I went to World Race training camp last week and it was one of the most intense and awesome weeks of my life (so far). It was incredible, hard, awesome, life-impacting, gritty, and beautiful. I can’t put into words all the ways the Lord moved in my heart, nor do I completely understand all the ways he changed and molded me. Honestly, I’m still processing everything that happened and trying to make sense of all those notes I took.
But here are some things I do know I learned:
Jesus is more important than my comfort.
Who would’ve thought? definitely not me. Our culture values comfort a lot and I’ve bought into that most of my life. As an American, I’ve worked hard to ensure my comfort. I plan my days around avoiding hardships and I surely don’t seek pain. But as a Christ follower, something I realized is that God doesn’t always call us into the comfortable. And in fact, he sometimes calls us right into the opposite of comfort… Sometimes he calls us right into the midst of pain. He calls us into the pain of our past, just so he can show us he was there with us the whole time and never left our side. Sometimes he calls us into other peoples’ pain, because he wants us to mourn while they mourn and maybe just maybe show them that Christ is still with them. And sometimes, I think, he calls us into His pain. He shows us glimpses of how broken he is over our world and how much he desires for his bride to return to him. And what I realized is that I’m okay going into that pain, because I’m not going into it alone or without purpose.
Being vulnerable and broken is actually a desirable place to be.
Its there that God can teach and mold our spirit. When we’re broken, we’re malleable; we can hold no pretense, and we understand there is nothing we can do on our own. And when we are vulnerable and let other people in to what is happening in us, it encourages them to be broken and malleable too.
P Squad! Those I’ll call family during my 11 months on the World Race
God is the Great Awakener.
(I’m making that a word)
He is the great awakener of our spirits and our dreams. He is the one who breathed our lives into existence and the one who awakens us to Him and to what He is doing.
Bucket Showers aren’t all that bad.
Okay on a completely different level, bucket showers really aren’t that bad. Well maybe a little bad. But I was surprised at how much I actually enjoyed them. And, like I just said, Jesus is more important than my comfort. I would choose bucket showers over and over again if it meant that I got to spend more time with Jesus. Also, bucket showers for 8 days makes me ten times more grateful for the hot showers I get to take everyday now that I’m home.
God still has so many new things for each of us.
I think we get to certain points in our life, at least I know I have, where I feel like I’ve made it. I’ve summitted the mountain. I’ve obtained all the wisdom and knowledge there is to know. I’m good enough just how I am. But wow, I am so wrong. First of all, there’s no end to knowing God. And secondly, there’s no end to knowing what he has for our lives. Going into training camp, I thought I had a pretty good grasp on God. He made sense to me. He loved us. He sent Jesus. He likes when we worship Him. He’s a pretty awesome father. None of which are false. But my view of Him is just so limited. He is so vast and I never knew the depths of His love like I did last week. I never knew how much delight he takes in me. And I’ve never realized how much he still has for each of our lives. And I’m sure this is still only scraping the tip of the ice berg when it comes to knowing God and knowing what he has for us, but let me tell you, it was so GOOD.
Team Awakened Warriors!
