This week has been full of team building and getting to know everyone that is apart of our team on a deeper and more intimate level. You would be surprised how much you can learn about a group of people when you take away from their social media and put them in a field with tents to assemble together and live for three days.
Coming into this experience I didn’t have any expectations pre-set in my mind. I came with an open heart ready and willing to meet new people and get to know them. I’m thankful for that, because coming in with an open heart has allowed me to get to know some beautiful people and hear some inspiring stories. I was reminded that what you see with an open heart is far more important than what you see with open eyes.
In this first week I learned that everyone has a story. No two stories are alike but all are special and significant. At first I thought maybe my story was too messy, or that maybe these people around me might have more of a cookie cutter testimony. Maybe my testimony would be better kept to myself or maybe it was too messy to share or to get into. Or maybe I just didn’t want to allow myself to be vulnerable and open up to people I didn’t really know that well.
I learned after this first week that all of us have come from a messy situation at one point or another in our lives and God has been faithful to each of us. Each of us have a testimony of God’s faithfulness, His mercy, His grace, His love, and His forgiveness. While sitting around a campfire and sharing our hearts I realized that each of us have a story to tell and a testimony to share.
My eyes were opened to the fact that God does not want us to keep quiet about our testimony or about what the love of God brought us out of. He is wanting to use our story to help those around us. What we see as insignificant or too small or too shameful to share, could be the very thing God uses to help free or encourage someone else around us.
Romans 12:3 Amplified Bible (AMP)
3 For by the grace [of God] given to me I say to everyone of you not to think more highly of himself [and of his importance and ability] than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has apportioned to each a degree of faith [and a purpose designed for service].