After 10 days full of cold bucket showers, tent camping, eating crickets, meeting new friends (and watching some of them get baptized!), lots of tears, but many more laughs, Spirit-filled worship sessions, 52 pages of notes, and jaw-dropping miracles, I am back from the World Race Training Camp, and forever changed by this experience! So here I am to give you a glimpse of what I learned down in Georgia.
“She was His before she was mine.”
This little phrase has been my mom’s response when people ask her questions like “How could you let Caroline go on the World Race?” “Aren’t you scared?” “What if something bad happens to her?!” (Side note: what an amazing woman of faith she is!)
“She was His before she was mine.”
I won’t lie and say training camp was a breeze because it wasn’t. But repeating these words over and over in my head is something that helped me to push through. Resting in the fact that God was with me even while I was sleeping on the ground, when I was exhausted and want to give up, and when I felt too inadequate to embark on this journey.
A huge part of my testimony is the realization that I had at 14 years old that I was created to be set-apart for God. While I always knew this, there have been points in my life where I have strayed from its truth. During training camp, however, God reaffirmed this within me. He was continually reminding me that I am His child, that I am His daughter. A daughter of the Highest King! A princess! And just like any royal position, this one comes with a calling to uphold great honor for the rest of my days. And at training camp, I decided to re-commit myself to this calling to be set-apart for Jesus.
So, what exactly does this look like? Well for me, it looks like changing the way I live my life each and every day. It’s in putting the salvation of others before my own worldly desires. In choosing to honor Him, I’m committing to laying down my own wants and plans and dreams. Before training camp, I was praying for my life to be radically transformed by Jesus. And through these realizations, I can see that transformation is real and that it’s upon me! And that excites me! One day, when I meet Him, I want God to look upon me and say “Well done, my good and faithful servant.” And for this to happen, I know that my life here on earth must change from the ways in which I’ve been living. So, you heard it here first! Here I am, committing to be Kingdom-minded! To living a life that upholds the great honor that has been given to me as a daughter of the Highest King! To always saying yes to the will of God in my life. To resting in the fact that I am His before I am anyone else’s. In the fact that I am His above all else.
So, here I am! Back in Maryland for 7 weeks, preparing to embark on the adventure of a lifetime! During this time, I plan to continue sharing more and more of what I learned during training and I also ask that you help by holding me accountable to these words I’m writing! Because while they may sound great and ambitious, the truth is, I’m still only human. I’m still going to mess up and make mistakes. But the greatest part of living in the Kingdom is trusting in the fact that as many times as I make a wrong turn, God is always there to direct me back to His great love.
And so I’m going to go. To feed the hungry. To heal the sick. To clothe the naked. And to speak love and light into the children of God, my brothers and sisters, all across the world. Next stop: South Africa.
