1 week… 7 Days… 168 Hours… 10,080 minutes until TRAINING CAMP!
This time next Monday, I will have arrived in Georgia to begin 2 weeks of Training camp to prepare us for our departure in September. There are a million thoughts running through my head from last minute items I need, to making sure I can set up my tent right (yikes!), to making sure everything is in order before I leave. I catch myself getting swept up in the excitement and worry of it all that I forget to be still and remember why we are doing this.
So as my fellow squamates and I prepare to come together, worship, learn, and glorify God through training camp I want to remind myself why I am doing this…Why WE are doing this.
- It’s a calling! – Not everyone can say that. What a privilege it is to be able to say that the Lord has called me, little old me, to walk on this journey with him. I may be MORE unqualified for this than anybody on my squad but that’s ok. He has a purpose. He didn’t just pull my name out of a bowl and I get to be the lucky winner. No, He CHOSE me. What an honor, Lord, it is to be able to spend this upcoming year loving on your children and glorifying you through my daily work.
- Love Never Fails – I honestly cannot sit here and tell you what I am about to experience over the next year. I don’t know the people that I am going to meet, or the cultures that I will encounter, or the trials that lay ahead. What I can tell you is that my sole purpose over the next year is to spread Christ’s love wherever I go. There is a reason that when you live in the light of Christ’s love that there is a difference in how you act, how you approach, how you treat others, and how you feel every day. I want others to know and be able to experience this type of love. I want others to see my actions, hear my words and be inspired to spread that love further. The turmoil in our world is so great these days, I know that if a few more people got out there and spread the kind of love that is talked about in 1 Corinthians 13, it WILL make a difference.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, It does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”
1 Corinthians 13: 4-8a (NIV)
- Discontentment – Big word, so many meanings. Don’t get me wrong, I am so happy to be alive and well! I am blessed beyond measure with my earthly success, the love of people around me, and my material blessings. But theres a difference when you own the fact that you are a daughter of Christ. A light switch is turned on and there is a fire thats lit inside. This fire is where my discontentment lies. I WANT to know my God on the most intimate of levels. I NEED for Jesus to be the one and only being, thing, and necessity in my life. I have the DESIRE for money, men, clothes, success, work, and so many other earthly pleasures to mean ABSOLUTELY nothing to me because I have Jesus. Over this next year, change is going to happen. It already has. I want to embrace it all. I so want to be the daughter that each night when I lay my head down, God can say “Well done my child.”. He has called me to something greater than this and I am ready to take the path to figure out what that may be.
- To Share my God – The Ultimate Reason why I am doing the Race. Others have to know about My God. They have to know how He has changed my life forever in less than a year. They have to know about his ability to pull me out of my deepest darkest point, hold me close, and tell me that I am loved each day. Others have to know about how he offers me grace and mercy to kneel at the cross and lift up my mistakes, burdens and worries for him to bear; how I am made new each day. They have to know that my God is the most loving, honest, gracious, dependable God. Others need to understand that when you live in His presence, it’s a different type of living where life has more meaning, each day is more precious, and each step I take is with intention and trust in His plan. That is my God and I have to share Him because He is always looking for more sons and daughters to realize that they too have always been able to call Him their God.
That is why I am doing this. I am a bottle of emotions ranging from both ends of the spectrum. I am so ready some days, and so NOT ready other days. But thats ok. It’s happening and I can’t wait to look back this time next year at the person I used to be! I’m going to leave you with some lyrics from a great song by Steven Curtis Chapman which sums up this next year pretty well!
“And this is going to be a glorious unfolding
Just you wait and see and you will be amazed
You’ve just got to believe the story is so far from over
So hold on to every promise God has made to us
And watch this glorious unfolding
God’s plan from the start
For this world and your heart
Has been to show His glory and His grace
Forever revealing the depth and the beauty of
His unfailing Love
And the story has only begun”
