Thursday night, I was sitting in the kitchen at my mom’s surrounded by my siblings, grandparents and my mom. I was clean, my hair was washed for the first time in 10 days, I wasn’t sweating bullets and I was eating my favorite foods for dinner but something didn’t feel right. I had this ache in my heart and a lump in my throat. I was adamant that the flood gates behind my eyes, that have not been as successful as I would like with stopping the tears, would somehow hold back the waterfall that was attempting to break through.
I don’t know if it is because I am still absolutely exhausted after 48 hours of being home and the best 2 nights of sleep I have had in a while or if it is because I have so much in my heart and on my mind that I don’t know where to begin to process.
Whatever it is, I know one thing:
I am not the same person who left 12 days ago for World Race Training Camp! That girl is gone and a newer, braver, more confident woman is evolving in her place.
There is something about living in community that changes you and makes you realize how truly beautiful community is.
There is something about literally feeling the Holy Spirit in a tangible way for the first time in your life that makes your heart shatter into pieces on the ground and tears come to your eyes every time you think back to that moment.
There is something about vulnerability and when you realize that it really isn’t a bad thing but a truly beautiful thing. I have found that when we are the most vulnerable with others, we are the most beautiful versions of ourselves.
There is something about sharing things with people you just met that you have never even told your best friend…or said out loud to yourself because you were too ashamed to admit whatever it is.
There is something about letting your guard down and allowing yourself to cry…allowing the tears to run down your face with no embarrassment and allowing others to love you.
There is something about humbling yourself to the point of allowing people to love you and serve you…and actually accepting the love…a point of letting people in when it usually takes months or years to let people in to who you are.
There is something about that moment you realize that those 49 strangers you met not even 24 hours before truly love you and would do anything for you, even do the 2 mile hike again with you when they don’t have to…and you don’t understand why.
There is something about that moment God tells you that you are exactly where He wants you…and you start crying because it is the first time all week you feel at peace.
There is something about the moment when all the anxiety and fear you have been feeling and holding onto literally disappears into thin air and you can breathe deeply because you feel the Lord’s presence holding you.
There is something about when someone tells you that God sees you and that He LOVES you and He wants to hold you…and you don’t believe it until the next night when God literally throws it into your face and you can’t hide from it…and you sob into a stranger’s arms.
There is something about that moment when the speaker asks if anyone wants to share what the Lord told them during the time of listening prayer and your hand shoots straight up…and on your way up the the stage the only thing you can say is “What the hell am I doing?” because you are the last person in the world who people would expect to do this…and you HATE being vulnerable.
There is something about sharing in front of over 300 people the one thing you hate telling people only because of fear of what they would think of you and they would treat you differently…and then you end up in the middle of a 49 person group hug just for you.
There is something about that moment when you hand over a folded up piece of paper with all the labels that have been placed on you by yourself and others through your life…it is freeing yet terrifying.
There is something beautiful yet weird about that moment you cry happy tears and tears of relief for the first time in your life because you had heard that there were many different types of tears but the only ones you had ever cried were of hurt and sadness.
There is something about baby wipe “baths” being acceptable, bucket showers being a luxury, sharing one plate of food with 7 other people for every meal, having no coffee or tea for 10 days, sleeping in less than ideal situations, getting your best night of sleep in a hammock, worshipping the Lord around a campfire in the middle of the woods with your whole squad, being 110% outside your comfort zone, you realize you can do so much more physically than you thought and the fact that “alone time” means sitting in a rocking chair with your eyes closed pretending there is no one around you.
It changes you…it challenges you…it grows you.
I have been changed. I am not the same Marybeth who left for Georgia a nervous wreck. I have had chains broken and my cup filled. I have been filled up and wrung out like a sponge. I have been challenged…physically, emotionally and spiritually.
I came home absolutely exhausted yet more alive and full of energy than when I left. There is nothing I would trade this experience for.
I grew in my relationship with Christ. I call him Daddy, He calls me Daughter. He holds my heart. What more could I want than to grow even deeper in this relationship with the true Lover of my Soul?
If the Lord has done this much in just 10 days, I can’t even begin to imagine what He has up his sleeves for the next 11 months!
I am physically home but emotionally and mentally, I am still at Training Camp surrounded by people who became my second family and who stood with me as God broke down walls and barriers that had been there for years made of bomb-proof material.
So, if I seem distant or in my own little world, please meet me there and allow me to continue to process all that my eyes and heart have experienced. As I say this, please also challenge me and help me to live in the present. Help me not to dwell on the past or dwell on what the next 11 months will be like. Help me stay focused in the here and now.
