2 Corinthians 5:17
So I've been learning a lot lately about what it means to truly devote myself to God in my music, specifically in my trumpet playing. At camp, I felt like it wouldn't be right for me to play in the worship band toward the beginning of the summer because I didn't want to play just for the sake of playing. I felt like I would be playing to stay in shape, and I wanted to leave that behind and focus on what He had for me. But at the end of the summer when band camp and band/orchestra placement auditions came around, I realized that the Lord had given me the opportunity to worship Him with my talents all summer, but I had refused to take it for the sake of suppressing my pride. I became the servant in Matthew 25:14-30 who buried the talent his master had given him, for fear of losing it or using it with no profit. I didn't want to build up my pride by adding myself into the worship team and performing in front of the camp every week. But all God was asking me was to use the talent He has given me. I asked Him at the beginning of the summer to help me maintain my playing ability through camp, but I missed my chance, which was the greatest chance of all: to play in a worship band for a bunch of kids. I could have played and allowed the Lord to redeem any pride that I allowed to build up inside of me, but I hid my talent away for the summer instead. So I paid the price for it when my audition came around, although He remained faithful to help me through it.
Then last night happened: the Battle Hymn solo auditions. Every year the Redcoat Band has three or four trumpet soloists who play the intro to the Battle Hymn of the Republic. Eighteen people tried out last night, and by God's grace I ended up being one of the four selected to be Battle Hymn soloists. I think He had a few reasons for giving me this honor. First, He's giving me a chance to redeem myself and offer myself completely to Him by putting on display the talent He has given me. Plus, up there in the upper deck, southwest corner I can put Christ on display for the people sitting up there by the way I act.
But He also has another reason that I just realized. It's a continuation of what I was learning this summer: confidence. My friend Shelby jokingly asked me earlier today, "Are you freaking out yet?" My answer was to the effect of, "Not quite yet, but I'm sure it will hit me the night before and the morning of my first solo performance." But then I realized what I had said. I was pretty much forecasting my fear, surrendering my will to my nerves. Yes, I said it based on my past experiences with big moments like this, but I don't have to be defined by my past. Who I am today isn't bound to who I was yesterday. This is both a blessing and a motivator: Because of my redemption by the blood of Christ, my past mistakes no longer determine who I am going to be; but on the other hand, all of yesterday's triumphs in Jesus' name are not enough for today. Each day I am allotted 24 hours to surrender to the Lord, and I must give Him all of it. Yesterday's hours of surrender do not add up to count toward today's hours. This should motivate me to seek Him actively every day, because when Jesus returns, if I surrender something new to the Lord every day, the sum of each day's submission will be that much closer to consuming my entire being. I should seek to surrender more of myself to God each day. At the same time, just because I have tended to remain calm until my nerves hit me shortly before big performances or presentations in the past doesn't mean that that is how it's always going to be. I am a new man every day. Michael on Friday, August 24th is not the same Michael that existed on Thursday, August 23rd. Neither am I the same person I was when I went in to my concert band audition last week. And I am not the same person I will be next Saturday on game day.
Just like the Lord has been teaching me since the spring, I need to stay focused on the here and now and live one day at a time. So as I prepare for my first performance of the Battle Hymn solo (well, at a football game, that is), I am determined to remember that "the old has gone, the new has come!" Even though my nerves have typically messed with me immediately before performances in the past, I am choosing to trust in the Lord and know that He has given me this opportunity to worship Him, and worship does not require skill or perfect performance, but only the heart and intention behind it. It is by His grace alone that my personal worship leads others to worship as well, and that is my prayer: that by my attitude in the upper deck, and as a Redcoat in general, others would see Christ in me and find that He is worth getting to know.
And I also apply this same prayer to my everyday life, asking God to help me remember to live each day as if it the only chance I will ever get to live. I pray that I would constantly keep my eyes fixed on Christ, straight ahead, not turning to the left or to the right, and that I would always live life to the fullest of the potential He has given me in everything. I pray that I would never be content with anything less than total devotion to the Lord in every area of my life. When I feel spiritually dry, I want to learn to thank God, because that dryness means that I have experienced greater spiritual saturation before and I am hungry and unwilling to remain in a place that is not as advanced as I have experienced before. I have drawn close to the Lord in the past, and I want to live in that position of communion with God moment by moment. I want to be in a state of constant prayer. I want my mindset to be one of taking thoughts captive and making them obedient to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). I want my attitude to be one of constant worship and submission to the Lord's will as I live continually in His presence. I pray that I would not allow myself to identify myself with my past failures, but that I would eagerly take hold of the truth that I am a new creation every day.
And I pray all of these things for all my brothers and sisters in Christ, and I hope you will join me in praying for these things as well. God bless!
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Overflow
Last weekend a group of us got together to pray for the school year, and overflow was a recurring word that night. It seemed like God was implying that overflow is to be a theme for this year. A few verses came to mind when I thought of the word overflow:
I believe the Lord intends to bless us this year with such a fullness of His Spirit and an understanding of His character that when we live for Him, others won't be able to help but notice. I pray that we would be an adequate representative of Christ so that people would be able to see Him in us clearly through our own transparency. I want love for others to be our natural reaction to the love God shows us, because He fills us with so much of Himself that we cannot contain Him within ourselves. When my cup is filled to overflowing with the power of His Spirit, the only place I can store the extra blessings is in someone else's cup. And if I sow generously of His Spirit, I will be emptied of myself so that I can reap abundantly and be filled to overflowing again.
So whether it's in humble acceptance of others, loving devotion, generous giving, being filled with peace and joy, or showing grace and patience, I pray that we would be characterized by a Spirit of abundance that longs to be spent for the sake of others so that we can be filled again, only to give of ourselves even more.
"You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows." ~ Psalm 23:5
"The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks." ~ Luke 6:45
"Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it." ~ Malachi 3:10
"Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you." ~ Psalm 116:7We were praying for the first Freshley meeting, and overflow first came up when I prayed that we would not have to generate any artificial love for the freshmen, but that the love we show them would simply be a result of the overflow of love the Lord has shown us. If we love out of such a source of love, then God will be more than pleased to pour out more of His love on us so that we can continue to bless others with His love. God loves to fill those who continually give because He knows that the more abundantly they are filled, the more abundantly they will give.
I believe the Lord intends to bless us this year with such a fullness of His Spirit and an understanding of His character that when we live for Him, others won't be able to help but notice. I pray that we would be an adequate representative of Christ so that people would be able to see Him in us clearly through our own transparency. I want love for others to be our natural reaction to the love God shows us, because He fills us with so much of Himself that we cannot contain Him within ourselves. When my cup is filled to overflowing with the power of His Spirit, the only place I can store the extra blessings is in someone else's cup. And if I sow generously of His Spirit, I will be emptied of myself so that I can reap abundantly and be filled to overflowing again.
So whether it's in humble acceptance of others, loving devotion, generous giving, being filled with peace and joy, or showing grace and patience, I pray that we would be characterized by a Spirit of abundance that longs to be spent for the sake of others so that we can be filled again, only to give of ourselves even more.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
"Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!"
Philippians 4:4
On Sunday I wasn't feeling so great about being back in Athens—that is, outside of the Christian community that I'm so used to being surrounded by all the time. Last year after the Freshley spring break mission trip to Jamaica, we had such strong, constant fellowship that we were always encouraging one another and helping each other grow in Christ. This past summer at Camp Highland, I got used to being in the "camp bubble," where nothing from the outside world matters and where we can devote everything to the Lord, knowing that everyone else is doing the same thing. But when the Redcoat Band was the first thing I jumped into when I got back to Athens, it was as if I had just come inside after being out in the bright sun, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dim light. I knew that the Lord intended to work here in Athens, and I knew that He would bring me back into the community He has blessed me with these last two years, but I was too nearsighted to really see and understand it in the midst of the darkness that covers so much of the band. Just like with the kids this summer, my patience was tested during band camp, and I let it get to me.
But there's a silver lining to this cloud. Throughout the week of band camp, whether the directors and the rest of the band realized it or not, the gospel was being preached very subtly. Despite the darkness that seems to cover the band, the teachings of Jesus Christ—the idea that we are to deny ourselves the immediate pleasures we so often desire, and that we are to humble ourselves and keep ourselves from acting like everything revolves around us—defined the lectures of the directors and lit up the band all week long, even when the band caused their patience to run thin. And it all reached a culminating point tonight when Irby, a former Redcoat and one of the leaders of the Team United Redcoat Bible Study (TURBS), came to practice to make an announcement about the first TURBS meeting. Just like any other Redcoat would do for announcements, he got up on the podium and explained what TURBS is all about... and he dove straight into explaining the gospel. In front of over 430 people, Jesus Christ was proclaimed Lord and Savior by the power of His death on the cross and His resurrection. I could hardly contain myself as Irby fearlessly preached the Good News as if it were a regular topic of discussion among the entire band.
I want to back up some. All of that is what has been happening in Redcoats, but even more has been happening with Freshley/Wesley. Sunday night, my friend Josh (he's more like a brother) got a group of Wesley leaders together, most of whom were on our Jamaica team last year, and we prayed for each other, for the freshmen, and for all of this year. (My friend John also had another separate prayer night, which is really cool because we had two different groups praying passionately for God's will to be done.) We spent the night in awe of everything the Lord is doing and has promised to do. He used each of us to welcome Him and His kingdom here on earth in different ways and to encourage one another in the work and the gifts He has given us. Needless to say, it was a very powerful night that got all of us fired up for the first day of classes.
