World Race Training Camp: meant to break down every area of comfort in your life.. or so it seemed
I knew it would be an interesting 10 days when the first night in my tent I felt like I was getting eaten alive by bugs.. and the next morning we had noodles in soup..for breakfast. Apparently thats how they do it over in east Asia.
There are a bagillion things I could talk to you about from training camp like freezing cold bucket showers, practice field scenarios, or the beautiful Georgia night sky filled with twinkling stars as I fell asleep in my hammock. I learned so much about community, vulnerability, forgiveness, shame, and the Lord.
But I want to focus on one topic that hit me pretty hard during the 10 days, identity.
I came into training camp thinking i had begun to understand who I was and what formed my identity. WRONG. At the first session I knew that this was going to be the beginning of a journey to understand who I was created to be, so I can do what I was created to do. This became my “go-to” phrase the rest of the 10 days.
Understanding False Self: Who we think people want us to be, or who we want people to think we are.
My entire life my identity has been defined by other people. My actions, my likes, my dislikes, even my relationships always seemed to line up with other people’s expectations of my life.
Nothing was my own.
In college I began to stray away from other peoples expectations and develop my own kind of identity. I started to discover what I liked to do.. Who I wanted to be..
However.. at training camp I realized that I was still sticking to the second part of the False Self: who we want people to think we are. It was the first time I was meeting the people I would be living alongside for the next 11 months, I was afraid to be weak. I was still stuck in the idea that I had to be ok despite the brokenness in my life (which the Lord was showing me a lot of).. and to be strong through the hurt. I would be vulnerable with my community by sharing my brokenness, but mask the pain inside by appearing to be strong enough. Perfectionism is a HUGE struggle of mine, so admitting that I wasn’t perfectly fine was hard.
Admit it to Community:
The Lord made this part really easy. He blessed me with an incredible community to share life with, X-Squad. These people instantly became my family day 1. I was not only listened to by them, but I was heard. They are God fearing passionate people in pursuit of something greater than the American dream. They have Kingdom Dreams. I am so excited to see the growth and love spread throughout the world through this squad
Not only did God bless me with an incredible squad, but also an amazing team! These are the women that I will specifically be doing ministry with each month. I am so confident in the Lord’s hand in the placement of this team. They are just great
Embrace Your True Self
I am already learning so much more of who I was created to be. The Lord did not create me, or you, to be an exact replica of the people around me or what they expect me to be. I am learning that I am not just a servant of the Lord but I am his beloved daughter. My identity is found in Him, and Him alone. I am SO excited to continue to break down my false self and firmly place my identity in the Lord alone.
The World Race is a Kingdom Journey. Finding your true self requires abandonment of your false self and the comforts that make it up. Abandonment is hard, but if you allow it to, it will create the space for God to do something. Something really really good.
According to Seth Barnes, the founder of Adventures in Missions, “away from the familiar, our hearts become a place where God can work, a place where only faith will sustain us.”
So after 10 days of training with an amazing squad, thats what I am ready to do. I am abandoning comfort. I am abandoning my false self. I am creating the space to allow God to move in my life and show me who He created me to be, so I can do what He created me to do.
I encourage you to dive deeper into what makes up your false self. What, or who, are you allowing to define you? Is there an area of comfort you need to abandon to allow God in and to move? This could be anything from facebook to your entire career. What in life are you turning to before or instead of God? Think and pray about it, seriously. It is so so worth it.
I would love for you to join me on this journey! You can subscribe to my blog to receive updates and if you would like to commit to praying with and for me, let me know! I am almost at 50% financially funded, thank you so much to everyone who has supported me so far! If you would like to financially support me please click the “support me” tab on this page!
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