I finished my LTE Life Transforming Event- Emotionally Stretching Opportunity of A Lifetime otherwise known as ESOAL this past Sunday around six in the morning. It all began around last Wednesday around nine at night. While a lot of my experience was a blurr, I will do my best to give detail and recall facts. I was placed in Texas Company with my brother core and cousin cores. two families, four cores- two guy cores and two girl cores. I obviously loved my company! We slept for a total of thirteen hours the entire time we were out there. eighty-four hours the entire time from beginning to end, and most of all an amazing time the Lord showed me his greatness. I remember the first day Thursday I wanted to ring out so bad because I thought i was so dumb being out there in the heat and sweating. I didnt find a lot of purpose in it and I missed my bed and good food. We ate three times a day our food consisted of a serving of 12oz of rice (no flavor) beans(no flavor) cornmeal(no flavor and food colored) I could not get through more than half a cup and it was forced down. Its crazy how much you take a sandwich or an apple for granted until you can not have it and you learn how to split a granola bar (chewy) into like thirty pieces to share with everyone. My entire family was working hard so i figured I would not quite knowing I had more to give and just would pray for an injury so I could ring out medically I remember hoping to hurt myself. It sounds bad but its crazy how the enemy puts those thoughts and lets us play with them so that we can give up. I spent most of Thursday in self pity. I worked hard, but the day seemed to drag on forever simply because I was too focused on myself and not on those around me. My pride would not let me ring the bell as well I know I would not be able to look at the kernel in the eye and tell him I could not go on. Friday I finally realized that I just needed to make it through the day and I would be okay. I was in pain, I was chaffing and dirty. With no shower and little sleep I didn't know what to expect so I expected the worst. We had the opportunity to worship and God really just gave me strength at five in the morning. I didn't want to let my family down and so I decided I would be full of joy. The days were so hot but I remember that Friday God provided wind and clouds I was so thankful! Finally on Saturday I remember marching in the morning around and I just saw Jackie's smile come to face and then my moms and then Luis's and then my sister Elizabeth's. Then it hit me that these people were praying for me I had a church praying for me and that brothers and sisters around the country lifting all of the internship in prayer. I wasn't alone and that God was with me. At that point I was full of pure joy the kind in James 1:2-4. I truly experienced it! From that point on I was in such a good mood it didn't matter what they did to us I loved every minute of it.! God showed me how unified we have to be I saw time in time again the companies that were weak in unity lost a lot of people while our company because we constantly were encouraging each other only lost six people total. That is GOOD! Joy is not something that we feel all the time. A lot of the time when we are facing a hard trial we want to sit around and throw pity parties for ourselves and complain, yet we fail to realize that those around us are going through similar things and possibly worse. You choose JOY! Sometimes you can not control the situation you are in but you can control your attitude you can choose JOY you can choose to smile even when you don't feel like it, you may think its not something I feel its lying... NO! Its taking a stand having faith that God is in control and that even in the trial you trust him! Whether through ESOAL or at work or even waiting for the red light, when you are running late. Choose joy! hahahaha okay on a lighter note, i think I will try to explain some of the evolutions that we did. We had to push a school bus a quarter mile, we had to sit in a cold bath in the middle of the night, we rolled down a hill, we ran obstacle courses that were set up like navy seal basic training! We got sandy! hahahah they would water us down from head to toe and then have us run to the sand pits and come back, and made us walk into a pond full of muddy water. You may think this is so cruel why would they do this why would they put you through that... well truth is they didn't i CHOSE to do it! We marched a lot!! I lost my voice We had two mile runs in the morning. Words will never give justice to exactly what I experienced those days. God is so good and well in the end I know he had me go through it to show me his faithfulness, my God, my God is a GOOD GOD! if you would like to check some videos out here is the site! till next time GOD BLESS
trailerclub.blogspot.com
Oh by the way: Thank you so much for all of the prayer that you guys are doing for me. Its your faithfulness in it that God is working wonders in my life right now! May God continue to bless each and everyone of you! :D
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