Training Camp has been intense. Before leaving the US I mostly thought of the how difficult all the travel would be (and it was pretty exhausting!) but I gave very little thought to the difficulty of training for this thing called The World Race. I assumed I would be fine, chill even. I mean, I’m not exactly new to ministry or sitting through ministry training. Even team building isn’t usually a problem for me.
I should have known better than to let myself think this way. My prayer before leaving was that God would help me be real, honest, even raw with my teammates. I told the Lord that I was tired of faking things. Tired of faking church. Tired of faking community. Tired of pretending to be fine even when I was struggling. Maybe I didn’t really believe that God would answer this prayer. Or maybe I was simply naive about the level of brokenness being truly genuine would require.
Day one of training Camp we talked about legalism. No big deal, I know being a Christian is all about a relationship and not at all about rules. I’ve been taught this my whole life. It shouldn’t have impacted me. But as I listened, the Holy Spirit, in His gentle, quiet way, began to work on my heart. As I watch the person teaching erase a list of rules from the white board, I felt the Holy Spirit erase the same list from my heart. What was left was a clean open space, both freeing and scary all at once.
Then I heard the voice of the Lord, “what will you do now?“
What WOULD I do? With no rules to dictate my life, what would my choices in life look like? I’m good at the rules. They tell me where I belong, how I’m expected to act. What would people think of me if I didn’t follow the rules? Finally I realized, rules have been a huge part of my identity.
Without the rules, who am I?
When the rules of religion and legalism are completely stripped away I am left with only two clear choices:
1. Float aimlessly through life with no direction or clear path to follow
2. Cling SO closely and desperately to Jesus that He is literally ALL I KNOW
What was it Paul said? “I resolved to know nothing… except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” (1 Corinthians 2:2) This is the verse the Holy Spirit dropped into my head.
I made the decision that day to let go of the rules and the part of my identity that has been tied to them for so long. I made the decision to cling to Jesus instead. I will find my identity in following Christ and listening to what He says about me. I need nothing else.
This was actually only the first of many things that the Holy Spirit asked me to work on during the last 2 weeks. I can’t express properly the level of freedom I have felt in this progressive work God has started in my life. I have let go of so many things that have held me back over the years. I feel like a completely different person already and I hope to share more with you all in later posts.
Thank you all for reading and for your support as I continue on this 11 month journey. Training is over as of today. Tomorrow we start ministry in the community!
My next fundraising deadline is a total of $13,000 by February 29th. I still need $1,646 to meet this. Please prayerfully consider partnering with me as I continue traveling to share God’s love.
