Two Week Update !!

Where do I even begin? So much has happened over the past 2 weeks since I left home for this trip. I completely forgot to write last Monday in order to give an update after the first week (oops, I’ve been pretty busy but I’m going to start writing more often :)). I’ve got a lot of things to share and I’m beyond excited to give you an idea of how God has been working in my life during these last two weeks! 

Training Camp: 

To start, I arrived in Gainesville, GA two weeks ago and met my team for the first time. I was a little nervous to get to meet everyone, but after the first night I could tell that God truly hand-crafted this team. It’s hard to explain the bond that we have developed over such a short amount of time, but it truly is something special and I am beyond thankful for each and every one of them. Hopefully I can attach a photo of our team with this blog post so y’all can see them! As a team we spent three nights in Gainesville as part of our training. During those few days and nights we had a whole lot of fun getting to know each other and learning what it looks like to sleep on the floor in one giant room. Also, apparently I talked in my sleep and may have even had a conversation with one of my teammates while sleeping (lol always an adventure). During training camp we spent a lot of our time worshipping. And let me just tell you, there is nothing like singing with a room full of people who love Jesus and don’t care what other people may think. It is truly special. We also were able to listen to several amazing messages, including a topic about our identity in Christ. This is something that I have been studying and truly trying to grasp so it was so cool for that to be a major point during training camp. There were a lot of other cool moments, but from the very beginning I knew that God was a part of what was going on and He wanted to do some work in my heart (and boy has He continued to work :)).

North Carolina: 

After three days at training camp, we said goodbye to the other teams that were there and made our trip to Black Mountain, North Carolina. We have been staying in the community at Excel college and I have been blown away by the things that God is doing. From the very first night here I could tell that God is the main focus of everything that goes on around here and it has been an absolute privilege to be able to be here. Before coming on this trip I had never heard of Excel college, but basically it is a community of people who do life together. The students that go to college go to class Mon-Fri from around 8:30-12:30, but it is so much more than just an education. The students (as well as some people who are not in the college) literally all do life together and it has to be one of the coolest things that I have ever seen. Each Tuesday and Thursday they have this thing called “All-team”, where everyone comes together in their community center and eats dinner together. After having this time of fellowship there is a time of worship and then it is followed by a message. Not only that, but on the other days of the week all of the girls in the community eat together and the guys do the same. When I say that the people here do life together, they actually do life together. The community here is exactly what I think of when I think of the church in the New Testament. This is the first thing that came to mind when we arrived and it is something that is continuing to be redefined in my mind.

In addition to being in an amazing community, we have had the opportunity to be serving at the Black Mountain Home for Children Thrift Store during the week! This has been such a great experience as well. During our time there we are able to serve the community in such practical ways. Whether that means helping sort clothes, tag clothes, take the trash out, clean the bathrooms, sweep and mop the floors, work in the cafe, move furniture around, work the registers, or even help with landscaping (me and the weed-eater got some talking to do if I see him again lol). But in all seriousness, it has been so cool to serve in such practical ways and be able to make a difference in the lives of the people here in North Carolina. Typically we work at the cafe Tuesday-Thursday and then on Monday and Friday we serve here at the Excel community in whatever ways are needed. Saturday is our adventure day and so far we have spent them playing soccer for three hours (yeah I may have gotten dehydrated, but hey at least I scored ya know) and going on a hike to a waterfall! It has been nothing short of an adventure 🙂

Some pretty darn cool stuff: 

Now for some super super cool stuff that I want to share. There have been some things that God has been doing, not just in my heart but also in the lives of those around me. Heading back to training camp, from the very first night my leader said something that has stuck with me. She said, “comparison is nothing but a thief of joy.” UMM HELLO, STRAIGHT WISDOM RIGHT THERE! Little did I know that comparison can play a huge role in my life, even if it is something small. God has been so gracious to me in this and continued to work in my heart with this. Another thing that stuck with me from the first day of training camp is the verse John 13:35, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” It’s not by our church attendance or our performance that people will know that we are Jesus’ disciples. It’s by the love that we have for each other! This is a love that can only come from the source and it is our command to love others as Jesus loved us. Now there has been a whole lot more that I have been learning and God is continuing to show me different things about Him and myself, but this is getting long so I will save it for another time (or you can ask me about it hehe :)).

There is one other thing that I want to share because I am still trying to process just how good God truly is. So one of my teammates has a chronic illness called POTS. This is an illness that deals with blood circulation and is a form of dysautonomia — a disorder of the autonomic nervous system. This branch of the nervous system regulates functions we don’t consciously control, such as heart rate, blood pressure, sweating and body temperature. In addition to this, she has severe neck and back pain. One example of the effects is that during worship she is unable to raise her hands for more than a few seconds because she loses blood flow to her fingers. Now I am still processing what I am about to say next, but I fully believe that God performed a miracle and COMPLETELY HEALED her from this illness. I saw it with my very eyes. And I don’t say this lightly because I have never seen anything like this before and whenever there is a story of healing I have always had a hard time believing it myself. But I witnessed this firsthand and I genuinely believe that it was the power of God that healed her this past Thursday night. After spending some time worshipping and singing around a fire, someone shared a story about how somewhere was healed of a leg pain and then my teammate courageously asked for us to pray for healing over her. And let me tell you, I have never felt the Spirit of God move in such a way before. As a group we prayed over her for probably 15 minutes, just crying out to God and man did He show up. Immediately after we got done praying she told us that the pain in her neck disappeared and that it was the first time in over a year that she didn’t feel the pain. I was literally in tears. Not only that, but the next night we had a worship night. And guess what, she was able to raise her hands the entire night!!!! She never lost blood flow to her fingers and she was able to jump around and praise God. NOW ISN’T THAT AMAZING, PRAISE GOD!! I am still in complete awe of it and it is now four days later, but I am learning that God is a lot bigger and better than I could ever imagine. It’s actually cool because at training camp I talked about how I was skeptical of healings and different things like that, but my leader didn’t tell me what to believe or force anything on me, she just told me to ask God to help me and to seek Him to find answers. And … well … answers He gave. God is so much greater than I ever imagined and I am only beginning to understand His power, His love, His grace, His mercy, and His forgiveness.

Wrapping it up … I promise 🙂

Now if you have made it this far, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I know that this is a long post (I promise to update more often so it doesn’t get so long), but I love you so much. Thank you for taking the time to invest in my life and see all that God is doing during this trip. I hope that you take the time to dig deeper into God’s love and what it truly means to love others. I’m going to include a short list of some things that you can be praying for as I continue serving here in North Carolina with my team.

Prayers:

– For my amazing team. That we will continue to grow in community together and serve with loving and joyful hearts in whatever we do.

– For the Excel community. That they will continue to embody what the church should look like. Also that our team may be a blessing to them.

– For the Black Mountain community. That our team will be able to serve and build relationships that point people to Jesus.

– For myself. That I will continue to grow and allow God to break boxes in my life. That I will learn what it means to follow Him and for people to see His love through me.

– For yourself. That you will not just hear these amazing things that God is doing, but that you will praise God for them. May God be glorified in your prayers.

Thank you again for reading this, you hold a special place in my heart 🙂

This is my AWESOME TEAM btw :))