Then we had Freshley last night. Words can't describe it adequately. During leadership prayer we packed around 100 leaders into the Wesley Prayer Chapel to worship the Lord and to seek Him in prayer for the freshmen and for each other. I've never experienced such authentic worship through music before. As we prayed, the words of the songs we sang seemed to echo our prayers and confirm to us that God is good and faithful to hear and respond to our prayers. Prayer and worship seemed to blur together in a way I've never known before. I've known that prayer and worship go hand in hand, but I've never actually experienced it in that way so clearly before last night. I felt as if I was outside of myself worshiping God and seeking His will. Typically there will be some kind of insecurity or self-consciousness that holds me back from worshiping with everything and pouring out my heart to God, but those chains were gone last night. I found myself with the same excitement and lack of negative self-restraint that I had at camp when I was trying to motivate the campers. And then we got to the actual Freshley service when the freshmen got there, and it was the same way, if not even more so because the freshmen were getting into it too.
During prayer, Elizabeth, one of the interns that I've had the privilege of going to Jamaica with two years in a row, and who will also be my leadership small group (LSG) leader this year, led us to pray that the Lord would create an atmosphere that is thick with the Holy Spirit and that is loving and welcoming and passionate about seeing God glorified. I was talking with one freshman in particular after Freshley, and in his own words, the atmosphere was one of the things he noticed.
Just as I found myself with the same excitement and disregard for my own dignity that I had at camp, I was also taken back to camp in a kind of vision when we sang Into Marvelous Light. I can remember countless times that my cabin would be lagging behind and my co-counselor (whoever it was that week) and I would have to jump up and start running to get them moving. I had a specific image of walking up the hill from the cabins to the gym and suddenly taking off running, urging the campers to follow suit. The Lord used that image to say that others will see and acknowledge our love and excitement and passion for God, and as we live out the abundant life we have been given, they will want to take part in it as well. When we run into marvelous light, we run with a train of people following behind us.
So... Yeah. That discouragement that I had to deal with on Sunday? It's been buried in the grave Jesus rose from. I can't wait to see what God has planned for this year! It may be difficult at times, but I know it will be good.
On Sunday I wasn't feeling so great about being back in Athens—that is, outside of the Christian community that I'm so used to being surrounded by all the time. Last year after the Freshley spring break mission trip to Jamaica, we had such strong, constant fellowship that we were always encouraging one another and helping each other grow in Christ. This past summer at Camp Highland, I got used to being in the "camp bubble," where nothing from the outside world matters and where we can devote everything to the Lord, knowing that everyone else is doing the same thing. But when the Redcoat Band was the first thing I jumped into when I got back to Athens, it was as if I had just come inside after being out in the bright sun, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dim light. I knew that the Lord intended to work here in Athens, and I knew that He would bring me back into the community He has blessed me with these last two years, but I was too nearsighted to really see and understand it in the midst of the darkness that covers so much of the band. Just like with the kids this summer, my patience was tested during band camp, and I let it get to me.
But there's a silver lining to this cloud. Throughout the week of band camp, whether the directors and the rest of the band realized it or not, the gospel was being preached very subtly. Despite the darkness that seems to cover the band, the teachings of Jesus Christ—the idea that we are to deny ourselves the immediate pleasures we so often desire, and that we are to humble ourselves and keep ourselves from acting like everything revolves around us—defined the lectures of the directors and lit up the band all week long, even when the band caused their patience to run thin. And it all reached a culminating point tonight when Irby, a former Redcoat and one of the leaders of the Team United Redcoat Bible Study (TURBS), came to practice to make an announcement about the first TURBS meeting. Just like any other Redcoat would do for announcements, he got up on the podium and explained what TURBS is all about... and he dove straight into explaining the gospel. In front of over 430 people, Jesus Christ was proclaimed Lord and Savior by the power of His death on the cross and His resurrection. I could hardly contain myself as Irby fearlessly preached the Good News as if it were a regular topic of discussion among the entire band.
I want to back up some. All of that is what has been happening in Redcoats, but even more has been happening with Freshley/Wesley. Sunday night, my friend Josh (he's more like a brother) got a group of Wesley leaders together, most of whom were on our Jamaica team last year, and we prayed for each other, for the freshmen, and for all of this year. (My friend John also had another separate prayer night, which is really cool because we had two different groups praying passionately for God's will to be done.) We spent the night in awe of everything the Lord is doing and has promised to do. He used each of us to welcome Him and His kingdom here on earth in different ways and to encourage one another in the work and the gifts He has given us. Needless to say, it was a very powerful night that got all of us fired up for the first day of classes.
Then we had Freshley last night. Words can't describe it adequately. During leadership prayer we packed around 100 leaders into the Wesley Prayer Chapel to worship the Lord and to seek Him in prayer for the freshmen and for each other. I've never experienced such authentic worship through music before. As we prayed, the words of the songs we sang seemed to echo our prayers and confirm to us that God is good and faithful to hear and respond to our prayers. Prayer and worship seemed to blur together in a way I've never known before. I've known that prayer and worship go hand in hand, but I've never actually experienced it in that way so clearly before last night. I felt as if I was outside of myself worshiping God and seeking His will. Typically there will be some kind of insecurity or self-consciousness that holds me back from worshiping with everything and pouring out my heart to God, but those chains were gone last night. I found myself with the same excitement and lack of negative self-restraint that I had at camp when I was trying to motivate the campers. And then we got to the actual Freshley service when the freshmen got there, and it was the same way, if not even more so because the freshmen were getting into it too.
During prayer, Elizabeth, one of the interns that I've had the privilege of going to Jamaica with two years in a row, and who will also be my leadership small group (LSG) leader this year, led us to pray that the Lord would create an atmosphere that is thick with the Holy Spirit and that is loving and welcoming and passionate about seeing God glorified. I was talking with one freshman in particular after Freshley, and in his own words, the atmosphere was one of the things he noticed.
Just as I found myself with the same excitement and disregard for my own dignity that I had at camp, I was also taken back to camp in a kind of vision when we sang Into Marvelous Light. I can remember countless times that my cabin would be lagging behind and my co-counselor (whoever it was that week) and I would have to jump up and start running to get them moving. I had a specific image of walking up the hill from the cabins to the gym and suddenly taking off running, urging the campers to follow suit. The Lord used that image to say that others will see and acknowledge our love and excitement and passion for God, and as we live out the abundant life we have been given, they will want to take part in it as well. When we run into marvelous light, we run with a train of people following behind us.
So... Yeah. That discouragement that I had to deal with on Sunday? It's been buried in the grave Jesus rose from. I can't wait to see what God has planned for this year! It may be difficult at times, but I know it will be good.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
"Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me."
Psalm 51:12
So I've been back in Athens for almost a week now, and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I feel like I'm going through a kind of culture shock coming from Camp Highland, where everyone is constantly pursuing God and pouring into each other, and returning to the Redcoat Band at UGA, where it's pretty much the opposite: people not only rejecting God, but actively running away from Him and tearing each other down. I love being a Redcoat, but I'm not loving the mutual lack of patience between the band and the directors because it's causing my own patience to run thin. On the bright side, when I have a task to do when I'm at the end of my rope, I focus only on that, and everything else becomes a blur. But unfortunately, everything else becomes a blur, and I think I almost seem rude—not because of anything I say but because I don't feel like say anything at all. And when I reach that point, things that annoy me, which I usually ignore, only push me deeper into that hard, hollow shell that forms inside me. So while I've been focused and quiet during band camp, I haven't been able to enjoy it, and I may have even kept others from enjoying it to the fullest.
I'm also finding myself being a lot less social than normal, which isn't saying all that much because I don't talk much anyway. But I usually like hanging out with friends, and I'm usually all about meeting new people at the beginning of the school year, but I can probably count on my fingers how many people I've met this past week. Maybe it's a result of my impatience with Redcoats this year. Or maybe it's a part of recovering from camp, where I met new kids every week; maybe I'm exhausted from meeting so many people that I just need to take a break. But whatever the reason, it all needs to change before Monday because I'm going to be a Freshley small group leader, and I need to be ready to meet the freshmen with joy.
I'm about to head to Compass Church with my friend Greg, one of my co-counselors from this summer, so hopefully whatever is making me feel so spiritually drained will be fixed when I get back.
———————————
So at Compass this morning the pastor gave a few key points about what it's like to live in God's will. We read Acts 20:22-24, but the Lord directed me beyond the intended passage to verses 25-27: "And now, behold, I know that none of you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom will see my face again. Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all of you, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God." It was exactly what I needed because it convicted me. Like I said this morning, I didn't meet very many freshmen last week. By failing to do so, I showed a lack of understanding of the fact that it's very possible that they don't know Christ, and meeting me could be the last chance they get to meet Him. Paul understood that when he went to Ephesus, and he made sure to make the most of his time with the Ephesians, knowing that he had very little time, and his time there could be the only chance for any of them to come to know Christ. And when he left, he was able to say with confidence that he had done everything he could do to make Jesus known to them. Sadly, I can't say that I've done everything I can to demonstrate God's love to my fellow Redcoats, especially to the freshmen. I need to "be transformed by the renewing of [my] mind" (Romans 12:2) so that I can devote everything to the Lord. And I need God to "restore to me the joy of [His] salvation" (Psalm 51:12) because "the joy of the Lord is [my] strength" (Nehemiah 8:10). In whatever I do, I want to "work at it with all [my] heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since [I] know that [I] will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ [I am] serving" (Colossians 3:23-24). I don't need to work in order to earn my inheritance as a reward for my work; I want to be able to work joyfully because the Lord has already promised me an inheritance.
So as I prepare to start classes tomorrow, please join me in praying that I (and all our brothers and sisters in Christ) would find strength and perseverance in the Lord to be able to serve Him joyfully and with patience and to lovingly and urgently make Him known to everyone we meet, as if each conversation will be our last.
I was talking earlier with Bryan, my co-leader for our Freshley small group, and we both want to see at least one guy who doesn't truly know Christ join our small group and learn to passionately follow Him this year. Whether it's through the Spirit's guidance through us or through the encouragement of other freshmen, we want to have the joy of seeing at least one freshman come to know Christ. So please be praying for us as we rely on the Lord to minister to these freshmen that we will be meeting tomorrow. And pray that our leadership and wisdom and love for our brothers in Christ would not be artificially generated, but that it would be genuine and would come from the overflow of God's love being poured out into us.
