Back to the Wack

Summer is officially over for me as I head back to Waco tomorrow morning. I'm pumped to finally be living in an apartment with Briana but I'm definitely dreading moving in. Since I leave tomorrow at the crack of dawn, I really should be packing. I figured I've been packing for the last 24 hours, I can take some time off. It seems like this summer has gone by crazy fast. Despite that, I've learned a few things.

1. It's imperative to have Christian friends. You have to have friends that you can call up and just be like "hey I need prayer. I'm struggling with this and I can't handle it alone." I've also realized that God removes friendships that aren't healthy for you to be in. When He takes those friends out of your life, He puts new and amazing friendships back in. 

2. I'm a master at making chocolate chip pancakes. Every once in awhile I would make chocolate chip pancakes for the kids I nanny for. Not to brag or anything, but they were pretty awesome. There was even talk that they wanted to eat them for every meal. It was a sad day in the house when we ran out of chocolate chips.

3. I absolutely love working with kids of all ages. I was a nanny for a 4 year old, 8 year old, and 12 year old. Along with that, I went to camp with middle schoolers. With every age group, there's different things I love. This summer just reaffirmed that I'm in the right field of study.

4. God has plans for my life that are way better than my own plans. At the start of the summer, I had plans. I love plans and mine included summer school, working, and just enjoying summer. Almost immediately, I knew the summer thing was not going to work out. Del Mar was a pain to work with and made it impossible for me to take classes. Then, I couldn't find a job. I spent hours driving around town dropping off my resume everywhere I could think of. Many different times I thought I had found something, got all excited, then it fell through. After many weeks, resumes, and tears, I got a call from a family in town. They needed a nanny. It was definitely an answer to prayer and I absolutely loved working with the kids. 

I'm excited about this upcoming semester and I'm super excited about having an apartment. Also, please please please keep my friend Stratton in your prayers. He was playing in a basketball game last night and most likely tore his ACL and MCL. He's already signed to play basketball with Dallas Baptist in the upcoming school year. It makes me sick to see him injured like this. Pray for healing and for God's will in this whole situation. 

Highland Journey 3

I already know it's going to be hard for me to put youth camp into words. About a month ago, Hollie asked me to be a leader at the middle school camp. Automatically, I said "well sure! That sounds like a blast!" Almost immediately after, I was FREAKING out. I would be in charge of 16 middle school girls?! That is a lot of girls! I've always been one to work with little kids and I tried my hardest to stay away from middle schoolers. They're intimidating. Then, I started to worry not about them, but about me. How am I going to be able to talk with them about Christ? I know during worship they're gonna come to me crying and I'll have no clue what to say. So I started praying. By the time the bus pulled out of the parking lot Monday morning, I was PUMPED. 

I went into camp knowing only about 5 of the girls really well. Thankfully, we got the cabin all to ourselves so we could have some real talk whenever we wanted to. Camp started out with lots of rain, thunder, and lightning. The students were stuck in an auditorium for about 3 hours. However, when it came time for church time that night, I was asking the girls what their favorite part of the day was. Here's the part that completely floored me. They said that they liked being stuck inside all day and not being able to do the banana boats or zipline. They all confessed that they were so focused on that stuff that they forgot about why they were really at camp. Can you believe that 13 and 14 year old said that? They blew me away. 

The speaker at camp was absolutely phenomenal. His name is Scott Venable. A year ago, he felt that God was calling him to start a church in Chicago. I didn't realize this but Chicago is technically an unreached people group. How crazy is that? Only 3% of the city is Christian. This guy was not afraid to tell it like it is. He preached the gospel without holding back. Check out his church here:  http://mosaicchicago.org/

The band was also pretty awesome. It's a band called Theophany out of Austin. They had a good mix of their own songs and popular songs right now that everyone already knew. You can check them out here:http://theophanyworship.org/ Be sure to look at the song Look What We've Become.  

I also got to pray with some girls on the first night that I knew absolutely nothing about. I was able to talk with them, encourage them, and tell them about Christ. After we were finished, I was completely stoked. Nothing that I said came from me. I know for a fact that Christ was using me to speak to these girls. At camp, I learned that the things these kids are thinking about their relationship with Christ is totally above anything I would've thought about when I was 14. These kids are wanting to live in Christ, not just for Christ. It makes me soooo excited for what God has in store for them. 

All of these girls seriously stole my heart. I woke up Saturday morning and missed them! I couldn't wait to see them at church on Sunday just so I could talk with them some more and give them a big hug. We all laughed together, cried together, and spent hours talking to each other every day. We formed Godly friendships that will last and we all grew in Christ together. 

Honduras

I can't believe that exactly one year ago, I was in Honduras. It seems like so long ago but I also can't believe it's already been a year. I sometimes forget all the valuable lessons I learned while I was in Honduras. Every once in awhile, I stop what I'm doing and go back and read some of the things I wrote about right when I got back from Honduras. I need a daily reminder of how that week changed my life. Going to Honduras gave me a sense of urgency in spreading God's word to the world. I know that I'm called to share Christ to everyone on a daily basis. The thing I remember most about Honduras is the children that we met at the school in La Canada and at Destino. These children were the most loving and joyful children that I've ever met in my life. The children at La Canada literally had next to nothing, yet if they were given anything, they wanted to give it away to someone else. I remember being overwhelmed the first day we met those children because I wanted to give them everything I had. I wanted to hand over my money to them. I soon realized that they don't need the money or the possessions. They were so happy and joyful because they knew Christ; that's all they needed. The hardest part of the trip was leaving that school on Wednesday and having to tell the children that we would not be back on Thursday. I also loved being at Destino which is a children's home in Honduras. This place is literally a little piece of heaven among complete poverty. The scenery is gorgeous, the kids are precious, and the people running it are Christ-centered people. I would do anything to go back there and see all of the children just one more time. 

The mission trip to Honduras was also so impacting to me because of the group that we had. I honestly could not have asked for a better group of people to share that experience with. Now, even a year later, I'm still growing closer to the people that went to Honduras.

Just reliving my trip to Honduras makes my heart ache to go back! That week was one of the most heart changing, draining, and exciting weeks of my life. It put me out of my comfort zone some, but I think God calls us to go out of that zone. If any of you get a chance to go on a mission trip, I urge you to do it. It is such an eye opening experience.