Walking into training camp I was terrified. I literally knew nothing about my new squad. I had changed routes two days earlier and I had no idea who any of the people I was going to be spending the next year with were. I mean I glanced over the blog list for July route 1 but there’s only so much you can gather about someone from a small thumbnail photo. Maybe if I had actually packed in advance I would have been able to read some blogs, trying to familiarize myself with these people, this new squad of mine, unfortunately that super organized person is not me so I was walking into training camp blind. I really had no idea what to expect or what was going to happen during the week, and to be honest there was no way to predict what did happen.
Coming into training camp you hear a lot of rumors about what to expect. The ride to training camp was filled with “ I heard that….” “I read on this one blog…” “are you ready to eat fish head soup?” “I heard you have to sleep under a tarp with nothing else for protection”. Well I’m not going to either confirm or deny any of those rumors; you future racers need some surprises to look forward to. Granted fun sleeping arrangements and interesting meals definitely made training camp quite an experience, but really it was so much, much more than that. It was all about how God moved. How the Holy Spirit descended upon a campground in White, GA and changed my life forever.
It’s been about a week now since I’ve been home and I feel as if I’m still trying to process what happened during that week, write it out perfectly and clearly for you to understand. It’s just that I don’t seem to know how to do this, what words could I possibly use to describe how God completely rocked my world and shattered the box that I had placed him in? As I sit here now I realize the following:
I had placed God into a box
I was holding on tightly to expectations I had for my life
I didn’t understand what it meant to be His Daughter
I didn’t know what it meant to just sit in His presence and bask in who HE is
I didn’t know what it meant to be LOVED
I didn’t know how to worship Him freely
This week changed all that:
I worshiped more freely than ever before and danced in worship
I sobbed and fell to my knees under the weight of His all consuming LOVE for me
I opened my heart up to the possibilities of whatever future He may have for me
I opened myself up to the Spirit and what it is He wanted to do in me
I had words of Confidence and Love spoken over me again and again
I finally understood what it meant to be a new creation in Christ, to shed the woman I once was and walk in the freedom of who God has made me
That week was pretty incredible and I know that I will be processing it all for a while. God moved in my own heart in crazy ways but he also really moved within my squad (F Squad), my new family. I was really terrified to meet them all and was shocked at how quickly I fell in love with them all. They are an incredible group of men and women who truly love the Lord and are well… ridiculous… and I LOVE IT! I am so excited to serve around the world alongside of them in this coming year.
Well at this point you’re probably wondering about the title right? Well God kinda went Boom! in my life tearing down walls and preconceived notions about Him so when I got I home I did one of the most impulsive things I’ve ever done in my life… I got a tattoo to commemorate it.
It says Chesed – Hebrew for steadfast love, something that God was reminding me of over and over and over – His steadfast love.
I just want to thank you all for your love and encouragement thus far, I promise to post more soon about my awesome team and what exactly this new route means!
– Jess