God is going to move in power this year, and I can't wait to see it! It's going to be a good year.
So I've been back in Athens for almost a week now, and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I feel like I'm going through a kind of culture shock coming from Camp Highland, where everyone is constantly pursuing God and pouring into each other, and returning to the Redcoat Band at UGA, where it's pretty much the opposite: people not only rejecting God, but actively running away from Him and tearing each other down. I love being a Redcoat, but I'm not loving the mutual lack of patience between the band and the directors because it's causing my own patience to run thin. On the bright side, when I have a task to do when I'm at the end of my rope, I focus only on that, and everything else becomes a blur. But unfortunately, everything else becomes a blur, and I think I almost seem rude—not because of anything I say but because I don't feel like say anything at all. And when I reach that point, things that annoy me, which I usually ignore, only push me deeper into that hard, hollow shell that forms inside me. So while I've been focused and quiet during band camp, I haven't been able to enjoy it, and I may have even kept others from enjoying it to the fullest.
I'm also finding myself being a lot less social than normal, which isn't saying all that much because I don't talk much anyway. But I usually like hanging out with friends, and I'm usually all about meeting new people at the beginning of the school year, but I can probably count on my fingers how many people I've met this past week. Maybe it's a result of my impatience with Redcoats this year. Or maybe it's a part of recovering from camp, where I met new kids every week; maybe I'm exhausted from meeting so many people that I just need to take a break. But whatever the reason, it all needs to change before Monday because I'm going to be a Freshley small group leader, and I need to be ready to meet the freshmen with joy.
I'm about to head to Compass Church with my friend Greg, one of my co-counselors from this summer, so hopefully whatever is making me feel so spiritually drained will be fixed when I get back.
———————————
So at Compass this morning the pastor gave a few key points about what it's like to live in God's will. We read Acts 20:22-24, but the Lord directed me beyond the intended passage to verses 25-27: "And now, behold, I know that none of you among whom I have gone about proclaiming the kingdom will see my face again. Therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all of you, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God." It was exactly what I needed because it convicted me. Like I said this morning, I didn't meet very many freshmen last week. By failing to do so, I showed a lack of understanding of the fact that it's very possible that they don't know Christ, and meeting me could be the last chance they get to meet Him. Paul understood that when he went to Ephesus, and he made sure to make the most of his time with the Ephesians, knowing that he had very little time, and his time there could be the only chance for any of them to come to know Christ. And when he left, he was able to say with confidence that he had done everything he could do to make Jesus known to them. Sadly, I can't say that I've done everything I can to demonstrate God's love to my fellow Redcoats, especially to the freshmen. I need to "be transformed by the renewing of [my] mind" (Romans 12:2) so that I can devote everything to the Lord. And I need God to "restore to me the joy of [His] salvation" (Psalm 51:12) because "the joy of the Lord is [my] strength" (Nehemiah 8:10). In whatever I do, I want to "work at it with all [my] heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since [I] know that [I] will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ [I am] serving" (Colossians 3:23-24). I don't need to work in order to earn my inheritance as a reward for my work; I want to be able to work joyfully because the Lord has already promised me an inheritance.
So as I prepare to start classes tomorrow, please join me in praying that I (and all our brothers and sisters in Christ) would find strength and perseverance in the Lord to be able to serve Him joyfully and with patience and to lovingly and urgently make Him known to everyone we meet, as if each conversation will be our last.
I was talking earlier with Bryan, my co-leader for our Freshley small group, and we both want to see at least one guy who doesn't truly know Christ join our small group and learn to passionately follow Him this year. Whether it's through the Spirit's guidance through us or through the encouragement of other freshmen, we want to have the joy of seeing at least one freshman come to know Christ. So please be praying for us as we rely on the Lord to minister to these freshmen that we will be meeting tomorrow. And pray that our leadership and wisdom and love for our brothers in Christ would not be artificially generated, but that it would be genuine and would come from the overflow of God's love being poured out into us.
God is going to move in power this year, and I can't wait to see it! It's going to be a good year.
Monday, August 6, 2012
Camp Highland: Summer 2012 — Psalm 40:5
"You have multiplied, O Lord my God, Your wondrous deeds and Your thoughts toward us; none can compare with You! I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told."
This verse definitely sums up my experience at Camp Highland this summer. After nine weeks in Ellijay—two weeks of training and seven weeks with campers—I can't help but praise God for everything He has done in me, through me, and for me at camp. He has taught me and grown me so much over the last two months that I can't imagine what I would be like now if He hadn't called me to work at camp. I just want to share some of what the Lord has done for me this summer.
To start, my whole experience with Camp Highland began when my friend Lauren applied and was hired as a counselor there. When she was hired, she was told that they still needed five more male counselors, so she told me and got me to apply for the job. Now, I had originally planned on going to Montenegro on a mission trip with the UGA Wesley Foundation, but when the money didn't come through (because all of it went toward my trip to Jamaica through Freshley), it appeared that God did not have Montenegro planned as my direct mission field this year. He did have a reason for making me sign up for the trip in the first place though: so that I could pray for the team specifically while they were there. So even though I wasn't directly influencing the Montenegrins, I was able to support my team and influence the nation through prayer. Anyway, God had a different mission field in mind for me: the youth of the Atlanta area gathered in Ellijay, Georgia. So when I heard about the camp, I immediately applied without much thought. Something inside of me told me that that was what the Lord had planned for me this summer. And since I was hired and I got back a week ago from spending my entire summer there and I saw several lives changed (including my own), I think it's safe to assume that that voice (the Holy Spirit) was right. (Interestingly, the Montenegro trip happened to be during staff training for camp, so having to back out of the trip opened up my schedule to allow me to work at camp.)
When I got to camp back in May (I can't believe that was over two months ago!), I spent the first two weeks there getting to know the rest of the staff and learning how to run all of the activities I would be facilitating this summer, including the Mammoth rock wall, the Drop Zone swing, and the High Ropes course. We also did a few team building activities, or initiatives, some in the Low Ropes courses and some in the gym and on the field. Those first two weeks were incredible, mainly because we had a really relaxed schedule that set aside the whole morning for a brief session that set us up for the day's Bible study, TAG time (Time Alone with God), and a debrief session so that we could share what we learned during our TAG time. That meant that we spent nearly three hours every morning just meeting with God. It was great for each one of us individually because it gave us time to study sections of Scripture we might not have put much thought into before, and it was also really cool to hear what everyone else was learning because all of it was helpful for more than just one person. It was great getting to hear the wisdom the Lord was sharing with all of us, and it showed the unity of the body of Christ in that the Word speaks to all of us in different ways but for a common purpose: to draw us closer to God and to each other, and to help us become more like Him. Just thinking about it right now, all of the staff seemed to be marked by a few specific gifts and characteristics of God: freedom, passion, wisdom, and love. As the summer went on, I got to see how these traits played out in each person uniquely, and it was cool to see how God worked through all of us differently with similar results.
Anyway, week two of staff training came along, and we were given a chance to practice what we had learned by facilitating initiatives for Calibrate, the leadership team from Stone Mountain Park's SkyHike and Wild Adventure. (Throughout the summer we had various outside groups come to camp for their own purposes (Stone Mountain staff training, Journey and Invest training before heading off to Kenya, and Florida College's Georgia Camp during Camp Highland's week off).) Now, before I applied to work at Camp Highland, I never could have seen myself being a camp counselor. I'm just not that energetic, outgoing kind of person that most camp counselors are. Plus, even though God gives me wisdom to share through my blog, I'm usually not much of a talker, so I didn't know how I was going to know how to lead kids, let alone a group of college age leaders for the Stone Mountain staff. Wisdom that comes in big waves and can be recorded in blog posts is one thing, but moment-by-moment wisdom to know how to answer spur-of-the-moment questions is another thing entirely. So when we had the opportunity to lead initiatives for Calibrate, and even when we practiced within the staff bubble, I didn't really know what to expect. But I found the Lord giving me grace to know what to say when I needed to speak, and that became a major area of dependence for me the entire summer. And God pulled through all summer long.
So after all our training on the equipment and our practice with briefing and debriefing, and after two whole weeks of soaking up all that God wanted to pour into us before starting camp, the campers finally arrived on Monday of Week One. What an adventure. Throughout the summer I found the Lord using me in ways I never could have imagined being used. To begin with, as introverted as I am, God had called me to spend my entire summer getting kids pumped up about knowing Jesus and living for Him. And not just any kids, but I spent the entire summer with kids between the ages of 9 and 14—fourth through eighth graders. Somehow God gave me the energy, patience, wisdom, and love to be able to lead the 62 kids who passed through my cabin this summer, along with the handful of other campers outside of my cabin that I got to talk to. Some weeks tested me more than others, and some were more rewarding than others, but each week had its breakthroughs and lessons from God.
Week One. I didn't know what to expect. I was encouraged at the end of the week by how much God worked through me and how little I had to worry about because of the confidence He gave me as I relied of Him. That week was just the start of something I came to realize throughout the summer: when I worry about not knowing what to say, I won't know what to say; but if I just open my mouth and let the words come out, without doubting whether or not the words mean anything, God speaks through me clearly without any hindrance from my self-consciousness. I had one camper that week who was a big thinker on spiritual matters. This particular fourth grader asked a lot of tough questions that I would expect to hear from high schoolers and even some of my friends at UGA. The one question that sticks out the most in my mind is "How do you hear God, and how do you know if you're hearing Him?" I don't really remember how Greg, my co-counselor, and I answered him, but I know that the Lord spoke through us to him, and I hope and pray that the answer will help him as he continues to walk with God.
