Training Camp. It's a place in the middle-of-nowhere Wisconsin where you're free of all the distractions of the real world. It's a place many call home and have come to deeply love. It's a place of both joy and challenge; love and dislike; calm and chaotic.
It's the one place I run on empty.
Empty of my own strength.
Empty of my own emotional capacity.
Empty of my own abilities.
Empty of my own stamina.
Empty of my own desires.
I have nothing to give. I am wholly dependent.
I come to the very end of myself in every area when I am emptying out my life into the staff and students on the field. It's not only the tasks and the rigorous schedule, it's choosing to emotionally engage with a fellow co-worker who is having a rough day. It's choosing to roll off my cot at 4:40am and not snooze. It's choosing to respond to a student with the utmost patience, even when I just came from a hard conversation myself. It's choosing to add one more thing to your list so you can free up someone else who needs a break.
I have nothing to give. I am wholly dependent.
I only have to give that which Christ has given me:
Love.
Joy.
Peace.
Patience.
Kindness.
Goodness.
Faithfulness.
Gentleness.
Self Control.
These summers I spend on the mission field never fail to remind me that I am actually always wholly dependent on Christ. In the "real world" I either act like I'm in control, or I try to control.
If this summer taught me one thing it is that running on empty is actually one of the best places to be. It's where all of my weakness, sin, pride, and humanity is completely exposed and I am left clinging to the only one whom I know to cling to; the Father.
He alone gave my the manna I needed every day, in my emptiness, to be able to continue to serve Him and those He had entrusted to me. I'm not saying I did it perfectly but in all of those moments where I literally had to give Him all of what I had, it was Him who showed up and was glorified, not me.
[Side note: even when He gave me what I needed I still had my moments where I needed to walk away, cry, be alone, talk to a friend, or have a tough conversation.]
He was glorified in my weakness, my emptiness, my not-enoughness. Because in reality I am all of those things even on my "good days" (whatever those are); weak, empty, not enough.
"7 So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited.
8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me.
9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
10 For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
[2 Corinthians 12:7-11]
None of this was done in isolation. All of it was done in community. Hard and beautiful.
It's hard to be at your most empty around other people.
It's beautiful to see the joy, grace, love, and laughter because we're all in it together.
It's hard having zero privacy at camp when you just want some time alone to cry.
It's beautiful to have so many brothers and sisters who bear our burdens too.
It's hard to take care of yourself and state what you need.
It's beautiful to have co-workers look you in the eye and tell you to go sleep.
We need each other.
As I re-enter into life at home I don't run on the same type of empty. I'm not living day-to-day life at the pace I am when I'm on the mission field. But the running on empty continues to be a reminder of my heart posture before the Father. A reminder for me that I was never in control to begin with and I still need Him desperately. In every moment.
I'm always wholly dependent. It's almost as if I need Him more because of the pull of the world and this false sense of feeling like I'm in control.
It has been a practice and a discipline of mine even before the summer, to invite the Father into every moment of my day; mostly with all of the seemingly small and mundane things.
So, as I run on a different kind of empty at home my prayer is to live in the present and invite Him into all of those spaces.
Because it's really Him that my soul is longing for, not the things this world has to offer.
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