Mountain Adventures

The last couple weeks have been quite exciting!

The week of July 17th, we were asked to make a schedule planning out every hour of our week- making sure we included times of running, 12 hours of prayer, and a new spiritual discipline, plus our regular serving and teaching times.  We were even told to plan our exact bedtime and not allow group plans to change what we had planned for ourselves. Once we had everything scheduled in that we needed to, we could leave space open for relaxing and spending time with other people. Jean explained that this an especially important discipline to learn in ministry in order to get things done that you need to get done and to keep you from letting feelings in the moment (fatigue, what others want to do, etc...) get in the way of what we have decided together with God that we need to do.

This was especially helpful in guarding our alone time and our prayer times. I found that with the business of our week, I really needed those scheduled times of prayer.

Finally, our week culminated with a big group packing party at Ryan's house for Colorado. We tried to evenly distribute all the food and equipment we would need for our 4-night stay in the mountains. And then at 5:30 the next morning we all piled into cars and started the journey to Colorado.

Day 1:
We got to our campsite around dinner time and began to pitch our tents. Once that was finished, we met with the staff, who had suspicious looking smiles on their faces. Lance said, "You guys did a great job with the tents, unfortunately you're not going to be sleeping in the tonight." He proceeded to pull out 3 tarps and some rope, and told us that our first challenge was to built a functional place to sleep for the night out of a tarp and some rope. That was quite an adventure. Kari and I finally settled on a tent that was low to the ground that would allow minimal wind and rain to get in. We won the award for "functionality" and spent the night a bit chilly, but protected under our tent. That night was also my first experience going to the bathroom in the woods. I can't say that it was my favorite experience- it made me very thankful for real bathrooms.

Day 2:
The next morning we woke up and ate oatmeal (and instant coffee :-) ) around the fire and then spent about 45 minutes by ourselves re-centering on God. Shortly after that, we left for a day hike. We set out on one of the trails near our campsite and ended up in this beautiful valley surrounded by mountains. We hiked up a small peak and took in the beauty all around us. We hiked back over some fields to a big rock formation and ate lunch there. We then hiked back to the open valley. The staff told us we had the rest of the afternoon to sit with God and read through the book of Matthew looking at the character of Jesus and how we saw him interacting with people. As I was sitting on a rock that looked over the mountains, I noticed something moving a couple hundred feet away. All of the sudden I saw a female moose with 2 baby moose following close behind her. They were walking across the valley. Then, the male moose with HUGE antlers slowly came into view. It was such a cool (and a little bit scary) experience! That night we had our usual flavored rice meal over the fire, Aaron led us in worship with his guitar, and then we moved into the welcoming tents.

Day 3: We got up and ate breakfast and then were sent off on our own for a day of solitude in the mountains. We were asked to read a book called, "Can You Drink This Cup?" by Henri Nouwen and reflect over the chapters. This was by far my favorite day of the trip. I found a cozy little spot next to a waterfall/ creek and spent the morning in reading and praying and singing worship to God. It was absolutely wonderful and beautiful. God spoke a lot to me about embracing the fullness of life that He has for me, and how that may not always be comfortable, but he promises that if I follow Him with abandon He will give me good gifts. I then walked out to the valley we had spent time in the previous day, and I just sat in prayer and worship with God... (plus a few minutes where I stood and sang "The hills are alive with the sound of music...." ;-) ). I went back to camp for supper and played some games with the staff and other interns. And then we all went to bed early to prepare for our big hike the next day! We planned to leave the campsite around 6:15 the next morning.

Day 4:

We drove out early to Mount Audubon. And started hiking around 8:30, and goodness gracious that was one of the hardest things I've ever done. It was hard to get used to altitude and lack of oxygen. The mountain was 13,221 feet high. We had to stop every few hundred feet to catch our breath. As we got to about 12,000 feet, I started feeling quite sick. I think I got a touch of altitude sickness. I kept pressing on and asking for strength from God, but a few hundred feet from the peak, I had to stop. David and Lance sat down with me and we waited as the rest of the group climbed to the top and  hiked back down. They reached the peak at about 12:30. The weather was beautiful and there was hardly and wind even at the top part of the mountain. Eventually my stomach settled a bit, the rest of the group returned, and we hiked back down to our car.

I think that day taught me a lot about God. Not very far into the hike, I was completely relying on God for every breath I took and the strength for every step I climbed. Eventually, I had to be vulnerable enough with the community to ask for frequent stops, and eventually had to make the decision not to keep going- reminding myself that God was not disappointed in me. That was really hard, but I was surrounded by the love and acceptance and encouragement of the community around me- reminding me of God's love. We reached the bottom and it started to downpour right as we were getting in the cars. I think God held off the hard rain for us :-)

We returned to camp and all relaxed for awhile, ate dinner, and then were led through a couple of teachings/reading that Jean had sent with Emily. The first was called, "Is Love really all you need?" which was about the verse in 1 John that says, "Perfect love casts out all fear." The article talked about how only God's love is perfect, humans can never give love perfectly, and therefore human relationships often create fear (fear of abandonment, fear of rejection, etc...) The second teaching was about trust and how important it is to exercise perceptive trust in relationships with other humans. We then paired up with another intern and shared our hearts and prayed for one another. I had an awesome conversation with Jeff Hendred and just felt very close to the community around me.

That night around the campfire, we played games, worshiped, and Aaron shared with us a song he wrote (which was AWESOME) and we settled in for our last night of sleeping in our tents.

Day 5: We got up and ate our usual oatmeal breakfast, and then the staff told us to stand in a circle around the fire so we could share encouragements and blessings for all the of the interns for the week. We would take turns for each intern and then tell them ways we had been blessed by them, seen God in them, or were thankful for them. Then the staff prayed a blessing over each of us individually. After that was done we packed up and piled back in to the cars for an 11 hour drive back to Kansas City.

God met me in unexpected ways on this trip. I was very far out of my comfort zone, but yet he protected me and sustained me. The biggest blessing and answer to prayer was that I was MIGRAINE-FREE all week!!! Which, really is miraculous. I got very little sleep, my whole schedule was different. The only explanation is a loving Father God who listened to our prayers and protected me. He is so good!

Now, we are about to start our last week of the internship, and I am expectant that God is not done teaching me things for the summer...

Thanks for praying!

Prayer Requests:
- That we would all be able to catch up on sleep and be able to fully choose into what God has planned for us this coming week.
- That God would seal the work he has already done in us this summer and show us how to walk in the truths we know about Him as we move into a new community environment.
- That we would not stop being thankful for the little ways and the big ways He is constantly providing and protecting and loving us.

P.S. I wrote the first verse and chorus of a song as I looked upon the mountains. I don't have a melody yet, but here are the words...

Verse 1:
Come pursue me
With your inviting presence
Whisper your love in my soul
Just one touch of your hand
Begins the healing within
Your breath upon my heart
Brings warmth to the cold

Chorus:
I see your strength
And I see your life
Your beauty and love
Your wisdom and might
And my greatest dream
Is to forever be seen
As the one who delights your heart.