The Lord also taught me a lot about loving those who are difficult to love that week, and He continued to teach me that all summer. Before the summer started I had written my prayer for the summer in my journal, so toward the end of the summer I went back to that page to see what I had written. I was amazed to see that I had written that I wanted to have "a heart for the least likely." In other words, I wanted to be able to show God's love to the kids who make things difficult. I wanted to see breakthrough in the kids who seemed to not be getting anything out of our discussions. And the funny thing is that, as Greg pointed out, because I prayed for a heart for the least likely, God gave me the least likely. Anyway, that first week I had one camper who made things pretty difficult. He was easily distracted and wasn't the best listener most of the time. But after several one-on-one talks with him, from both me and Greg, his behavior seemed to improve. I actually came to like hanging out with him as the week went on. I began to see that he was just looking for attention and for a role model, because his behavior was a result of a less than ideal home life; so when he started receiving positive attention, his output starting reflecting the input he was getting.
And what's awesome about that camper is that he came back the next week. This time he wasn't in my cabin, but that made things more interesting for me because I got to hear all the positives that he was getting that week instead of seeing everything, good and bad, play out personally. My favorite comment from him was toward the end of the week when he asked me for a dollar to get something out of the vending machine. First, a little background: he had spent the whole first week trying to borrow money from me and from other campers because he didn't have any of his own. But week two, his grandparents had given him $20 to spend, and on Thursday evening he still had $11 left because "my grandparents gave it to me and I don't want to spend all of it because I want to have something left to give back to them." And even more encouraging was when his counselors that week told me that he was pretty much leading their debrief discussions rather than being a distraction.
As for my own experience with Week Two—or, as we call it, Week 1.2—I had a great time! That week most of my cabin was either all in for Jesus or at least interested. There were two specific kids who I could tell got a lot from that week. One of the kids had so much wisdom, and he was very inquisitive. He would ask question after question, diving deep into the meaning of Scripture, looking for life lessons and interpretations of whatever he read. One night we, the three counselors, washed our campers' feet at the end of the day as a display of humility and leadership by service. After we were done, a couple of the kids, including the inquisitive one, said that they wanted to wash our feet, so they did. Afterward, while the rest of the cabin was getting in bed, another camper pulled me outside to talk for a little bit. Throughout the week this kid was probably the most enthusiastic kid in everything we did, whether it was doing the Drop Zone, debriefing Nitro Crossing, packing up to camp out under the rock wall, or just sitting having TAG time in the morning and cabin time at night. He said that a lot of times when he prays he feels like he doesn't really connect with God. Again, another comment I would expect to hear from someone my age, this time coming from a rising sixth grader. Conveniently, God had been teaching me a lot about prayer throughout the school year, so He allowed me to use what He had taught me to encourage my camper. The words He gave me were along the lines of "Jesus prayed the Lord's prayer as a model for our own prayers, so praying with the Lord's prayer as a guide is one way to ensure that we're praying with the right intentions. Pray that God would be glorified before asking for anything, then pray that His will would be done before your own; then ask for what you need. And keep no sins hidden from God (Jesus didn't need forgiveness of sins, but He included this in His prayer because He was demonstrating how we should pray), and ask for protection against the devil's schemes. The best way to learn to connect with God through is to pray. A lot. When we pray often, prayer becomes easier. It becomes a natural response in any situation because we see results, and we know that we will see more results if we continue to pray, so we pray even more." Then on the last day of the week, when we were going around the cabin talking about our takeaways from the week, this camper said that that week had changed his perspective on reading the Bible, and he was a lot more interested and excited to not only read the Bible regularly, but also to study it in depth.
The next couple of weeks were really hard for me, and I get the feeling that I learned more from those two weeks than most of my campers did. I learned a lot about patience and the hope that does not disappoint (Romans 5:5). One cool thing from Week 1.3 was that I had the nine-year-old son of the founder of Camp Highland, and since his parents own the camp, he's been around for a few summers. I had him in my cabin the first week too, and there was a noticeable change in him the third week. The first week and the beginning of the third week, it was a little bit of a challenge to keep him interested in our discussions. He just wanted to get to the next activity. But toward the end of Week 1.3, he started really getting into our debriefs and TAG times and cabin time discussions. It was encouraging to hear from his mom that he took note of my knowledge of Scripture, and apparently it's hard to impress him. So it was cool seeing how God used my extreme thirst for the Word when I first started really following Him to build up a store of Scripture that I could draw from at any time (Psalm 119:11), so that one kid would notice and want to have that same desire for the Word.
One thing from Week 1.4 struck me hard: halfway through the week the campers started identifying me as kind of a disciplinarian (in eighth grade terms). I wasn't used to that, and that made me realize that I had to work on my patience with the kids so that I could direct them on the right path in love instead of strictly forbidding the wrong path.
The following week was a week off for most of the summer staff. Some people stayed behind to help with a camp Florida College was running on Camp Highland's property, but most of us went home for a week of much needed rest. That week taught me a little bit about hunger and thirst for God. Sometimes when I'm not physically hungry, if I eat a little bit, I find that I actually had more of an appetite than I realized. And it's the same way spiritually: if I know that I should pray and read the Bible but I don't feel like it, if I do it anyway it might make me realize that I really do want to spend more time with God in that moment.
Then Week 1.6 came around. That week God showed me a lot about authentic passion for His glory. I'm pretty sure He showed that to a lot of people that week. During Week 1.4, the Chapman family, the family that owns and runs the camp, left to go to Alaska. They spent that entire week, as well as the week off and the first half of Week 1.6, away from camp. But they were not any farther away from God than we were while they were gone. In fact, when Mr. Bill came up to speak the first day he was back, it was obvious that he had spent some, as he likes to say, rich time with Jesus, getting to see just how awesome and how worthy of all glory He is. Interestingly, the night before, my cabin had been talking about the same thing. Two of my campers had been asking a lot of really good questions that had both me and my co-counselor searching deep in our knowledge of Scripture to be able to provide answers for them. But the one question that stood out to me was, "What does God look like?" I tried to find Exodus 33:18-23 and 34:5-8 to use as an answer, but I wasn't sure of the Scripture reference, so I couldn't find it. God had a different passage in mind that night. We went to Isaiah 6 and saw how the glory of the Lord completely filled the temple, and how the sound of His praises were so powerful that the entire temple shook. We saw Isaiah's reaction to seeing the Lord face-to-face, with such all-consuming conviction and repentance and awe at God's power that when He asked who would go to the nations as a messenger of the word He wanted to proclaim, Isaiah eagerly jumped at the opportunity to play a part in giving God just a piece of the glory He deserves. One kid in particular was amazed when he heard just how awesome God is. The Spirit very much filled us all that week.
That Thursday night, Chad, one of the full-time staff, came to me to say that the person who normally speaks before Friday morning TAG time wasn't there, so he asked me to lead it instead. I'm not much of a public speaker. I write a lot, but talking isn't my strong point, especially in front of large groups. But the Holy Spirit gave me peace and kept me from getting nervous. Now, that week was the first—and only—week that I had campers who actually wanted to go off and read on their own during TAG time. It was refreshing to not have to say, "Open your devotional and read today's section, then open your Bible and read the related passage." They just got their Bibles out and started reading. So I decided I wanted to get some of their input on what they thought I should say the next morning. So we talked about it that night, and I was amazed, and I still am, at the wisdom that came from those twelve- and thirteen-year-olds. The next morning when I went up to deliver the message before TAG and to debrief afterward, I got a little nervous beforehand and my heart rushed a little as soon as I was done, but I felt no anxiety at all while I was speaking. I don't even remember most of what I said, because it wasn't me speaking. As I was trying to plan the night before on what I should say, I had some kind of mind block that prevented me from thinking clearly. When my exhaustion from the day's activities became too much, I decided to just pray and go to bed, leaving it all up to God. And the Lord was faithful to speak powerfully and clearly through me because I wasn't mentally present enough to be a hindrance to His voice. I had some notes and a general idea of what to say, but my plan wasn't so solid that I was determined to say everything I had planned. The Spirit just flowed freely, without hindrance from my plan (or lack thereof). In that moment, the prayer "Empty me of me so I can be filled with You" was answered.
A little background on that week: After getting back from my week off, something inside me made a decision on the day the campers arrived that I didn't want to get to know just the kids in my cabin, but I wanted to hang out with kids from other cabins too throughout the week. So as the campers arrived, I made a real effort to get to know the names of as many kids as I could, and I made sure to acknowledge them and talk to them some throughout the week. Being a typically shy person, I have to say that was a little out of my comfort zone. But it became a huge blessing Friday morning because when the Lord spoke through me, He spoke to everyone, but He especially spoke directly to the people I had gotten to know and who had gotten to know me, which was really cool. The Christ-centered fellowship that whole week was like nothing I had experienced all summer. It was awesome!
Week 1.7 presented me with a little roadblock, but it became a huge surprise and an incredible blessing by the end of the week. I had one camper who required a lot of one-on-one attention, especially at the beginning of the week. His family is moving to Africa to be missionaries, and it wasn't exactly the most exciting thing for him to be leaving his home in just a few short months. It took him a while to become entirely present in the here-and-now, but when he finally got it Thursday evening, he transformed like I've never seen anyone transform before. He went from being reluctant to play Tribal Games (Camp Highland has an outpost in Kwambekenya, Kenya, so the teams we use for our Tribal Games represent the tribes that exist in that area of Kenya), to telling me that he didn't want to wear shoes because he needed to practice for Africa so that he wouldn't make kids sad by wearing shoes when he visits orphanages where the kids don't have shoes. He went from not listening, to seeking approval from the counselors before doing anything. He even asked the worship band to play a specific song for him, and it changed the entire week for everyone there. Friday night the band played Lose My Soul, by TobyMac, mixed with Open Up the Skies, and whereas we were all used to hearing a few feeble voices in the audience singing during worship, the entire camp sang back that night as if making a bold declaration. I think this particular camper finally started to realize why his parents are taking the whole family to Africa, and it started to click with him just how important it is that they go and take the gospel of Jesus Christ with them. I'm thankful that he came to Camp Highland that week, because it wasn't just his life that was changed. I'm still amazed at the change that took place in him, and I'm excited and honored to get the chance to partner with him and his family by supporting them as they move to Africa.
