One of the coolest things about Georgia is the amazing
thunder and lightening. The first time I experienced it was in the van on the
way to camp near Gainesville. Lightening struck across the sky followed by
booming thunder. As I marveled at the enormity of God’s strength, I knew big
things were going to happen this week. Thunder and lightening big.
So much has happened so far that it would be impossible to
share it all…but I’ll give you a few of the things that have left an impression
on me.
The two times I’ve really cried:
- One
day we were given the unexpected assignment of packing some of our things
in a shared backpack and following a leader through the woods. All we were
told was that we would need our sleeping bags and we may or may not come
back before nightfall. We didn’t know how long we would be gone for or
exactly what we would be doing. We ended up hiking out to camp beside the
lake. My small team was the cooking team and we built a fire and cooked
chicken and veggies for all 70 squad mates with out little camping pans.
It took forever and the fire mixed with the Georgia humidity was pretty
miserable, but the experience was still very fun J
The whole trip was really great and when evening came we all got together
to worship. In the midst of praise, people started coming forward to share
things that God had been revealing to them that week or ways they had been
growing, etc. One of the men stepped forward and started explaining how
during “Man Time,” all the guys had prayed for us and vowed to protect us
for the year. Our brother rightly proclaimed that he knew most, if not all
of us, had been hurt by men. All the men then gathered around us and
started proclaiming truths about us as women and sisters in Christ. They
said you are beautiful, we will stand in front of you and protect you, we
will honor you and serve you, you are princesses, etc. I wish I could
remember the other things they said, but I was so touched by their
brotherly affection for us and their recognition of the pain that has been
caused to us by many men in our lives, that I was moved to tears. It was
just so touching and I had never had a man/ brother in Christ talk to me
so boldly in that way before. It was just so beautiful and genuine- I wish
every woman could experience something like that.
- Last
night the President of HopeChest came and spoke to us about his
experiences fighting child prostitution and sex slavery. We watched a
video about orphan girls in Russia who were forced into prostitution and
talked about the realities of sex trafficking even in the US. It was such
an emotional time as we all cried out to God on the behalf of the orphans,
prostitutes, and AIDS victims across the world. It was such an intense
time of worship afterwards as we all sang “Break my heart for what breaks
yours; everything I am for your kingdom’s cause. As I walk from earth into
eternity: HOSANNA, HOSANNA, HOSANNA in the highest!”
*UPDATE
Just a few hours ago, the 70 members of our group were split
into our small teams (about 8 members) of people that we will be living with
and traveling with all year. We had time to finally go off site to the
“civilized” world and bond together. We all shared our testimonies with each
other and I was amazed by what my teammates had overcome. They are all such
amazing people and I am ecstatic to see how we mold together as a family. Keep
us all in your prayers as we unite together and learn how to live with absolute
strangers with a similar passion and life goal J
That’s about all I think I can write about training camp for
now except just know that they are DEFINITELY doing their best here to prepare
us for the field. Mostly just by feeding us smaller portions, “exotic” foods,
living in uncomfortable conditions (heat, sleeping bags, bugs, etc), and never
knowing what the schedule will be for each day!!
Altogether though, training camp has been such a wonderful
and amazing experience that I hope accurately prepares me for the field. Even
in one week I already feel transformed. I feel so much grace and love…
Lindsey and I at camp 🙂
