Where You go, I'll go; Where you serve, I'll serve. I will Follow.

It's one thing to see service from afar, and appreciate the many tasks which are being done for you, but quite yet another to jump at it full force and immerse yourself into the mess of life.  I simply cannot stand and watch others serve, or see the many needs of the world and let the need continue or allow less hands struggle to carry all the weight.  Christ has called us to be his hands and feet and help the least of these, "I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!" Matthew 25:40.
As part of the Kaléo program, we are called to serve in the areas of camp and church ministry.  Camp Qwanoes has been home for the past 6 summers, and it is no strange task to be gladly helping out here once again!  I'm so delighted to be able to give back in a more permanent way thoughout this next year and serve alongside my fellow students, and also the year-round staff that have given their lives to follow God's calling of service.  Along with serving at Qwanoes, each of the students are assigned a local church to attend, serve, and be actively involved in.  Myself, along with my friends Michael and Evan attend a church called Warmland Community Church in Crofton, BC, not even five minutes out of the camp.
There are many opportunities to serve here at camp.  With a camp that usually runs with over 500 campers each week in the summer, year-round there are numerous retreats, guest groups and special events such as the Qwanoes Road Tour which is held at supporting churches.  I am involved with helping out in the dish room washing dishes once a week after dinner with a few of the other students, helping out with activities for guest groups such as belaying in the challenge course or supervising the skate park, and in the upcoming weeks, I will be working full weekends counseling at the Juniors and Junior High retreats.  I love serving here at Qwanoes,  I feel that God has called me to this place for the purpose of bringing glory to him.  I was so excited just to be able to lead by example to my fellow peers and show them how things are being run at camp, hopefully making their lives easier as well.  It brings me such joy to be able to see the people I am impacting here at camp become closer to God while I allow them to have fun on activities or be able to have clean dishes or ask their questions about life and faith.  I have come to be content and even eager to serve in whatever area of camp I am needed in order to allow Camp Qwanoes to run, and thousands of people to come to know Christ more deeply.
When we were being assigned our churches, I was eagerly waiting and expecting to be serving in a church where I could use my God-given talents and just to be able to offer up my gifts and services wherever they were needed.  But when it was announced that my church for the year was going to be Warmland in Crofton, I am sorry to say that I was a little disappointed.  Warmland was the small local church, well known to the camp, that the camp worship leader and games leader both served at during the year.  I guess I had presuppositions about the church because I had come from quite a larger church back home in Coquitlam, and I was doubting that this was where I was really meant to be.  I knew that Crofton was a small seaside community with a lot of twisted problems that went back far into the family tree, and I did not think that this church was going to be well organized at all.  But of course, in all things, the Lord had a divine plan that is far above mine, and I reluctantly decided that I was going to trust in whatever he had in store for me.  The first Sunday, Michael, Evan and I arrived at Warmland, and by the end of the service I felt like God had done a complete 180 turn-around in my heart.  This small church was not at all what I had expected, full of fake and shallow people who didn't really want to come to church, but instead I found an amazing community of believers who were trying to reach out to a desperately lost community by drawing their neighbours into a community that could only be characterized by Christ's love.  As I talked with the pastor, Bryan, and many other attenders there, I felt a huge welcoming and I knew that Christ had put me there for a reason.  My LinQ, who is another staff member at camp that a student is "linked" with for the year, Alycia, also attends Warmland, along with my good friend Kayla, and I could see that Christ was affirming my place in Warmland Church.  I was a little hesitant about the first youth kick off on Friday night, but right away when I got there, I got talking to some of the girls there.  They wanted to get to know me and play with my hair and jump on my back, and I welcomed it all in stride.  I was a bit taken aback at the size of the group, the 12 students there, because at my youth back home, there would have easily been 70 students on a given week. Even through all this, I saw that Christ was showing me that faith is not all about numbers, it is about building into those lives that he gives you.
Not even two weeks into Kaléo, and already I can see God's hand in everywhere that I serve.  As he continues to give me opportunities to serve him, all I can hope is that I really do serve with all that I am, and not do it for selfish ambition, but only to glorify his name.  I pray that I would not lose sight of the mission, and catch myself trying to have selfish ambitions, but that my service would mold me into the woman of God that he intends for me to be, the woman of God who selflessly follows his call wherever he may lead.
"And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other's feet.  I have given you an example to follow.  Do as I have done to you.   I tell you the truth, slaves are not greater than their master.  Nor is the messenger more important than the one who sends the message.  Now that you know these things, God will bless you for doing them." - John 13:14-17