TC CliffsNotes: He must become greater, I must become less.

 
 
It’s been five days and five nights (in my very own bed!) since I returned from simultaneously the most wonderfully exhausting and reviving week of my life. I’ve tried to process all that went down at training camp – my new family, the breakdowns, breakthroughs, new insights, constant prayer, can’t-keep-still-even-if-I-tried worship, and so much more. There’s a lot, so for your sake, I’ll give you the CliffsNotes version… 

• TRUE COMMUNITY: I got to see and experience what true community is all about – sharing belongings and tents, serving one another without keeping score, using our distinctive gifts to build one another up, sharing a good poop story or two (yes, I just wrote that), and having fun, resting in the knowledge that our Father loves us more than we could ever know. I didn’t know it was possible to love 50-something strangers so quickly and so fully, but God is everywhere in K Squad, and so it happened without even trying. 

• FREEDOM. If I could sum up what God did in my heart this week in one word, it would be: freedom. Like a lot of people, I felt God meet me where I was, heal wounds I didn’t know I still had, bring back memories I had repressed only to truly free me from them, and remind me that all things are possible with Him. I came out of our sessions and times of worship feeling a hundred pounds lighter, literally feeling the chains come off me and understanding, perhaps for the first time, what freedom in Christ really means. I am excited that what I pour out into other people this year will be all Jesus — no longer with any of my own hurts, sin, and experiences mixed in. All week I found myself echoing John the Baptist’s prayer: “He must become greater, I must become less.” (John 3:30) As another flawed human being, I have nothing to offer the people we meet, but Jesus has everything to offer us. I found unbelievable freedom in that secure truth. 

• His constant, stop-at-nothing pursuit of all of us. Our God is a jealous God. This week I became acutely aware of His pursuit of my heart, as well as the hearts of my teammates and our families. He impressed upon me that this journey is a fight for all of God’s children, the ones we meet this year and the ones we leave at home. While praying for a squadmate as a group, someone said that they felt that this mission trip is a fight for her sister at home. Once I heard this, I couldn’t get it out of my head, and I felt that that was true for me as well – for my family and friends. Chances are, if you are someone who has been in my life for any semi-significant period of time, I thought about you this week. A lot. I’m sorry if that’s creepy, but it’s true. God has set it on my heart that this adventure is SO not about me. Yes, He wants to do a lot of work in and through me, but I am just a small piece of the puzzle. His call for me to follow Him on this is yet another way that He is surrounding YOU, pursuing YOU, and asking YOU to love Him and trust Him. He’s using this trip as a way to get to you and your heart.