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Over the last year I have been prepping for this year’s summer camps. Yes, camps plural – three of them to be exact. When I took on this project I had the opportunity to split up the project to make it more manageable. However, because camps are a huge part of my job and I feel comfortable coordinating them, I decided to take on the majority of the work. Looking back now, that was a big mistake.
It started off well with making registration forms and getting students registered. Then I began the waitlist process. Instead of being humble and admitting to my team and myself that the waitlist was a new thing for me, I acted as if things were smooth sailing and that I had everything under control – which I did, for the most part. However, the Lord saw the pride I was hiding, and was ready to throw a few things my way to bring it to the surface.
I got to the office like any other day, set my things down, turned on the espresso machine, grabbed what I needed from my box and started to settle into the work day. I went to my locker to grab my computer, but it wasn’t there. I instantly panicked. Was someone playing a joke on me? Had I taken it home? No, it was gone, stolen from where I thought it would be safe.
In that moment I should have given up the control I wrongfully thought I had, but instead I turned into Bryce Howard in the Jurassic World movie, doing everything in my power to fix a mistake that in reality was my fault.
I rebuilt all the registration and waitlist details I could from scratch, from old emails and voicemails. And when I was finished, my pride grew and festered within my heart. I couldn’t even give part of the glory to God because I was only focused on myself and my flesh. As camp got closer, the Lord started to send me little healthy reminders that I am not in control, but again I chose to ignore them.
Then the real chaos started. People started dropping out, cabin assignments caused frustration, leaders dropped out last minute. You name it, it happened. I was working tirelessly, during all hours of the day. It wasn’t until the Friday before camp, after having another hard parent conversation, realizing I was leaving for camp in two days and had not gotten anything ready that I needed to, and sobbing from the tiredness I had created for myself, that I had a revelation: I am not in control. God is.
I was feeling so tired and frustrated because I thought I could control everything regarding camp, but I don’t. God does. I sat in silence on my living room floor, and started to pray and ask for forgiveness – forgiveness of my stupidity, and forgiveness of my selfishness, my pride, and my submitting to my flesh. And in that moment things started to become clear. I was able to let go of the “what ifs” that had been circling in my mind, and honestly just give it to the Lord and trust that He knew what he was doing. I could finally just move forward, and even enjoy some time with the hubs before I was off to camp.
Then I was able to just enjoy being at camp and loving on our students. I was able to spend a week seeing what the Lord was doing not only in my life, but what He was doing in our students’ lives, and I would have missed all of that had I not been able to identify the sin of pride in my life before leaving.