As most of you know, I started my apprenticeship at Adventures in Missions last week. For the first week of the Center for Global Action, we weren’t in the office. Instead, they decided to send us out into the woods to experience God without distractions. As nervous as I was about it, I can honestly say that there couldn’t have been a better way to kick off my time at the CGA! Plus, God redeemed a bad camping experience from my childhood and created a love in me for the wilderness 🙂
Here’s a little snip it of what God did on DAY 1….
AIM loaded us all into one of their big school buses, with the destination set as the great unknown. When we passed a restaurant with goats walking on the roof and a sign for Mountain City, I assumed the great unknown was getting pretty close.
Sure enough, we ended up on a road that dead ended into a creek. We grabbed our packs, got briefed on some wilderness survival skills, and took the path less traveled by.
We had only hiked for about a mile when we reached our first resting spot, a beautiful little waterfall. The water was crystal clear and the rapids made you wish you had a kayak. After we were done exploring the waterfall, Neil informed me that I would be leading the team the rest of the way to the camp site. This doesn’t sound like that big of a challenge, but there were spider webs the size of Alaska all along the trail. If you know me, then you know that I am terrified of spiders and don’t particularly enjoy getting them on me. So, needless to say, this was definitely a challenge for me.
When we began hiking we were asked to ponder the question, “What are the distractions in your life keeping you from the Lord?”
It was hard to process that question, seen as I was spending most of my day feeling like I was in the movie Eight- Legged Freaks. I mean, I wasn’t really sure how I was going to figure out what my spiritual distractions were while being so distracted by my physical ones.
Thankfully, Neil gave me a thin branch with a bunch of limbs coming out of it to swat the beasts away. There were still a few times that I got a face full of web and a spider on my shirt, but not nearly as many as before. That was the moment that I realized my spiritual distractions went hand-in-hand with my current physical ones.
I realized that I had a lot of fear lingering around in my life that had been distracting me from the Lord, especially in the area of finances. I mean, I had only been home for a month before I moved to Georgia to spend another year not getting paid. With my bills beaming down on me like the African sun, it definitely wasn’t the most financially “responsible” decision I’ve ever made, but then again it kind of was.
So, once I had identified my spiritual fear, I decided to look to my physical one for some pointers…
What was making my fear easier to overcome?
The stick I was using to beat the webs down.
I had a tool…Which I was told that I looked pretty fierce beating through the woods with that branch in my hand and a machete in the side of my pack.
What tool could I use to combat my spiritual fear?
As Sunday School as it may sound, my Bible.
That’s an avenue that the Creator of the Universe speaks to me through, it’s my survival guide for every situation, it’s a love letter addressed to me from my Daddy.
What else helped me combat my fear?
The knowledge that I was not alone. I had people walking the same path with me, encouraging me, and helping me out however they could.
Community is extremely important! Christ has filled my life with a new community here in Georgia. Even though I am tired of establishing new community after the race, it’s so important that I keep that up. Having a community to be open with, pour into, and grow with is vital.
Finally, the last spiritual/physical revelation I got was that I have to trust my leadership.
I had to trust that AIM/Neil wouldn’t put me into a position in which they thought I could get hurt. In the same way, I have to trust that God didn’t lead me to Gainesville to let me down or disappoint me.
Now, why is it so hard for me to trust that God isn’t going to to fail me?
Is it possible that I have more faith in myself than I do in my God…Scary thought.
Stay tuned for part 2…
Rattle-snakes, bees, and bear bags…Oh my!
