“You tell me that you are pleased and that I’m never alone, you’re a good good father.”
Just a few months ago this line in the song Good Good Father would have never hit me in the way that it did in the past week and a half. As many of you know I spent eleven days in Gainesville, Georgia for training for The World Race. In those eleven days I learned more about who my God is and just how much He loves me.
The very first night I got to spend at the beautiful AIM campus I was there for the storytelling workshop to learn more about how to provide a great story through pictures and videos. We set up our tents at the campground assigned for the workshop crew and it started pouring down rain. It literally rained the entire half hour we were setting up and then it stopped as soon as we were done. It was good though because we all laughed about it and helped each other out even though our clothes and tents were soaked. Honestly I just signed up so that I can meet some of my squad mates before the real training began, but I’m so grateful I went because I learned so much and met some really cool people.
Second day came around and most of us were pretty anxious to meet the rest of our squad. When everyone started showing up it finally became real. All of the sweet faces I Instagram stalked months ago were finally standing there right in front of me. Yeah that might sound a little weird, but let’s face it just about every World Racer understands the anticipation of meeting the people they’re spending the next nine months with haha.
Within the hour of everyone showing up I got to hold in my hand the list of the six people on my team!!!! I’m on a co-ed team which I was super excited about! Four girls and three guys. They are absolutely amazing. Each one of them are so different, but each show a different quality of Jesus and I believe that our team is a great representation of the body of Christ. You would think being in a co-ed team it would be difficult to share some of life’s biggest trials, but our group didn’t shy away from vulnerability and I loved every minute of our time together.
I wish I could go through every single day, but I also don’t want to bore you to death with one of those extensive blog posts. So from here on I’m going to talk about what I took home from camp spiritually.
Let’s go back to that short line in the song by Shane & Shane that I shared at the top of the page. Go listen to the song if you’ve never heard it before because it’s sooooo good!
“You tell me that you are pleased”
Going into training camp I was afraid. Truthfully I was scared that there would be all these amazingly wise and knowledgeable people, which there were, and I wouldn’t be able to keep up because they are way smarter than me and know more about the Bible than I do. The Lord is so sweet when He proves us wrong. He’s so gracious about it. By the end of the week I was so confident in knowing that it was okay not memorizing everything there is to know about the Bible because I have different spiritual gifts.
The Lord sent people to tell me that I am a leader, and that I can sing, and that I am caring, and that I’m a great listener. All of these things were once insecurities of mine and it’s like within a matter of ten days He reassured me that every single one of those things are where He is most proud of me. What I was believing before about who I wasn’t, it was just a bunch of lies whispered to me by the evil one.
“That I am never alone”
I was far from alone during training camp. Community was sooooooo real! This was a community of people that just loved on each other and brought Jesus into everything that they did and I never got tired of it.
We learned about the different ways people are able to hear the Holy Spirit and I learned very quickly that mine was through nature and worship. We were allowed to experiment with other pathways which was cool. I got to sit and look at a forest for about a half hour and journal. Then we went in the training center and literally just got to listen to an acoustic guitar player play some tunes and sing along with whatever we were feeling. Knowing now how easily approachable our God is is so comforting. I don’t ever have to feel alone.
“You’re a good good father”
Oh goodness how this is true!!! Our Heavenly Father is ALWAYS GOOD! When this was played during worship people were literally screaming this as they should.
We had to do this crazy hike with our big packs on. 2.2 miles in 38 minutes in the very humid Georgia weather. We got through it, but man that next morning I had just about the worst kink in my neck because of how hard I pushed during the hike. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done physically. Having that kink in my neck did not make my morning very enjoyable and it put me in a pretty bad mood, but as soon as I got to morning session after breakfast my squad/teammates showed nothing but kindness. I mean people were offering me medicine, back rubs, and essential oils to try to help me feel better. I was so touched because this was the love of Jesus shining through them. Jesus sees us in our time of misery and wants to sit there with us and be there and make things better we just have to allow Him to take over.
He is such a good father. His love for us is so big.
The last few days we were there everyone just enjoyed their time together. We had our last couple of worship sessions and some of us slept in hammocks for the last little bit because we were too lazy to set up our tents again. Leaving from the airport was sad, but I know that we all kind of needed some time to miss each other for a bit before we are together 24/7 month after month. These next few weeks I’ll be preparing for launch and spending lots of time with my sweet family.
Thank you to everyone who helped me get to this point. I would have never gotten here on my own. If you want to know more about my training camp feel free to contact me at (702)-338-1153 or you can email me [email protected]
Much love,
Jess
