It’s been a fully week since we’ve first arrived at training camp. Homesickness has hit, tiredness and a few sniffles as well, but the leaves are starting to change and so are the hearts.  Slow, tender love from the Father sweeps over me and a room of almost 300 other eager faces.

I always compare my life to an image of creation.  Right now it’s the slow, crisp mornings when the leaves are a little mellow as the sky changes into shades of pink and red. The sun starts to touch everything around like a warm embrace. The air is sweet, the leaves are warm with shades of orange. This image in my mind encapsulates the sweet, warm, and newness of the Fathers love. It’s a little bitter sweet, the change, and I can’t deny it’s a little scary.  Giving someone your heart is entrusting them with all you are, all you love, the deepest, rawest parts of who you are. Giving God my whole heart has been a slow tender process. Some days I cry in frustration, others I smile as I feel the warmth of His love shine on my face. Change will hurt, grieve it. But it is beautiful, like the changing of seasons, or dawn in the morning.

“But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.”

-Proverbs 4:18