Before I came on the trip I had a lot going though my head. Questions like: What exactly will I be doing? Answer: They’re too vague to really be sure what my specific jobs will be. How involved with the people will I be? Answer: Involved. Why does everyone love mission trip so much? Most common answer: Because it’s awesome. So..basically…on day two of being in California I know that…I’ll be working…maybe with people…having an awesome time… In my “younger” (that’s right, early twenties is tragically old haha) days, before I really understood what having a relationship with Christ was, this probably would have really bothered me. But now, that I have Christ living inside me and aching to be spread to the dark places of the world…well, I just think it’s awesome too.
I’m not going to sugar coat the bus ride…20-something hours in a seat with a bunch of people who have the “Oh my gosh let’s stay up all night” attitude sort of threw me off at first. I knew that as soon as I got on the bus my negativity would either make or break the ride. But as soon as I got on the bus, I went through the list of things I wanted accomplished on this trip. One of my items was to grow in relationships I normally wouldn’t. It’s funny how when you ask God for help He will often times just throw you into the middle of a test and say “well here ya go!” As soon as I realized what He was up to, I changed my mindset and began to see the beauty of being in a crammed space with a bunch of other believers talking about God and getting hyped on the fact that we’re going to be showing Christ to people who might go their entire lives without getting a glimpse of who He is if we weren’t going. The jokes, games, seat switching and the sound of everyone who didn’t want the person next to them to know they had snacks opening them at 3 am to sneak them made the trip on a smelly double-decker bus more than worth it.
We got to Redondo Beach last night and headed straight for the pier. As we were walking around, getting food and eventually moving to the beach, it was weird how my perspective of this trip had changed. At the risk of sounding cliché, I will say that Sunday morning had a huge impact on my life. Nick decided we would worship on the beach, something I probably would have been uncomfortable with a week ago. But I was genuinely excited to be praising my God and having people walk by and stare…it’s an awesome feeling knowing Christ is sitting right next to you giving you a “hey go ahead and stare..or, even better, come join” attitude. Nick spoke a bit and then had us do something weird. He told us to walk into the surf and write the one thing that we needed God to wash away in the sand, and then let him wash it away. I wrote something down and then realized that I had written down something I was comfortable with other people seeing. So I went farther out into the water and wrote down the one thing that I truly feel like keeps me back from Christ. And then I watched Him wash it away. Now he obviously didn’t completely heal me but just the symbol behind it made it really quick. I looked at the sand and realized that that sand was once huge rocks. And now it’s soft between our toes. God is a continuous ocean working on us and washing away the things that keep us locked away form Him. This morning helped me realize that I can’t wait for my heart to be soft as the sand that covers the beaches. I made a decision about the trip this morning: let God heal me and slap me around a bit with his waves of mercy…he’s always trying. And I can let him do it the hard way, or I can just give in. So here we go! LA-Mission Trip-2010. Guns up! Let’s do this!
