I got out of the car and grabbed my pack, my parents squeezed me goodbye and off I went. I looked back and saw my mom’s eyes tearing up as I walked into my next adventure. My throat felt tight and my heart heavy for a second, until I turned around to walk up to the check in lodge and saw my squad mates. The sadness of letting go faded and now I felt completely different, my heart raced and excitement was building. I was so nervous and so scared the first day, after seven months of anticipation and prayer I was finally there, at training camp.
After I checked in I got the names of the girls on my team. I have a squad of 51 people that will travel together, but I will be living alongside 5 other girls for nine months. I will be in a team with Ashley, Daniella, Emma, Jordan, and Rachel. Each of us are so unique and strong. The rest of the week was challenging. We worked through three key components of this next year, Missional Living, Intimacy with God, and Community.
Missional living means living with a mission mindset; a couple of areas we were trained in were children’s ministry and women’s ministry- Beauty for Ashes. Intimacy with God opened a door for me, God transformed my heart in ways I never imagined. Through prayer and inner healing my team and I walked through some spiritual bondage. The last category was community, my squad of 51 is a community and a church. We will live life together and serve together for nine months. We learned how to love each other well through accountability, grace, by listening to each other, and consistent prayer for one another.
These are merely highlights of this incredible week. A few fun words that describe these ten days would be- tents, bucket showers (a shower with only a bucket), little sleep, lots of overwhelming love, challenging, serving, giving, sweat, bug bites, more sweat, stinky clothes, red dirt, doing hard things, dancing, laughing, crying, rejoicing, and praising.
Overall, I have learned that the Lord is so good. He is so good to those who relentlessly pursue Him. He will carry you and sustain you when you don’t have anything else to give, He will bless you, love you, and forgive you. This week I learned a lot about my squad mates, and quite a bit about myself through the eyes of God. I am overjoyed by this experience and I cannot wait for launch in September!
(My squad will launch the week of September 7th from Atlanta, GA to go to our first country- Swaziland (South Africa))
