As many of you know, I just returned from training camp a few day ago (camp took place Oct 13-20th in north GA)…How would I describe training camp? Honestly, it’s almost too crazy to describe, but the best description I can come up with is that it was a wild paradigm of opposites….
–Challenging yet amazing, feeling broken yet set free, exhausted yet so full of life
Needless to say, the Lord was working on my heart big time this week. He was pulling things out of me that had been buried, bringing things to light I had never seen, giving me a deep desire for the hearts of my teammates and most of all giving me a fresh passion for seeing His Kingdom and His glory revealed in my life.
We camped in our tents (by ourselves and with teammates), we slept 60 adults plus all our gear on a children’s school bus, we made shelter, cooked meals over a campfire and slept in a swampland together. We praised our God together and learned to hear from Him in new ways…we became united. United as a squad and united in Christ. It was a powerful week to say the least…powerful and life-changing.
So maybe not quite as many tents as I had pictured in Night 3: Our crazy night on the bus…not a whole
my last blog…but there were definately a whole lot! lot of sleeping going on.
Before coming to training camp I really tried to surrender my expectations for the squad, for my future team and for leadership. The Lord and I had many conversations about these things before I left and most of them included me saying to the Lord, “You know my heart, you know what I need. You know my heart is anxious about being called to be a leader and I think we would both agree this would be a great season for me to learn how to follow more than lead….right Lord?” Not so much. It’s true He knows my heart and He knows what I need, and in this next season that includes stretching me, growing me and allowing me to see myself in the ways He sees me.
We learned a lot about hearing God this week, both for ourselves and for our teammates. One teaching that really stuck out to me this week is that, “God wants you to be His hands and feet, but He also wants you to be His VOICE.” I learned that speaking words of truth, encouragement and life over others is powerful. The voice of the Lord sometimes comes as a whisper from the Holy Spirit and sometimes it comes as a shout.
I am thankful that the Lord deals tenderly with my heart because He knows often I need time to process all He is doing (especially when it contrasts with what I had planned for myself). This past week the whispers kept coming- through His word, through the mouths of my teammates and squad leaders, and through the Holy Spirit washing over my heart.
-“You are called to a life of leadership. You are not just called to a support role, you are meant to be a
Moses not an Aaron”
-“You have the heart and humility of a great leader, high moral character and a strong presence about
you”
-“For God did not give us a spirit of fear or timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.”
2Timothy 1:7
Even though words like this persisted throughout the week I still attempted to resist, knowing that our squad is filled with so many powerful leaders and surely He wouldn’t calling me to be one of them. Eventually the accumulation of whispers became a shout in my heart that I could no longer ignore. Near the end of the week, when I realized the proposition of leadership was coming my way I finally fully surrendered to whatever the Lord had for me and left it completely in His hands. The peace He blessed me with was unreal compared to the anxious heart I had previously had about leadership.
When I was officially asked to be a team leader I already knew in my heart the Lord wanted me to say yes, but I took the time they gave us to pray about it once more. I thanked God for where He was calling me, surrendered again to the ways He was leading, and similar to a child who has received directions from her father I asked once again for confirmation. It was so beautiful because I was praying in a shady, tree-filed field and just as the request for confirmation was voiced in my heart the Lord brought the sun up over the trees on full blast soaked me in His warmth and light. In that moment I heard the Holy Spirit whisper to my heart, “Shine my light. Feed my sheep.” That was the final confirmation I needed in order to walk joyfully into all He had for me.
I am so thankful for a God who knows our hearts so completely, and who has such better plans for us than we have for ourselves. I am also thankful for the disciples the Lord chose to surround me with next year who are willing to speak boldly into my life the truths of the Lord. I am humbled, to say the least, but I am also confident in the direction He is calling me. I am so excited to experience all this next year brings and to share it with you all!!
Look out for my next blog about my wonderful teammates, squad mates and squad leaders plus more training camp pics!! 🙂 Here is a sneak peak of some of their lovely faces…
Our beautiful team! I am soo blessed by each of them! The amazing other team leaders I will be serving alongside.
From the left: Kurt, Melanie, Kacie, Me (Melissa), From top left: Jolene, Emily, Eric, Justin, Michael.
Jacquelyn, Estie and Thomas Bottom left: Kayla, Me & Nicole
“I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we can ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations, forever and ever! Amen.” Ephesians 3:16-21
Let that sink in 🙂
