Made it home from training camp!!! In a nut shell: I had a crash course on the culture of every region in the world, ate at lot of rice and beans (and a few crickets), had my first experience of bucket showers, saw a scorpion, saw someone get healed right in front of my eyes, didn’t look in a mirror for 10 days, only gotONE bug bite, met the Expedition squad and my 6-person team for the next year, and enjoyed the company of the Holy Spirit within me, around me, and through my teammates.
To say I had an amazing experience would be undermining the incredible change God has done in the last 10 days in my heart. What I realized is that although this trip is about going and loving those around the world, God has HUGE plans in store for molding my heart to be more like His. Through all the adventure of training camp in this short time, God pealed back every part of my being and showed me how much He loves me through all the pain, suffering and lies that have built up inside me for the last 23 years. He opened my eyes to see what areas of my life are holding me back from loving more and experiencing Him deeper. He brought back memories from my life that have impacted me and grown roots of lies in my heart that I didn’t even know existed. And what’s best of all is that through all the tears, He was the one comforting me and telling me how beautiful I am. So while the busyness of camp was happening all around me, there was a gentle peace within me. God was slowly unleashing my grip on the things I constantly hold onto for comfort, things that will never satisfy and was helping me see that He is ALL that I need. This is the start of a new life following Him, a life where everything is abandoned so that I can fully know my Father.
So there I was, in the middle of Gainesville, GA, sleeping under the stars in my little tent sweating it out in the heat and praying to God to light me on fire for His Kingdom. And here I am blazing for more. He is better than life and more abundant than I can fathom. I pray He is revealing Himself more to you too. Because there’s nothing sweeter than the pure love of our Father.
