did. I really needed that in that moment. All of the women on my team are so awesome and gifted. I was starting to wonder how I could fit into the mix. God clearly showed me that day why he put me in the mix. I do have gifts he can use for his kingdom and I have gifts that no one else has.
Pride:
Alright so here is the part that those who know me are waiting for. Yes I did get injured at Training Camp. How? I was being too stubborn to ask for help. We were running a team building activity called the plane crash scenario. In this scenario one person was unconscious, one was blind, one had an infectious disease no one could touch them, two had only one arm, and two of us had only one leg. It was our job to get as far from the crash as we could. At first I was good I was hopping around just fine but as we went I got more and more tired and more and more off balance. But did I ask for help? Nope, I was going to make it and not slow my team down. We got to a fairly steep hill I had to hop up and I went for it even though everything in my body was screaming for help. As I hopped up the wet Georgia clay slid from under my foot and I twisted my ankle badly. When I hit the ground I immediately began crying. Not from the pain but because I knew I was really hurt and felt like I had let my team down. To add insult to injury I landed in an ant pile and they were biting me. A girl from another squad saw me go down and ran over. She was an EMT and did a quick assessment. It was swelling in her hand I couldn’t walk on it. So what happened with the scenario? It continued. I became the unconscious one and my team carried me to our next meeting point where everyone else would continue doing activities.
I sat there watching everyone else do the things I wanted to be doing and was so mad at myself. I couldn’t believe I had let this happen. God spoke to me through the night about how yes I had been prideful and need to learn to let others help me. But he also said it was OK to forgive myself. The next day my sQuad prayed healing over my ankle and as they were praying my ankle instantly went from the size of a softball to normal size.
God knew that if my ankle was not healed I would have a rough time the rest of the week. See I ended up in the Hospital twice with a fever of over 104. No doctor knew why. I think it was because Satan was attacking me. It was the day at camp when I began to realize my gifts and identity in Christ that the fever spiked. Right before I went to the hospital the Holy Spirit gave me exactly what I would need to get through the long night in the ER. He manifested in me as Joy so pure and unrestrained I had never felt anything like it. If I had not just experienced that power from the Spirit it would have been a very different night. God taught me to be still and wait on him. I missed alot of the sQuad and team bonding time but when I got back everyone was so supportive and loving to me. God showed me I have a new family. Those men and women are my family! I can not wait to do ministry with them.
