So here I am.
Training Camp.
Day 3.
It's so hard to summarize the last few days in one blog post. Lots of people here, including me, have said that it feels like we have been here for weeks and weeks.
If I had to focus on one word to describe the experience, it would be freedom. We've been talking a lot about freedom here: the freedom that we will give the people we encounter in each country, and the freedom we need to find in ourselves before we can set free other people.
I think it's kind of ironic that yesterday was Independence Day. The day that we as Americans celebrate our freedom – a freedom that we often take for granted.
Yesterday here at Training Camp, we celebrated our freedom, too. The freedom to look deeply inside ourselves and figure out not only who we are, but also the person that Jesus sees. And loves.
(Man, He loves us. It's incredible the amount of love He has for us. As our worship band here sings, "Your love is an endless ocean, an infinite sea.")
You see, we've had to look inside ourselves and address our issues, our faults, our grudges and all the dark corners and crevices of our hearts because we will be looking inside others and address their issues, their faults, their grudges and all the dark corners and crevices of their hearts. We will be able to walk alongside them and say, "I know. I know it's hard. I know it's painful. I've been there. But I'm here to tell you that I am free because Jesus walked with me and showed me the freedom I could have in Him. So let me walk with you and show you to His freedom."
It won't be easy. If there's one thing I have learned this week is that this whole thing might just be more challenging than I thought. But I mean, really – I think I knew all along that this would be stretching, painful and absolutely incredible all at the same time.
There are so many other things I could tell you about Training Camp so far. Like the fact that my squad is super awesome, incredibly helpful and well, pretty much fantabulous. That I don't think I have even worshiped this much in this way ever, ever before. Or the fact that I have already had a crazy spider encounter in my tent and I am pretty sure it's just a precursor to what is to come in Africa.
But really, the most important thing is that it's been about freedom. The freedom to love myself and others around me. The freedom that we have in Jesus. And the freedom that we will bring to the nations.
