Writing a blog post about training camp is so stinkin’ hard. There are so many thoughts racing around my head. I cant seem to grab them, and put them in words that make a lick of sense. Before this post, I have already scratched and trashed a few others. I would finish them, read them over, and realize that they didn’t even come close to portraying how I felt about those ten days in small town Georgia. So I would delete it all and start over.
So this time, I am going to try something a little different. I am a pretty big fan of making lists, so I am just going to spill out all of those words in one long list and hope for the best. Here it goes.
1. During Training Camp, I got to see the Lord move in amazing ways, like I had never experienced before. I saw the walls that people had built up crumble in the presence of the Lord’s loving power. I saw my squad come together as a body of believers to pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ all through the night. People’s physical and emotional hurts were healed, and a passion was renewed in our lives. It was crazy. During worship, we would sing:
“Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Come flood our hearts and fill the atmosphere!”
I can not describe any better what happened. The Holy Spirit was present folks. And it was amazing.
2. The church is not a set of four walls with a few pews and a pulpit. The church is not a meeting place. The church is not even where you go to be a good Christian. Let me tell you what the church is. The church is a body of believers united under Christ. Our squad is a church. I learned more about what church really means, and what Christian community really is, sweating like crazy in a campsite with these crazy people than I ever did in sunday school. Our squad is composed of so many different people, with unique talents, personalities, and gifts. All together, they make up the body of Christ. A body that is on fire with the passion for Christ, and with a heart burdened for the lost.
3. I learned a lot of practical life skills. For one, if you ever have a few hundred people using about fifteen porta potties, you need to have them cleaned out often.. very often. Let me tell you. Those things fill up fast. Add that to the Georgia heat, and man, its enough to make you pass out. Also, I now know that crickets taste like sunflower seeds, and when your whole backpack gets stuck in the rain, you better dry that thing out ASAP before the smell sets in! Learning is so fun.
5. The World Race is going to be hard. I mean, I knew it was going to be hard. But I don’t think I realized quite how hard it was going to be. It is all very overwhelming. Honestly, It took me a long time to process. Going into training camp, I knew very little about the specific details of the race. I was trusting God, but it is easy to trust God when you don’t know the details. You don’t know what you are even trusting Him with! Now, I know a lot more, and that makes it harder. Now I know what I am trusting God with, and the selfish part of me wants to try and to it all myself. That’s impossible. There is no way that I can do this next year- that is, without the Lord. During training camp, I made the deliberate decision to trust God completely and entirely. I am trusting him with what I do not know, and every single detail that I do know. I can not do it without him, and neither would I want to.
I really hope that all of that made sense. No matter how hard I try, I don’t think that I would describe the experience of training camp in words. But, I hope that I was able to show you a glimpse of how the Lord is working in my life. I can’t wait to tell you what happens next!
