Summer Training Project: Awake
We’ve been in South Carolina for 3 weeks already with 200 college students from Minneapolis and our staff team. Our theme for the Summer Training Project is “Awake.” Our theme comes from the verse “So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.” (1 Thessalonians 5:6). Some of the talks our staff have given so far have been called “Awake and in Awe,” ”Awake to the point,” ”Awake to you,” “Awake to Eternity,” and “Awake to Brokenness.” In our “Awake and in Awe” talk, one of our staff asked the question: What should happen when we think of God? When we find out his character, who he really is, we would have no other reaction than to be “in awe.” A quote that stuck out to me was this: ”Only a few people are awake and they live in a constant state of amazement.” We’ve discussed and seen so personally in our own hearts and lives how as Christians, we’re continually falling asleep. We continually need to be living our lives in community and awakened by God’s word through scripture and conversations of who He is and eternal reality. Without these things, our hearts fall asleep. We forget the good news of Jesus. We forget that there are people dying who do not know him. We forget that He saved us from his wrath through his death on the cross. We forget all his benefits, rewards and blessings he has for us. The toughest one is that… we forget he loves us. At the risk of sounding cliche… we feel like we’ve woken up to our own struggles with sin more deeply, we’ve woken up to God’s character more sweetly, and woken up to his freely offered grace more frequently. What we’ve been exposed to in the past few weeks has led our hearts to deeper worship. We’ve only got a few days left and are soaking in such wonderful teaching and community while we have it.
