We had debrief in Brasov, Romania, and although the city is breathtaking, I was felt like it was hard to breathe for many different reasons. First of all, I was 2 days late because I flew to Finland for my brother’s wedding. I had traveled for 18 hours by the time I arrived, and when I got there the whole squad was praying for Andy, who was going back to the States. Everyone was crying and everyone had a different hair-do or hair color. It felt like I had walked in at a very awkward moment and like I had been gone for 6 months. The next day, our team had debrief, and it was extremely intense. I never felt the Holy Spirit move like that in a debrief before. It was so thick, the only thing you could do was cry. I was elated though, because our team had some hard-core breakthrough moments….praise God. At worship that night, Sean started praying for the children, that we had come in contact with over the course of our race. And there it was…….I completely lost it! All I could think about was the kids that had been molested and I said out loud “Here it comes.” It felt like God had turned my heart upside down and poured out every ounce of hurt and pain that I had been carrying. I know I needed it to move on, but man that hurt. The next day was even more intense. I couldn’t explain what was happening to my heart, but any time a person cried….I cried. If a person laughed or even told a joke……I cried. If a person prayed……I cried. I know that God was ripping things off of me that didn’t need to be there, and I know He was healing my heart, but I haven’t been that vulnerable since Ghana, which was 3 months ago. And once again, I thought the worst was over. Nope….not yet…He wasn’t done. I knew that I needed to lay down the one thing that I had been holding onto for dear life. I had this thing in a death grip and I wasn’t about to let it go, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to heal or fully move on until I did. So the best way I can describe it is, God had turned me inside out, and I felt like people could see the flesh underneath my bones….it was raw and it was very sensitive. I knew salt was about to be sprinkled onto it, and it was going to hurt like you know what.
During my first morning at debrief, during a teaching from Mike Paschall, God whispered to me, “Go to the cross……Go to the cross and grieve.” So after I grieved that night, I thought I was done. Not even close. I didn’t want to hold on to this thing that I needed to let go of any longer, so Justine and I walked to a nearby gas station to talk about it. Afterwards we tried to find a grassy spot to pray and release it. As we started walking, I looked to my left, and low and behold, I saw a cross. We walked over to this grassy pasture full of cows and bulls and sat there next to it. I felt exposed and embarrassed, but I knew the only choice I had was to release it. So I spoke a prayer out-loud repenting for trying to control my own destiny and grieving, repenting for holding something hostage that possibly didn’t belong to me and grieving, releasing it back to God and grieving, and letting it go and grieving. Talk about feeling like you have just been run over my a massive train, that is probably the best way I can describe my time at this debrief. It was good, so good, but it was extremely painful.