That camper, along with one the following week, fell under the category of "the least likely." But the funny thing is that those kids were the ones I connected with the most all summer. When God gave me the least likely, He gave me a desire to see them changed by His love and His devotion to them, so He gave me a determination to reach out specifically to them. Maybe that kept me from connecting with the other campers because I spent so much time pouring into those few, but I believe that the ones I connected with were some of the ones who most desperately needed someone to reach out to them. Now, I'm not proud to say that there were a few times when I almost lost my cool with them, but those moments taught me and prepared me so that I could hold back and rely on God to give me patience the next time a difficult situation came up. And He had grace for me too: the kids barely seemed to notice when I almost lost it, and they even seemed to respond more willingly afterward. Sometimes I had to be blunt with them, but the Spirit gave me the grace to be able to say it in love. And that helped me understand better when He had to be blunt with me and tell me to take a step back and calm down before doing anything else.
So what did I learn this summer? A lot about patience: God put a spotlight on my impatience so that I could see how much I need His patience. As I was praying at the end of the week off before starting Week 1.6, I asked God to not only give me His strength when I find that I'm weak, but to make me weak so that I would have no other option but to rely on His strength. And boy, did He ever answer that one. He also taught me about confidence: instead of thinking about what to say and worrying about whether not it was the right thing to say, I often found myself saying things without really knowing where it was coming from. When I simply opened my mouth and allowed God to speak through me without hesitating to think about what I was saying, I had less fear about what I was saying, and the Lord's Word had much more power than if I had stopped to think about it and formulate my own sentences. Prayer was another big lesson: I neglected prayer a lot this summer, unfortunately; but when I made time to devote myself to prayer (Colossians 4:2), the Lord responded in big ways. The conversation about Isaiah 6 and what God looks like came after I spent my night off in prayer. (Each staff member gets a night off every week, where we get two hours or so to rest and regain our strength and energy to be with the kids for the rest of the week.) I had planned on doing my own Bible study during that time because my morning TAG times were becoming slack because I was so used to always having to keep the kids focused that I couldn't stay focused myself. But instead, the Lord called me to pray. And I saw immediate results when the campers arrived back at the cabin. And finally, I learned about love and humility: sometimes love requires us to allow ourselves to be humiliated or to suffer pain. It takes a Romans 12:10 heart, a heart of servanthood and a desire to almost competitively put oneself below others. When my camper was walking without shoes Week 1.7 in order to honor the kids in the African orphanages, I was so moved that I had to join him and take my own shoes off. It was uncomfortable and sometimes painful, but the heart behind it is what counts, and I have to say that that kid's statement convicted me and really humbled me.
I feel like I pretty much just recounted the highlights of the summer, and I didn't really elaborate on what God taught me, but I still have a lot of processing—a lot of personal debriefing—to do before I fully understand it myself. So if you've stuck with me this far, congratulations on finishing this whole post. And thank you for keeping me and the whole Camp Highland team in your prayers this summer! Please continue to pray for us as we head back to school, and pray for the campers, that their experience at camp would leave a lasting impact on them. Pray that this summer wouldn't be a mountaintop experience that we have to come down from, but that it just be the beginning of an upward journey toward God. And pray that that "upward" journey would actually be a process of lowering ourselves and allowing the Lord to keep His promise in James 4:10.
"How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you." ~ Psalm 139:17-18
This verse definitely sums up my experience at Camp Highland this summer. After nine weeks in Ellijay—two weeks of training and seven weeks with campers—I can't help but praise God for everything He has done in me, through me, and for me at camp. He has taught me and grown me so much over the last two months that I can't imagine what I would be like now if He hadn't called me to work at camp. I just want to share some of what the Lord has done for me this summer.
To start, my whole experience with Camp Highland began when my friend Lauren applied and was hired as a counselor there. When she was hired, she was told that they still needed five more male counselors, so she told me and got me to apply for the job. Now, I had originally planned on going to Montenegro on a mission trip with the UGA Wesley Foundation, but when the money didn't come through (because all of it went toward my trip to Jamaica through Freshley), it appeared that God did not have Montenegro planned as my direct mission field this year. He did have a reason for making me sign up for the trip in the first place though: so that I could pray for the team specifically while they were there. So even though I wasn't directly influencing the Montenegrins, I was able to support my team and influence the nation through prayer. Anyway, God had a different mission field in mind for me: the youth of the Atlanta area gathered in Ellijay, Georgia. So when I heard about the camp, I immediately applied without much thought. Something inside of me told me that that was what the Lord had planned for me this summer. And since I was hired and I got back a week ago from spending my entire summer there and I saw several lives changed (including my own), I think it's safe to assume that that voice (the Holy Spirit) was right. (Interestingly, the Montenegro trip happened to be during staff training for camp, so having to back out of the trip opened up my schedule to allow me to work at camp.)
When I got to camp back in May (I can't believe that was over two months ago!), I spent the first two weeks there getting to know the rest of the staff and learning how to run all of the activities I would be facilitating this summer, including the Mammoth rock wall, the Drop Zone swing, and the High Ropes course. We also did a few team building activities, or initiatives, some in the Low Ropes courses and some in the gym and on the field. Those first two weeks were incredible, mainly because we had a really relaxed schedule that set aside the whole morning for a brief session that set us up for the day's Bible study, TAG time (Time Alone with God), and a debrief session so that we could share what we learned during our TAG time. That meant that we spent nearly three hours every morning just meeting with God. It was great for each one of us individually because it gave us time to study sections of Scripture we might not have put much thought into before, and it was also really cool to hear what everyone else was learning because all of it was helpful for more than just one person. It was great getting to hear the wisdom the Lord was sharing with all of us, and it showed the unity of the body of Christ in that the Word speaks to all of us in different ways but for a common purpose: to draw us closer to God and to each other, and to help us become more like Him. Just thinking about it right now, all of the staff seemed to be marked by a few specific gifts and characteristics of God: freedom, passion, wisdom, and love. As the summer went on, I got to see how these traits played out in each person uniquely, and it was cool to see how God worked through all of us differently with similar results.
Anyway, week two of staff training came along, and we were given a chance to practice what we had learned by facilitating initiatives for Calibrate, the leadership team from Stone Mountain Park's SkyHike and Wild Adventure. (Throughout the summer we had various outside groups come to camp for their own purposes (Stone Mountain staff training, Journey and Invest training before heading off to Kenya, and Florida College's Georgia Camp during Camp Highland's week off).) Now, before I applied to work at Camp Highland, I never could have seen myself being a camp counselor. I'm just not that energetic, outgoing kind of person that most camp counselors are. Plus, even though God gives me wisdom to share through my blog, I'm usually not much of a talker, so I didn't know how I was going to know how to lead kids, let alone a group of college age leaders for the Stone Mountain staff. Wisdom that comes in big waves and can be recorded in blog posts is one thing, but moment-by-moment wisdom to know how to answer spur-of-the-moment questions is another thing entirely. So when we had the opportunity to lead initiatives for Calibrate, and even when we practiced within the staff bubble, I didn't really know what to expect. But I found the Lord giving me grace to know what to say when I needed to speak, and that became a major area of dependence for me the entire summer. And God pulled through all summer long.
So after all our training on the equipment and our practice with briefing and debriefing, and after two whole weeks of soaking up all that God wanted to pour into us before starting camp, the campers finally arrived on Monday of Week One. What an adventure. Throughout the summer I found the Lord using me in ways I never could have imagined being used. To begin with, as introverted as I am, God had called me to spend my entire summer getting kids pumped up about knowing Jesus and living for Him. And not just any kids, but I spent the entire summer with kids between the ages of 9 and 14—fourth through eighth graders. Somehow God gave me the energy, patience, wisdom, and love to be able to lead the 62 kids who passed through my cabin this summer, along with the handful of other campers outside of my cabin that I got to talk to. Some weeks tested me more than others, and some were more rewarding than others, but each week had its breakthroughs and lessons from God.
Week One. I didn't know what to expect. I was encouraged at the end of the week by how much God worked through me and how little I had to worry about because of the confidence He gave me as I relied of Him. That week was just the start of something I came to realize throughout the summer: when I worry about not knowing what to say, I won't know what to say; but if I just open my mouth and let the words come out, without doubting whether or not the words mean anything, God speaks through me clearly without any hindrance from my self-consciousness. I had one camper that week who was a big thinker on spiritual matters. This particular fourth grader asked a lot of tough questions that I would expect to hear from high schoolers and even some of my friends at UGA. The one question that sticks out the most in my mind is "How do you hear God, and how do you know if you're hearing Him?" I don't really remember how Greg, my co-counselor, and I answered him, but I know that the Lord spoke through us to him, and I hope and pray that the answer will help him as he continues to walk with God.
The Lord also taught me a lot about loving those who are difficult to love that week, and He continued to teach me that all summer. Before the summer started I had written my prayer for the summer in my journal, so toward the end of the summer I went back to that page to see what I had written. I was amazed to see that I had written that I wanted to have "a heart for the least likely." In other words, I wanted to be able to show God's love to the kids who make things difficult. I wanted to see breakthrough in the kids who seemed to not be getting anything out of our discussions. And the funny thing is that, as Greg pointed out, because I prayed for a heart for the least likely, God gave me the least likely. Anyway, that first week I had one camper who made things pretty difficult. He was easily distracted and wasn't the best listener most of the time. But after several one-on-one talks with him, from both me and Greg, his behavior seemed to improve. I actually came to like hanging out with him as the week went on. I began to see that he was just looking for attention and for a role model, because his behavior was a result of a less than ideal home life; so when he started receiving positive attention, his output starting reflecting the input he was getting.
