9:05 in the morning, sitting on the airplane still having no idea what to expect. The time before training camp I was working six to seven days a week, full time and I did not let myself think too much about Training camp. As the thoughts of what might happen invaded my peace on the plane, I got anxious. I was not completely sure what I was getting myself into, but I was okay with that. I knew God had already had this in this plan long before I ever did, and I decided on that plane that I was going to let God do whatever He needed to do through me while at camp.
Around 6:30-7am I would awaken to the sun either blinding me in my tent or a Squad Leader filling the still morning air with, “Time to get up,” and slowly crawling off of my sleeping pad to do some type of physical activity. I then would head off to the training center (a place where we had worship and had sermons). My day was always filled with something new to do, new experiences, and each night would end at the training center. The days would feel like weeks and by the end all I wanted to do was crawl into my tent and sleep for a couple days, but I would always look forward to night worship because that was a time of the Lord rejuvenating me spiritually. It was a place where I would completely open myself up to whatever the Lord had for me. Before the music would fill the room, I would stop and pray, “God help my mind, spirit, heart, and ears to be open to whatever you have for me.” I know the Lord is always with me but I have to make a decision to let Him in and do what he needs to do, so I would invite the Lord in before every session. In that time of complete openness I realized that I had a struggle about somethings I believed about Jesus. It was a struggle that if I told someone then they would view me as not mature in my faith or a “weak Christian”, or that’s what I thought. And like the Lord always does, when you want to be close to Him then He will break down those doubts and barriers that you had up.
Towards the middle of the week before worship started I prayed that same prayer but something different happened. The heaviness in my eyelids lifted as i tried to see the dim light in the room but as the dim light started to enter I felt a piercing pain like a bee just stung them. It was painful and I couldn’t open my eyes. I can get pretty bad allergies but this was worse than I had ever experienced before. Thoughts came flooding my mind like what if I become blind, but as hard as it was, I gave the situation to the Lord. I looked to the Lord and asked Him that if this is part of His plan for tonight then leave it, but if it’s not, please take it away because it was very uncomfortable. Well, it stayed and I was okay. With just able to see the black from my eyelids I knew that He needed me to put all my focus on Him and nothing surrounding me, so I could get what He needed me to get out of this time with Him. With the lyrics of a song I was unfamiliar with came pouring into my ears, I had to truly focus on what the words were saying so I could sing the lyrics. With no distractions it was easy to relate the lyrics to my situation and turn towards the Lord. This worship was in one word, Freeing. Freeing because It was a time of only the Lord and I. At times I even forgot that there were people around me because it was a time of genuine, authentic, true worship, something I had never fully done to this extent. I was not able to look around to see what others were doing so I was free to give it all to the lord and leave the thoughts of how I was “supposed to worship”. Freely lifting my heavy arms from the long days high in the air and lifting my feet off the ground, dancing letting my spirit be rejuvenated and uplifted by the Lord, I then felt a hand come softly upon my shoulder that asked me, “Is there something you are questioning God about?”.
I was shocked because there was! It was something that I thought if I told someone then they would question why I was even going on the Race because it was a concept that a small child first learns in Sunday School. I knew I could not keep letting my fears of others thoughts keep me from getting what the Lord knew I needed to bring to light, so openly without holding the fear of judgment back any longer, I explained to her, “I had been questioning if God really died for MY sins When he was on the cross. Did he really think about my sins because that was such a long time before I was born? Did He just think about all the sins everyone would do or did He actually feel the weight of all of my individual sins?”. I felt her warm breath fill my ears as she was so close to me, praying a strong prayer that I wanted to believe. With the breath fading, she asked that the Lord would speak to me and then the breath left. I immediately felt disappointed because God had done all of this to make me only focus on Him and I didn’t get clarity right in that moment of her prayer. As I was almost doubting I turned back and trusted that my God did have a plan and I was going to be open to His timing and when He wanted me to have clarity on this question. Then out of nowhere a heavy presence fell over me so strong my legs could no longer hold the weight. My body was like a dozen bricks stacked on me. In the dim room with worship going on all around me I dropped to my knees with a wave rushing over me of this presence, an overwhelming presence of the Holy Spirit. I no longer was focusing on what was around me because I really couldn’t, this presence had all my attention. The Holy Spirit started to talk audibly to me through my lips, I was no longer the one talking. The holy spirit was using my lungs to be filled with His breath so I could hear the truth. I was open but also scared because this does not just happen. As The spirit spoke words came pouring out of my mouth. I had no control and didn’t know what was coming out until the declaring words filled my ears. While my knees were on the hard ground the words that first submerged my mind and ears was a strong tone of, “Monica you are loved”. It was a tone that I felt He was saying “listen to Me. Understand what I am saying. Believe these words.” A tone of declaring. In that moment I saw a clear vision. I was no longer in that Training center. I was next to Jesus on the cross on his level looking at His face close to mine. My eyes taking in the presence. This fragile skin I was staring into had me captivated. I did not long to look around because all I was focused on was this face right in front of me. The small background I saw was a brown color of wood and I knew I was in that moment seeing Jesus on the cross.
