Growing up I was taught that God was calling me to be his servant, his hands and feet, and this vessel of his love that is to be shared with all those I come in contact with. When I was 13 years old, I was at a SLAM service week and that shift from following God out of obedience to my parents and teachers to a desire to serve God myself took place; I met God on my own and was challenged to begin this process of making my faith my own. From then on, all of the mission weeks that I got to participate in with my school furthered my relationship with God, teaching me to see the correlation between serving God and serving people (something we see evident in his Word through the life of Jesus). Mission trips became focused on growing in wisdom and understanding of who the God is that I had committed my life to.
Last summer, I went on my first Internship, my first “adult” mission trip, and something that I took away from that whole process was that we don’t spend countless hours studying Gods word for ourselves, we do it for our brothers and sisters we serve. This so powerfully changed my view on mission work. A common mindset among the world of Christianity is that in order to make a difference, to help a village or community in need, we need to build up their infrastructure. A new church! A new community center! A hospital! And while those things are not bad, they aren’t what God desires our focus to be on when we go out and claim his name in what we are doing. In Jesus’ ministry, he focuses on 2 main components: healthcare and education. This is our focus.
During boot camp we get to spend hours in Gods word prepping our hearts, minds, and spirits for all that God has in store for the summer, but it is evident in the service we do along side these studies that they aren’t just for ourselves. Boot camp pushes us to get our minds off of ourselves and our own personal relationships with God (still a wonderful thing to develop and this is a HUGE part of the process, but there is more to it), and onto practically implementing what we are learning in Gods word in our lives, and communicate it to those we serve. Last year was my first experience with boot camp, I did not know what to expect, but it was one of the most powerful moments of that mission experience because it pressed me in ways I didn’t know I needed to be pressed, and I used all that I learned during that time throughout the rest of the summer.
Book camp is calling me to remain present in the moment, soak up all that I’m learning, so that I can love the people I will serve this summer the way God loves them.