And what's awesome about that camper is that he came back the next week. This time he wasn't in my cabin, but that made things more interesting for me because I got to hear all the positives that he was getting that week instead of seeing everything, good and bad, play out personally. My favorite comment from him was toward the end of the week when he asked me for a dollar to get something out of the vending machine. First, a little background: he had spent the whole first week trying to borrow money from me and from other campers because he didn't have any of his own. But week two, his grandparents had given him $20 to spend, and on Thursday evening he still had $11 left because "my grandparents gave it to me and I don't want to spend all of it because I want to have something left to give back to them." And even more encouraging was when his counselors that week told me that he was pretty much leading their debrief discussions rather than being a distraction.
As for my own experience with Week Two—or, as we call it, Week 1.2—I had a great time! That week most of my cabin was either all in for Jesus or at least interested. There were two specific kids who I could tell got a lot from that week. One of the kids had so much wisdom, and he was very inquisitive. He would ask question after question, diving deep into the meaning of Scripture, looking for life lessons and interpretations of whatever he read. One night we, the three counselors, washed our campers' feet at the end of the day as a display of humility and leadership by service. After we were done, a couple of the kids, including the inquisitive one, said that they wanted to wash our feet, so they did. Afterward, while the rest of the cabin was getting in bed, another camper pulled me outside to talk for a little bit. Throughout the week this kid was probably the most enthusiastic kid in everything we did, whether it was doing the Drop Zone, debriefing Nitro Crossing, packing up to camp out under the rock wall, or just sitting having TAG time in the morning and cabin time at night. He said that a lot of times when he prays he feels like he doesn't really connect with God. Again, another comment I would expect to hear from someone my age, this time coming from a rising sixth grader. Conveniently, God had been teaching me a lot about prayer throughout the school year, so He allowed me to use what He had taught me to encourage my camper. The words He gave me were along the lines of "Jesus prayed the Lord's prayer as a model for our own prayers, so praying with the Lord's prayer as a guide is one way to ensure that we're praying with the right intentions. Pray that God would be glorified before asking for anything, then pray that His will would be done before your own; then ask for what you need. And keep no sins hidden from God (Jesus didn't need forgiveness of sins, but He included this in His prayer because He was demonstrating how we should pray), and ask for protection against the devil's schemes. The best way to learn to connect with God through is to pray. A lot. When we pray often, prayer becomes easier. It becomes a natural response in any situation because we see results, and we know that we will see more results if we continue to pray, so we pray even more." Then on the last day of the week, when we were going around the cabin talking about our takeaways from the week, this camper said that that week had changed his perspective on reading the Bible, and he was a lot more interested and excited to not only read the Bible regularly, but also to study it in depth.
The next couple of weeks were really hard for me, and I get the feeling that I learned more from those two weeks than most of my campers did. I learned a lot about patience and the hope that does not disappoint (Romans 5:5). One cool thing from Week 1.3 was that I had the nine-year-old son of the founder of Camp Highland, and since his parents own the camp, he's been around for a few summers. I had him in my cabin the first week too, and there was a noticeable change in him the third week. The first week and the beginning of the third week, it was a little bit of a challenge to keep him interested in our discussions. He just wanted to get to the next activity. But toward the end of Week 1.3, he started really getting into our debriefs and TAG times and cabin time discussions. It was encouraging to hear from his mom that he took note of my knowledge of Scripture, and apparently it's hard to impress him. So it was cool seeing how God used my extreme thirst for the Word when I first started really following Him to build up a store of Scripture that I could draw from at any time (Psalm 119:11), so that one kid would notice and want to have that same desire for the Word.
One thing from Week 1.4 struck me hard: halfway through the week the campers started identifying me as kind of a disciplinarian (in eighth grade terms). I wasn't used to that, and that made me realize that I had to work on my patience with the kids so that I could direct them on the right path in love instead of strictly forbidding the wrong path.
The following week was a week off for most of the summer staff. Some people stayed behind to help with a camp Florida College was running on Camp Highland's property, but most of us went home for a week of much needed rest. That week taught me a little bit about hunger and thirst for God. Sometimes when I'm not physically hungry, if I eat a little bit, I find that I actually had more of an appetite than I realized. And it's the same way spiritually: if I know that I should pray and read the Bible but I don't feel like it, if I do it anyway it might make me realize that I really do want to spend more time with God in that moment.
Then Week 1.6 came around. That week God showed me a lot about authentic passion for His glory. I'm pretty sure He showed that to a lot of people that week. During Week 1.4, the Chapman family, the family that owns and runs the camp, left to go to Alaska. They spent that entire week, as well as the week off and the first half of Week 1.6, away from camp. But they were not any farther away from God than we were while they were gone. In fact, when Mr. Bill came up to speak the first day he was back, it was obvious that he had spent some, as he likes to say, rich time with Jesus, getting to see just how awesome and how worthy of all glory He is. Interestingly, the night before, my cabin had been talking about the same thing. Two of my campers had been asking a lot of really good questions that had both me and my co-counselor searching deep in our knowledge of Scripture to be able to provide answers for them. But the one question that stood out to me was, "What does God look like?" I tried to find Exodus 33:18-23 and 34:5-8 to use as an answer, but I wasn't sure of the Scripture reference, so I couldn't find it. God had a different passage in mind that night. We went to Isaiah 6 and saw how the glory of the Lord completely filled the temple, and how the sound of His praises were so powerful that the entire temple shook. We saw Isaiah's reaction to seeing the Lord face-to-face, with such all-consuming conviction and repentance and awe at God's power that when He asked who would go to the nations as a messenger of the word He wanted to proclaim, Isaiah eagerly jumped at the opportunity to play a part in giving God just a piece of the glory He deserves. One kid in particular was amazed when he heard just how awesome God is. The Spirit very much filled us all that week.
That Thursday night, Chad, one of the full-time staff, came to me to say that the person who normally speaks before Friday morning TAG time wasn't there, so he asked me to lead it instead. I'm not much of a public speaker. I write a lot, but talking isn't my strong point, especially in front of large groups. But the Holy Spirit gave me peace and kept me from getting nervous. Now, that week was the first—and only—week that I had campers who actually wanted to go off and read on their own during TAG time. It was refreshing to not have to say, "Open your devotional and read today's section, then open your Bible and read the related passage." They just got their Bibles out and started reading. So I decided I wanted to get some of their input on what they thought I should say the next morning. So we talked about it that night, and I was amazed, and I still am, at the wisdom that came from those twelve- and thirteen-year-olds. The next morning when I went up to deliver the message before TAG and to debrief afterward, I got a little nervous beforehand and my heart rushed a little as soon as I was done, but I felt no anxiety at all while I was speaking. I don't even remember most of what I said, because it wasn't me speaking. As I was trying to plan the night before on what I should say, I had some kind of mind block that prevented me from thinking clearly. When my exhaustion from the day's activities became too much, I decided to just pray and go to bed, leaving it all up to God. And the Lord was faithful to speak powerfully and clearly through me because I wasn't mentally present enough to be a hindrance to His voice. I had some notes and a general idea of what to say, but my plan wasn't so solid that I was determined to say everything I had planned. The Spirit just flowed freely, without hindrance from my plan (or lack thereof). In that moment, the prayer "Empty me of me so I can be filled with You" was answered.
A little background on that week: After getting back from my week off, something inside me made a decision on the day the campers arrived that I didn't want to get to know just the kids in my cabin, but I wanted to hang out with kids from other cabins too throughout the week. So as the campers arrived, I made a real effort to get to know the names of as many kids as I could, and I made sure to acknowledge them and talk to them some throughout the week. Being a typically shy person, I have to say that was a little out of my comfort zone. But it became a huge blessing Friday morning because when the Lord spoke through me, He spoke to everyone, but He especially spoke directly to the people I had gotten to know and who had gotten to know me, which was really cool. The Christ-centered fellowship that whole week was like nothing I had experienced all summer. It was awesome!
Week 1.7 presented me with a little roadblock, but it became a huge surprise and an incredible blessing by the end of the week. I had one camper who required a lot of one-on-one attention, especially at the beginning of the week. His family is moving to Africa to be missionaries, and it wasn't exactly the most exciting thing for him to be leaving his home in just a few short months. It took him a while to become entirely present in the here-and-now, but when he finally got it Thursday evening, he transformed like I've never seen anyone transform before. He went from being reluctant to play Tribal Games (Camp Highland has an outpost in Kwambekenya, Kenya, so the teams we use for our Tribal Games represent the tribes that exist in that area of Kenya), to telling me that he didn't want to wear shoes because he needed to practice for Africa so that he wouldn't make kids sad by wearing shoes when he visits orphanages where the kids don't have shoes. He went from not listening, to seeking approval from the counselors before doing anything. He even asked the worship band to play a specific song for him, and it changed the entire week for everyone there. Friday night the band played Lose My Soul, by TobyMac, mixed with Open Up the Skies, and whereas we were all used to hearing a few feeble voices in the audience singing during worship, the entire camp sang back that night as if making a bold declaration. I think this particular camper finally started to realize why his parents are taking the whole family to Africa, and it started to click with him just how important it is that they go and take the gospel of Jesus Christ with them. I'm thankful that he came to Camp Highland that week, because it wasn't just his life that was changed. I'm still amazed at the change that took place in him, and I'm excited and honored to get the chance to partner with him and his family by supporting them as they move to Africa.