What I was looking at was in total indescribable. This was a moment where I knew I was with Him, In the moment with Jesus on the cross. As I stared at his face, his eyes never met mine. They were deep brown eyes but he was looking off into the distance and never met mine. While I was fixated on the whitish, tan, olive like skin that filled his face, I was met with the side of the deep brown eyes still looking of into the distance. I stopped and was captivated for a few seconds, I knew in that moment he was feeling the weight of my own sins. He was feeling the weight of all the sins I will create and He knew Me on the cross. The only way I can describe it is that I just knew that He was feeling my sins right in that moment where he brought me to look at him on the cross. I don’t think he let me see directly into his eyes because he didn’t want me to see the pain because the moment was bigger than that. It was not a moment of Him trying to show me how bad my sins felt but a time of The Holy Spirit answering my prayer. Like in my prayer, my eyes, mind, spirit, heart, and ears were made clear to why he died on the cross. Knowing that He heard me and cared this much to answer me by bringing me to that indescribable moment, I was in shock. After I looked into the side of his eyes and knew he thought about me, I was taken back to my knees touching the hard cement.
This is a moment that I will never forget because it’s a picture that I could not forget. My eyes were made clear to why He had to die on the cross, because Jesus had to feel billions of people’s sins, including mine. He had to feel that weight so I could freely worship and be with Him. The Holy spirit continued to fill my breath and it audibly said aloud to me, ”Monica, I see everything you do and you have listened to me. I am so proud. Monica, you are beautiful. I died so you could be with me and see me. I made you on purpose and was thinking of you on the cross. You have done everything right. Stop thinking others are better than you spiritually and physically. I made you in my image, which is perfect. This upcoming time will be hard and challenging but continue to put your trust in Me and you will see amazing things happen. Thank you for listening to me this far.” Like WOW!!!!!! My body was trembling as the Holy Spirit left my body. It was so strong I couldn’t control my limbs. I sat on the hard floor in the training center just talking to the Lord, trying to process everything that just happened. My mind was racing I could not believe all this had just happened. I have never experienced anything like that and let me tell you, if you don’t think God hears you He does! He hears our every word spoken to Him and to be able to hear His voice your spirit has to be completely open. And I believe I was able to experience that because through that entire time my only focus was on my God.
Training camp was wild and the Lord can do amazing things through all of us if we let him in to take control. I had never before experienced anything like that but God speaks to us all in different and amazing ways. This is probably a phrase you have heard before but I believe it’s oh so true. True faith being at the end of your comfort zone. In this case, while standing there in the dim room with praises being sung, not being able to see, that was very scary and uncomfortable. When I worship I always tend to look at those around me and see what they are doing, if they are raising their hands or dancing, and that takes my total focus off of Jesus and puts it on those around me. It’s a comfort in a way. If I know how others worship then if I do the same I won’t look weird or if they’re not dancing then I wouldn’t dance because then I would look weird. My form of worship was not 100% focused on God and not having others to look at was extremely out of my comfort zone. In that time, the people surrounding me could judge me and I wouldn’t know because I didn’t even know how i looked. But that’s the Grace of God. God does not judge us on how we look, he wants us to look ridiculous and give it all to Him. And I’m so blessed to have a God that would take away that comfort, so I could realize what true worship is like. I could realize that this life is full of uncomfortables and when I embrace it God will do things I could never imagine. While not able to see, I had to give up that comfort and focus completely on what I felt right and focus on why I am worshiping and why I am giving him the praise. This was the first time I felt free to worship because I didn’t have that view of others to go off of. Training camp was nothing but uncomfortables and being stretched but it was the best type of uncomfortables. In those I was able to make 51 best friends, laugh uncontrollably, cry with one another, open up, and grow as a family with the community of girls around me. We even ate crickets together. I would go back in a heartbeat. I cannot wait to see how the Lord will take more of my uncomfortables in the next 9 months to use them for His glory.
Being honest, this blog was extremely difficult to write because this event that Jesus brought me to doesn’t just happen to everybody. Also I have been extremely busy with work but most of all I was scared that people would judge me for it because its a crazy thing that had happened. however, I have come to the realization that God let it happen to me and I feel that I should share it because if it can help one person in a way that only the Holy Spirit can move in someone then it was worth sharing. I thank you so much for reading this blog and I hope that you continue to follow my journey. I leave to Georgia and then off to Cambodia in 4 short days!!!!
