This week at Training Camp was the hardest and most rewarding week. God showed up in all of our lives in different ways and yet accomplished the same thing for everyone: A place of surrender.
A never ending love penetrates my heart and I can breathe.
A never ending grace surrounds me and allows me to live.
A never ending peace consumes me and gives me strength.
The only living God draws me close and clothed me with passion.
“Joy is a mystery because it can happen anywhere, anytime, even under the most unpromising circumstances, even in the midst of suffering, with tears in its eyes….” –Frederick Buechner
I was losing control and it was painful. My comfort zone was being stripped away. I thought being strong was being able to control your emotions, fears and sorrows. I could no longer hold the emotions that were attached to my pass, birth family and the uncertain future ahead of me, it was time to grieve and move on and it was painful. All I could do is cry and ask God why!
With hands held high and waterfall tears rushing down my face, I surrendered. I could feel everything I thought I had control of leave me. With my eyes closed and hands held high I cried out WHY!!! I poured out my heart before God and more tears streamed down. Then God spoke “I am taking you where you’ve never been, higher and higher in me. Trust me.”
Trusting God puts me in a place of peace, in my Father’s (God) arms; the place where I will grow. With my hands held high, I surrendered my will and accepted God’s will. When I felt unworthy he called me worthy. When I thought I was forgotten, he was there all along and I am overwhelmed by the love that he has shown me. God trust us young adults to love his children like he loves us….Unconditionally. He calls us worthy and He calls us His, so I will trust in my maker and love with the eyes of an artist. With hands held high, I surrendered.
“If we are to love our neighbors, before doing anything else we must see our neighbors. With our imagination as well as our eyes, that is to say like artists, we must see not just their faces but the life behind and within their faces. Here it is love that is the frame we see them in.”
– Frederick Buechner, Whistling in the Dark: A Doubter's Dictionary
The people I will get to serve with V Squad! ( There are a few people missing in this picture.)