That camper, along with one the following week, fell under the category of "the least likely." But the funny thing is that those kids were the ones I connected with the most all summer. When God gave me the least likely, He gave me a desire to see them changed by His love and His devotion to them, so He gave me a determination to reach out specifically to them. Maybe that kept me from connecting with the other campers because I spent so much time pouring into those few, but I believe that the ones I connected with were some of the ones who most desperately needed someone to reach out to them. Now, I'm not proud to say that there were a few times when I almost lost my cool with them, but those moments taught me and prepared me so that I could hold back and rely on God to give me patience the next time a difficult situation came up. And He had grace for me too: the kids barely seemed to notice when I almost lost it, and they even seemed to respond more willingly afterward. Sometimes I had to be blunt with them, but the Spirit gave me the grace to be able to say it in love. And that helped me understand better when He had to be blunt with me and tell me to take a step back and calm down before doing anything else.
So what did I learn this summer? A lot about patience: God put a spotlight on my impatience so that I could see how much I need His patience. As I was praying at the end of the week off before starting Week 1.6, I asked God to not only give me His strength when I find that I'm weak, but to make me weak so that I would have no other option but to rely on His strength. And boy, did He ever answer that one. He also taught me about confidence: instead of thinking about what to say and worrying about whether not it was the right thing to say, I often found myself saying things without really knowing where it was coming from. When I simply opened my mouth and allowed God to speak through me without hesitating to think about what I was saying, I had less fear about what I was saying, and the Lord's Word had much more power than if I had stopped to think about it and formulate my own sentences. Prayer was another big lesson: I neglected prayer a lot this summer, unfortunately; but when I made time to devote myself to prayer (Colossians 4:2), the Lord responded in big ways. The conversation about Isaiah 6 and what God looks like came after I spent my night off in prayer. (Each staff member gets a night off every week, where we get two hours or so to rest and regain our strength and energy to be with the kids for the rest of the week.) I had planned on doing my own Bible study during that time because my morning TAG times were becoming slack because I was so used to always having to keep the kids focused that I couldn't stay focused myself. But instead, the Lord called me to pray. And I saw immediate results when the campers arrived back at the cabin. And finally, I learned about love and humility: sometimes love requires us to allow ourselves to be humiliated or to suffer pain. It takes a Romans 12:10 heart, a heart of servanthood and a desire to almost competitively put oneself below others. When my camper was walking without shoes Week 1.7 in order to honor the kids in the African orphanages, I was so moved that I had to join him and take my own shoes off. It was uncomfortable and sometimes painful, but the heart behind it is what counts, and I have to say that that kid's statement convicted me and really humbled me.
I feel like I pretty much just recounted the highlights of the summer, and I didn't really elaborate on what God taught me, but I still have a lot of processing—a lot of personal debriefing—to do before I fully understand it myself. So if you've stuck with me this far, congratulations on finishing this whole post. And thank you for keeping me and the whole Camp Highland team in your prayers this summer! Please continue to pray for us as we head back to school, and pray for the campers, that their experience at camp would leave a lasting impact on them. Pray that this summer wouldn't be a mountaintop experience that we have to come down from, but that it just be the beginning of an upward journey toward God. And pray that that "upward" journey would actually be a process of lowering ourselves and allowing the Lord to keep His promise in James 4:10.
"How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you." ~ Psalm 139:17-18
Saturday, August 4, 2012
"Whatever else I do, I must pray." ~ R.A. Torrey
It frustrates me to no end knowing that prayer is a last resort for many people. It makes me sick that it's often a last resort for me. I knew it before, but it really caught my attention at camp this summer. When someone would get hurt, the first response was always to try the first aid kit, and if that wasn't enough, then we would go to the nurse. Sometimes the problem was beyond her expertise, and we would just sit there perplexed, waiting for some improvement. And I hated that I didn't have the boldness to skip all of that and make God my Plan A. I mean, sure, I prayed when someone got hurt, but it was always a private prayer while Nurse Emily was trying to help the patient. I don't understand. It's a Christian camp, and the nurse was our primary healer... This isn't to put down camp, because it's a great camp, and this is definitely not to belittle Nurse Emily, because she did a great job all summer. I'm just frustrated with my own timidity and fear of not getting an answer to prayer. I'm tired of making the Lord, the Healer and Provider of all good things, Jehovah-Rapha and Jehovah-Jireh, my last resort. I want to fearlessly claim the promises of Jeremiah 17:14 and Mark 11:24, knowing that God is faithful to respond to expectant prayer.
I'm really encouraged by my friend Rebekah, who, whether she realizes it or not, gives off a sense that she lives in constant communion with God through prayer. Whatever problems she faces, she doesn't hesitate to immediately and completely commit it to the Lord in prayer. Whatever joy she is presented with, she thanks God out of her deep love for Him because she knows His blessings flow from His love for her, and thanksgiving welcomes increased blessings. I was just reading her blog, which is what got me thinking about all of this, and in one post she wrote that she "prayed endlessly" about a decision she had to make and that it would allow God to be glorified all the more adequately. And the thing is, I believe it. Often people will say, "I'm praying for you," but in too many cases, it's just something people say. In reality, what they mean is, "I sympathize with you, and you have my thoughts until I move on to the next thing." But I know that Rebekah means it when she says that she's praying endlessly about something. And I get the feeling that it's not a last resort for her. It's not just something that she tags onto a practical method of obtaining blessings as a way of improving her chances of getting what she asks for. Prayer is her method. Everything else is an answer to prayer, so prayer should come before anything else.
God is convicting me right now, showing me that I allowed my busy schedule at camp to crowd prayer out of my life this summer. Rather than being a time to meet with God personally, I allowed prayer to become a quick, mindless means of getting something I needed, and only when other methods didn't work. I did find time to truly pray, but those times were few and far between, and they became more scarce as the summer wore on. But now I want to return to that place of complete dependence on the Lord that I was just getting to know before the summer started. I want prayer to become second nature for me, but not in the sense that it becomes a mindless habit, but that it would become my natural response to any situation. I want to pray so often—and I don't mean quick, ten-second prayers, but real, passionate, earnest prayer—that when my schedule starts to wear me out, stress and fatigue would not crowd prayer out of my life, but prayer would be so ingrained into my being that it would leave no room for stress or fatigue in my life. Just as Jesus did, when life starts getting too busy, I want to learn to make even more time for prayer than in the easy, relaxed times.
At this point, my plan is to go back to work at Camp Highland again next summer. So now that I know the effect the busy schedule has on my prayer life, I pray that God will help me to devote myself to praying with my whole being so frequently that no amount of stress of weariness or discouragement would be able to uproot prayer from my life, but that prayer would so completely consume the soil of my life that there would be no room for the seeds of stress, weariness, and discouragement to even be planted in me. I pray that I will always be ready to pray, and that seeking the Lord would always be my first response, not my last resort. "Whatever else I do, I must pray."
"This is what the Lord says: 'Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit." ~ Jeremiah 17:5-8
I'm really encouraged by my friend Rebekah, who, whether she realizes it or not, gives off a sense that she lives in constant communion with God through prayer. Whatever problems she faces, she doesn't hesitate to immediately and completely commit it to the Lord in prayer. Whatever joy she is presented with, she thanks God out of her deep love for Him because she knows His blessings flow from His love for her, and thanksgiving welcomes increased blessings. I was just reading her blog, which is what got me thinking about all of this, and in one post she wrote that she "prayed endlessly" about a decision she had to make and that it would allow God to be glorified all the more adequately. And the thing is, I believe it. Often people will say, "I'm praying for you," but in too many cases, it's just something people say. In reality, what they mean is, "I sympathize with you, and you have my thoughts until I move on to the next thing." But I know that Rebekah means it when she says that she's praying endlessly about something. And I get the feeling that it's not a last resort for her. It's not just something that she tags onto a practical method of obtaining blessings as a way of improving her chances of getting what she asks for. Prayer is her method. Everything else is an answer to prayer, so prayer should come before anything else.
God is convicting me right now, showing me that I allowed my busy schedule at camp to crowd prayer out of my life this summer. Rather than being a time to meet with God personally, I allowed prayer to become a quick, mindless means of getting something I needed, and only when other methods didn't work. I did find time to truly pray, but those times were few and far between, and they became more scarce as the summer wore on. But now I want to return to that place of complete dependence on the Lord that I was just getting to know before the summer started. I want prayer to become second nature for me, but not in the sense that it becomes a mindless habit, but that it would become my natural response to any situation. I want to pray so often—and I don't mean quick, ten-second prayers, but real, passionate, earnest prayer—that when my schedule starts to wear me out, stress and fatigue would not crowd prayer out of my life, but prayer would be so ingrained into my being that it would leave no room for stress or fatigue in my life. Just as Jesus did, when life starts getting too busy, I want to learn to make even more time for prayer than in the easy, relaxed times.
At this point, my plan is to go back to work at Camp Highland again next summer. So now that I know the effect the busy schedule has on my prayer life, I pray that God will help me to devote myself to praying with my whole being so frequently that no amount of stress of weariness or discouragement would be able to uproot prayer from my life, but that prayer would so completely consume the soil of my life that there would be no room for the seeds of stress, weariness, and discouragement to even be planted in me. I pray that I will always be ready to pray, and that seeking the Lord would always be my first response, not my last resort. "Whatever else I do, I must pray."
"This is what the Lord says: 'Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit." ~ Jeremiah 17:5-8
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Taking Root
I decided to go for a walk through my neighborhood today, and the Lord seemed to be drawing my attention to all the trees around me. After walking and thinking for a while, I didn't seem to hear anything from God, so I took a different approach. I keep catching myself trying to figure out interpretations of images on my own, and I know that isn't what the Lord wants me to do. So when I caught myself trying to conjure up some deep insight as to the significance of trees, I allowed my single train of thought to become a two-way conversation with God instead. I immediately found the Lord asking me questions, just as Jesus did to His disciples and, interestingly, the same way I did with the kids at camp this summer. Actually, He only asked me one question: I had been thinking about roots, so He asked me, "What are roots for?"
