I have been so blessed to be with the same 5 people for the race thus far. Our team name is Awakened Ezekiel’s. However our squad at times, calls us “Awkward Ezekiel’s”. I do not know why, but we do some strange things. We love to cuddle, we like to go into really small spaces to meet, we like to have feedback in the bathroom, we like to dance…a lot, we like to hollar, we like to say ‘boring’ phrases and we have so many other quirks. I love my team. We often speak of our team dynamic and why we were blessed with such a great team. I do not mean to sound as if other teams are not blessed, but we have been able to be together all race, we all like each other, we choose to spend time together and we continue to grow together. And that is rare. I have been thinking about this a lot recently.
(This was our second day of ministry in Honduras in an orphanage. Photo credit: Emily Peterson)
This past month one of my prayers was to “choose love”. In every situation I wanted to choose love. When I had a thought of a way to serve someone or when someone needed something and I was able to provide for that person, I wanted to always choose to do so. I believe God calls us to love this way always, but I have not been so open, generous and bold.
(After a squad murder mystery in Albania. Photo Credit: Emily Peterson)
I think my team has done a great job at choosing love. I believe from the beginning we have chosen love and continue to do so. I believe when we choose love, even when it is hard, even when we have to give hard feedback or have a tough conversation about conflict, we are realizing love is good.
(In Bulgaria, getting ready to win health challenge and 5K! Photo credit: Emily Peterson)
Love is what brings life, love is what we desire, love binds us together, love is for what we were made. There are around 40 people on O’squad. Whenever we are all together my team notices how we continue to desire to be together. We continue to sit together, we play cards together, we walk together, we exercise together, we read together and so forth. The other day us four girls were all playing cards together. We were in a house with 14 other girls and it was all the girls on team TAE together. On our day off, four of the five that walked to the airport out of 15 girls were the girls of team TAE. Whenever we do workouts, again it is almost always us four girls. (I keep talking about the girls, because last month was feministry month, so only women).
(Us girls at lunch during debrief in Jinja, Uganda)
I wonder how when we choose to love God, that we too, continue to choose him. Like my team from the beginning, we chose to love each other and to be united and to fight together; we continue to choose to love each other. And when we go to deeper places of love, vulnerability and intimacy we realize we were made for that. Even when it may be hard, it is good.
(A dinner with our ministry in Romania! Photo Credit: Emily Peterson)
So my encouragement to this testimony is for you to continue to chose love and to fight for those in your life. At the beginning it might be hard, there might be disagreements or conflicts. But once you get past those and learn from each other and grow together you realize the hard conversations are just what you needed. You begin asking for the hard feedback, you begin loving being known so well. You know the people around you know you and love you and fight for you in all cases. So keep digging deeper, keep speaking boldly and loving extravagantly.
(After Emily got baptized in Uganda! Photo Credit: Shannon McGowan)
