I have so much on my mind and so much on my heart. First and foremost, I need to acknowledge the fact that I am so in love with Jesus Christ right now its incredible. It's such a comforting feelings knowing that my entire life is in good nail-pierced hands.
This past weekend I went up to Williams, Arizona to a camp called Lost Canyon.
I have been there twice before. Once as a student, once as a worker and now as a coach. I can honestly say that going up as a coach was the best experience there. I lead a group of 7 amazing and beautiful 16 year old high school girls and i had the privilege of coaching 6 of them this weekend.
It's alot of hard work and a huge time commitment. And sometimes its frustrating and feels like your wasting your time. But this weekend all of that paid off. I got to see the benefits of all of it.One of my best friends, Ashley, is a coach as well and we ended up in the same cabin(only after a little persuasion of course:]) and we both had 6 sophomore girls so we decided to combine our small group and it was the best decision we made all weekend.
Our girls got along so well and encouraged each other through it all. We were like a little family. During small group time the girls just blew me away with how vulnerable and honest they were. But also with just the things they were saying about wanting to follow Christ. Hearing those girls talk about how much they wanted to dedicate and live their lives for God brought goosebumps to my arms and tears to my eyes. NOTHING is more rewarding then hearing someone you've been trying to lead say that they want God in their life.Another rewarding aspect of the weekend was my time with Ashley.
We were close before but this weekend just brought us so much closer. I've had some rough friendships in the past and everyone knows I have a tough time getting along with girls. But Ashley and I are so much alike and just get along so well, its so refreshing. Most of the friends i've had who claim to be christians do not live their lives that way but it was amazing to be able to lead along side of her and know that we both mean exactly what we are saying. Teaching and training those girls together was totally awesome because we got to learn from each other and also experience each other's girls in new ways.Although it was a high school retreat and I was a coach, I felt like I learned just as much as the students. Jeremy Jernigan, the 3F teaching pastor, was our speaker and even though I hear him every week and know him on a somewhat personal level, I learned more from him this weekend than I ever have before. He has a way of making God feel so real and so alive in your daily life. It's remarkable. Also, the 3F band rocked so hard. And they are all some of my closest friends but they totally brought it.
Worship is such a huge connector to God its so cool. If you ask any student what their favorite part of the weekend was I guarantee you most of them will say worship. But besides the production and all of the hype, I can just say that God was so present. If God was visible he would have been standing right in the middle of that camp spreading his arms out to the farthest corners of the camp.This weekend our main point was trusting God with our lives. This is something I've always struggled with. I'll give him the majority of my life but i'll keep parts to myself and tell him I'll take care of those areas. But lately I've learned its so much easier to just throw it all at him. He knows whats best for me better than I do so why not let him handle it? It used to be such a hard concept for me to grasp but now it seems likes such an easy decision. Just give it to him. That simple. One of the questions in our small group time was; When you encounter a problem how much do you trust God and how much do you trust yourself to handle it? Most of us would answer this question the same. We trust ourselves. When we come across a problem we just automatically go into "me-mode" instead of stopping in our tracks and asking God for help. One thing I'm really happy about is the fact that I have been going to God right way lately. When I sense a problem arising or if I'm hurting or upset the first thing I do is drop to my knees and ask God to help me take care of it. After I do that a sense of calmness and stability hits and I know God's right there with me. I cant describe it but its such a cool feeling.
This weekend had its hard times but I think its exactly what I needed. Pretty much every aspect of my life was affected and there were certain aspects that needed to be affected. I got some confirmation and alot of hope. But all in all, this weekend was one of the best weekends of my life and I was nowhere near ready to come back to reality.
Reality comes back with its stresses and worries. Like I said, I have a million things on my mind and heart right now. I need to make some HUGE decisions really fast and i feel like I can't win any way. Alot of things are going to be compromised and people are going to be disappointed but like a good friend told me today if I make decisions based on other people's reactions I may not be doing the right thing. I've been told multiple times today to just picture the future and see whats really going to matter in the long run. There are really only two things I can picture in my future for sure and one is God, the other is a person. Everything else is up in the air and I don't know anything for sure. I'm feeling completely overwhelmed and overcommitted. I'm only 19 years old and I feel like I'm 46 and having to make huge life changing decisions. Life can be so hard and confusing sometimes. But I totally believe that everything happens for a reason. And although we may not like it at the time, God's plan will always prevail over ours. Sometimes he just wants us to trust him, which is exactly what I plan on doing with all these big decisions. I'm not ready to talk about what going on quite yet, but when the time is right I will reveal what God and I are working on in my life. Let's just say, I'm making these decisions for me, not for anyone else. I apologize in advance for letting anyone down or making a decision that you don't agree with but I committed my life to Christ so I will go where He leads me.