A tree's roots dig into the soil the tree is planted in and absorbs water and nutrients to feed the tree. They also serve to anchor the tree in the ground for stability. However, contrary to the cliché, roots don't actually dig all that deep—they grow outward rather than downward. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First off, when I started answering God's question, I noticed something about soil and dirt that led me to think of the song Beautiful Things, by Gungor. When a tree is planted, it isn't planted in a bed of flowers, where everything is nice and pretty. In order for a tree to grow properly, it has to be planted in fertile soil, plain old dirt. There's nothing special about it. It's just dirt that has been prepared so that the tree can be planted in it. In the same way, our lives aren't founded on big, exciting moments. Those things come and go and can even draw our attention away from God, just like flowers can use up the nutrients a tree needs. Our lives are founded on the continuous stream of everyday living: the ordinary dirt of life. We find joy and hope in the simple things because we see God in them, and our ability to find joy in the dirt of life enhances our ability to see God in the bigger, flowery moments of life. But we don't find our satisfaction in the simple things; we find our satisfaction in the goodness of God that is revealed in them. Yet we hope for the dirt of life because we know that it will result in the growth of our relationship with Christ.
If a tree's roots grew straight down into the ground, the tree probably wouldn't be very stable. Plus, it wouldn't get the nutrients it needs because most of the necessary nutrients lie close to the surface. Likewise, if we dig deep into a particular aspect of life, we become hindered from gaining the spiritual nourishment available in all of God's creation. We focus on that one thing too much and become so attached to it that, if it were eliminated from our lives, we would go down with it. Instead, we need to learn to not dig our roots deep but to spread our roots wide. A healthy tree will have roots that span two to four times the diameter of its crown, the distance covered by the visible part of the tree above ground. For visual reference, the crown of a tree is the size of the shadow created under it at noon, when the sun is directly overhead. The roots of a healthy tree will spread two to four times that distance, beyond where the shadow reaches. So a healthy spiritual life is one that can find God in such a wide range of simple things that the person's outward life cannot demonstrate even half of what he is taking in from the Lord. A healthy spiritual man does not dig his roots deep into one simple thing of life so that he loses his ability to be nourished by it, but rather he spreads his roots wide to gain the most growth from all sources of nourishment. A man who digs his roots deep shows insecurity and a need to be comfortable. But a man who spreads his roots wide shows a willingness to step out of his comfort zone and seek the Lord in ways he has never known before so that he can gain the most out of life. He knows that God is found in all of the simple things of life, not just in what he is comfortable with, so he seeks to find as much of Him as possible. That way if a single aspect of his life is removed, he is not shaken because he still has plenty of other sources of strength in Christ.
But it doesn't stop there. A tree does not take root only for its own growth. If we could examine the thoughts of an animate tree, I believe it would have other living creatures in mind. A strong, healthy tree is not only stable and immovable, but it also provides shelter, produces fruit, and spreads seeds. In the same way, a person whose roots are spread wide, not being so attached to one particular thing but finding joy in all things and being content with whatever he is given—this person will not stop at his own spiritual growth but will be determined to do for others what the Lord has done for him. His strong roots in the Lord will allow him to be an unshakable source of shelter for those in need of hope and comfort. The growth he finds in prayer and in his study of the Word will give him a foundation from which to bear fruit, actions that demonstrate God's character, which will draw to people to enjoy the sweetness of the fruit and to seek more. And the joy he finds in the Lord will cause him to desire to see the same results in the lives of others, so he will spread of the seed of God's Word and His love, specifically by bearing fruit. The seeds of a fruit tree are carried by the fruit it bears, and the seed will not come if fruit is not produced. Similarly, we must bear fruit in order to effectively spread the seed of the gospel. And we can find encouragement in this: even if our fruit goes unnoticed by those we intend to reach by our good deeds, the fruit we bear still carries seeds to plant new trees. So even if our actions may not seem to have had an effect on someone, we can know that somewhere down the road someone will have a lasting impact on that person's life, and the Holy Spirit will take root inside of him.
So let's grow to be strong trees—oaks of righteousness (Isaiah 61:3) planted by streams of water (Psalm 1:3), abiding in Christ and bearing much fruit (John 15:5) to leave a lasting impact (John 15:16) so that all may see and know that we serve the Living God (John 15:8) and that they might see His glory and power and desire to serve and worship Him as well (Isaiah 6:1-8). Rather than digging our roots deep, let's spread our roots wide so that we can be firmly anchored in Christ and well nourished by His Spirit, allowing us to serve others effectively and adequately give God glory. And let's seek to grow our roots in the dirt of life rather than in the flowerbeds, because we know that Jesus makes beautiful things out of dust. The greatest things in life are not those that are very clearly outwardly glorious but rather those that the Lord makes glorious, no matter how unlikely and apparently useless and irredeemable it may seem. Worship God in the dull, everyday moments, not just in the big, emotional moments, because the majority of life is made of the simple things. As long as the big moments are the only times we give glory to God, Jesus has no hold on our lives. But if we learn to devote our everyday life to Him, then our whole being will truly be committed to Him.
A tree's roots dig into the soil the tree is planted in and absorbs water and nutrients to feed the tree. They also serve to anchor the tree in the ground for stability. However, contrary to the cliché, roots don't actually dig all that deep—they grow outward rather than downward. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First off, when I started answering God's question, I noticed something about soil and dirt that led me to think of the song Beautiful Things, by Gungor. When a tree is planted, it isn't planted in a bed of flowers, where everything is nice and pretty. In order for a tree to grow properly, it has to be planted in fertile soil, plain old dirt. There's nothing special about it. It's just dirt that has been prepared so that the tree can be planted in it. In the same way, our lives aren't founded on big, exciting moments. Those things come and go and can even draw our attention away from God, just like flowers can use up the nutrients a tree needs. Our lives are founded on the continuous stream of everyday living: the ordinary dirt of life. We find joy and hope in the simple things because we see God in them, and our ability to find joy in the dirt of life enhances our ability to see God in the bigger, flowery moments of life. But we don't find our satisfaction in the simple things; we find our satisfaction in the goodness of God that is revealed in them. Yet we hope for the dirt of life because we know that it will result in the growth of our relationship with Christ.
If a tree's roots grew straight down into the ground, the tree probably wouldn't be very stable. Plus, it wouldn't get the nutrients it needs because most of the necessary nutrients lie close to the surface. Likewise, if we dig deep into a particular aspect of life, we become hindered from gaining the spiritual nourishment available in all of God's creation. We focus on that one thing too much and become so attached to it that, if it were eliminated from our lives, we would go down with it. Instead, we need to learn to not dig our roots deep but to spread our roots wide. A healthy tree will have roots that span two to four times the diameter of its crown, the distance covered by the visible part of the tree above ground. For visual reference, the crown of a tree is the size of the shadow created under it at noon, when the sun is directly overhead. The roots of a healthy tree will spread two to four times that distance, beyond where the shadow reaches. So a healthy spiritual life is one that can find God in such a wide range of simple things that the person's outward life cannot demonstrate even half of what he is taking in from the Lord. A healthy spiritual man does not dig his roots deep into one simple thing of life so that he loses his ability to be nourished by it, but rather he spreads his roots wide to gain the most growth from all sources of nourishment. A man who digs his roots deep shows insecurity and a need to be comfortable. But a man who spreads his roots wide shows a willingness to step out of his comfort zone and seek the Lord in ways he has never known before so that he can gain the most out of life. He knows that God is found in all of the simple things of life, not just in what he is comfortable with, so he seeks to find as much of Him as possible. That way if a single aspect of his life is removed, he is not shaken because he still has plenty of other sources of strength in Christ.
But it doesn't stop there. A tree does not take root only for its own growth. If we could examine the thoughts of an animate tree, I believe it would have other living creatures in mind. A strong, healthy tree is not only stable and immovable, but it also provides shelter, produces fruit, and spreads seeds. In the same way, a person whose roots are spread wide, not being so attached to one particular thing but finding joy in all things and being content with whatever he is given—this person will not stop at his own spiritual growth but will be determined to do for others what the Lord has done for him. His strong roots in the Lord will allow him to be an unshakable source of shelter for those in need of hope and comfort. The growth he finds in prayer and in his study of the Word will give him a foundation from which to bear fruit, actions that demonstrate God's character, which will draw to people to enjoy the sweetness of the fruit and to seek more. And the joy he finds in the Lord will cause him to desire to see the same results in the lives of others, so he will spread of the seed of God's Word and His love, specifically by bearing fruit. The seeds of a fruit tree are carried by the fruit it bears, and the seed will not come if fruit is not produced. Similarly, we must bear fruit in order to effectively spread the seed of the gospel. And we can find encouragement in this: even if our fruit goes unnoticed by those we intend to reach by our good deeds, the fruit we bear still carries seeds to plant new trees. So even if our actions may not seem to have had an effect on someone, we can know that somewhere down the road someone will have a lasting impact on that person's life, and the Holy Spirit will take root inside of him.
So let's grow to be strong trees—oaks of righteousness (Isaiah 61:3) planted by streams of water (Psalm 1:3), abiding in Christ and bearing much fruit (John 15:5) to leave a lasting impact (John 15:16) so that all may see and know that we serve the Living God (John 15:8) and that they might see His glory and power and desire to serve and worship Him as well (Isaiah 6:1-8). Rather than digging our roots deep, let's spread our roots wide so that we can be firmly anchored in Christ and well nourished by His Spirit, allowing us to serve others effectively and adequately give God glory. And let's seek to grow our roots in the dirt of life rather than in the flowerbeds, because we know that Jesus makes beautiful things out of dust. The greatest things in life are not those that are very clearly outwardly glorious but rather those that the Lord makes glorious, no matter how unlikely and apparently useless and irredeemable it may seem. Worship God in the dull, everyday moments, not just in the big, emotional moments, because the majority of life is made of the simple things. As long as the big moments are the only times we give glory to God, Jesus has no hold on our lives. But if we learn to devote our everyday life to Him, then our whole being will truly be committed to Him.
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