My Training Camp Experience

Training camp.

Brea, California to Gainesville, Georgia.

Ten days spent with my squad going to sessions, eating new foods, and experiencing field scenarios that we will encounter in our time in Swaziland, Nepal, India, and Guatemala.

Ten days of raw emotions, hard truths, powerful worship, and transformative moments with the Lord.

 

Going into this ten days I was terrified of it all– meeting new people, being dirty and sweaty for two weeks straight, and learning about what I actually signed myself up for

• Meeting New People

I was super nervous to meet my squad mates (the 46 others who will travel with me throughout the 9 months on the field), scared that I wouldn’t fit in with everyone. On the plane to Georgia I wrote in my journal, “I hope the Lord will help to calm my nerves so I can be as real/myself as possible with them all”. I kept this prayer in my head all day and in the first hour of meeting everyone I knew the Lord had answered my prayers and knocked down the fears that tried to build up in my head. After spending ten days with these guys and gals, I can affirm that I will be serving alongside the cooliest people in the world! These are passionate lovers of the Father, all so fun and lovable and beautifully themselves! I would look around every once in a while and my heart would explode with joy because it was so evident that the Lord placed each of us specifically on this route. I’m now so excited to grow deeper with my U sqUUUad family and watch the Lord set fire in us over the next 9 months!!!

 

• Dirt and Sweat

Ten days straight of southern humidity, bucket showers, baby wipe baths, and living in my two person tent. Going into this, I truthfully had an incredibly selfish mindset on this part. I was focused on how gross I would look and feel and smell, instead of focusing on the opportunity for growth the Lord had planned for me in the midst of the sweatiness. In the first couple days I did struggle to focus on what was happening around me because I was so caught up in my self-image, but man oh man did the Lord BREAK ME! He ripped my eyes off of my outer shell and forced me to look up to Him!

One morning my team and I were doing our morning devotionals and we focused on

2 Corinthians 4:7

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”

The jar of clay symbolizes us as humans and  the treasure is the Holy Spirit inside of us, our new life in Christ. When I used to read this verse or hear about “jars of clay”, I always thought a jar of clay was meant to be a beautiful, perfect object that the treasure was placed in. That was until our devo leader explained a jar to be ugly, bland, useless without the treasure in it. I was completely convicted. I used to see myself as a beautiful jar, and the treasure inside was just an added bonus. That is so wrong! I am completely useless, weak, boring UNTIL the treasure of Jesus is placed in me. The treasure in me is what’s special, I am just a vessel for the gift to be placed in!

I stopped focusing on how dirty I was, stopped stressing about the sweat that was everywhere, and set my eyes inward– on the Holy Spirit. It was really difficult to realize how selfish and vain I had been, but I experienced so much peace in being able to have my full focus on Jesus and not on myself. I will be constantly dirty, sweaty, and in need of a shower this year – but I could not care less! This trip is not meant to be comfortable, clean, or focused on me! It’s about leaving behind my selfish desires so I can fulfill the desire God has to reach the hearts of every single nation, tribe, woman and man living around the world!

 

• What I Got Myself Into

Before arriving I was so scared that I would regret signing up, that I would realize that God actually didn’t call me to this trip.

After sitting through many sessions on discipleship, different religions, and what to expect on the field I can say that I definitely didn’t know what I was signing up for. It’s not going to be easy to witness so much brokenness and pain in these different cultures. My heart will break to witness men and women separated from the life Jesus has for them. I will learn to give every ounce of my trust to God, completely hanging on to Him as I go in and out of each country. It’s going to be some of the hardest nine months I will walk through, but also the most joyful and rewarding. Being able to trust only in the Lord and hang on to Him for nine months straight is such a blessing.

I am confident in the Lord’s faithfulness! Jesus has looked into my eyes and affirmed me that I am one of “God’s chosen people” meant to “proclaim the excellencies of Him” as 1 Peter 2 says! I am so so so excited to see where my obedience to the Father takes me!

Final thoughts / random Training Camp moments!

• Worship was NEXT LEVEL… picture 280 people praising the Lord at the top of their lungs, free to dance or kneel or pray however they feel called to! I have never felt so physically and spiritually open to the Lord ever! Man I can’t wait to worship so freely with my brothers and sisters on this trip

• Dancing brings us TOGETHA! Sad, happy, exhausted, hangry– u squad danced through every emotion possible and we can allllll get down to the funky sound!!!!

• Spiritual warfare is REAL and it’s scary, but the Devil flees at His name! There is POWER in the name of Jesus!!

• Bugs aren’t that bad! This California gal was not excited to camp with the mass population of Georgia bugs, but I can proudly say that I only screamed once(ish) at a bug, killed multiple spiders, and accepted the many many centipedes who became my tent mates every night!!

The biggest thing I learned at training camp:

The Lord is Good… ALWAYS! There were a lot hard moments and a lot of amazing moments at camp, but through it all I was able to understand that He is good. We will never be able to understand God’s power– why He allows pain, why He loves us unconditionally, why He doesn’t make life easy– but by trusting in Him and keeping our eyes aligned with His, we can see His goodness and faithfulness through every situation.

 

Thank you so much for reading this and supporting me, I love you whoever ya are!!!