This one time at church camp....

(This is me on one of our Kitchen Staff outings at the mall)



Sigh. I'm home from camp. Thank God! Not only am I home, but I survived 2 weeks of Camp Greystone Kitchen Staff Dish Crew. That right there is an accomplishment, ladies and gents. Trust me. The past 2 weeks were extremely challenging in so many ways. God had several lessons he wanted to teach me and I'm ashamed to say that I was not a very good student. I failed several times, but in the midst of that, there was grace and I made it through. And I came out on the other side stronger...I hope. :) So for those of you wondering if I had fun at camp...not really. For the most part I was homesick, tired, annoyed, and angry. Not to say that I had no fun at all, but over all....let me put it this way: I won't be going back to camp. The End.

Enough of that. The day after coming home from camp, I went to The Do Hard Things Conference. It was FABULOUS! Hand clap to Lily for all her hard work in bringing it to Nashville! The Harris brothers are talented speakers and had a great message to share to Christian and non-Christian teens. It was also super cool that the twins Alex and Brett had there brother Joshua Harris come a speak at the last session. I bought his latest book while I was there and he signed it for me and Hannah and me got to chat with him and his daughter for quite a while after the conference. He and his daughter are also Owl City fans, by the way. Just sayin'. :) I also got to talk to Alex and Brett and they signed there book for me too. Awesome family. Hannah and me really wanted to find out where they were headed to eat afterwords and "just happen to show up". But after thinking that idea through and how terribly stalker-ish the notion was, we decided to not to. :) So we ended the great day at the Farmhouse Restaurant where I felt like I had just returned from a different country the way they were so excited to see me. :) It was fun and I'm excited to get back to waitressing today.
So here I am back in my own house, in my own kitchen, with the familiar sound of the washer and dryer going and music to sing-a-long to. It's good to be back. But even though the struggles that I faced at camp are gone, there's a whole different set of them here at home. I left them here for 2 weeks and they were right there standing with my family to greet me home, threatening to make discontent even here in my own comfort zone. So I'll suit up once again with the armor of God and prepare to fight the temptations that will come my way today. And when I fall, Jesus will pick me back up again and with His help I'll keep fighting...because it's worth fighting for.

-Jessie Rae

"There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious day,
Up from the grave He rose again!
And as He stands in victory,
Sin's curse has lost it's grip on me..."