"God is so real it's unreal!"

Today, I'm thankful for my camp staff family. I wish that I could be out getting together with you tonight, but an "extreme weather warning" makes that impossible. 

Camp staff family, thank you. Thank you for caring when I'm sick, for praying for anything I ask, for not judging me when I stand in front of you after hysterically crying for half an hour to ask for prayer, for supporting me (and letting me support you), for giving me one of my best friends, for always being good for an encouraging word, for your hugs when I'm upset, and simply just for being you. This summer was the hardest one I've ever had and even though no one really knew exactly what was going on, you all were supportive and encouraging anyway. I don't look back at this summer negatively, because every time something negative happened one of you would do something awesome and it would always take precedence. 

Thank you for being the best faith community around. 

"Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." James 5:13-16

Camp staff family, you live this passage. 

I hope you each have someone to bless you like you all have blessed me. 

-Cailey

Blessings | Mentors

Negative thought- The roads here are so bumpy that when I have impromptu mini jam sessions by myself when I'm driving my voice sounds funny from the bumpy road 

Positive thought- snow is SO GORGEOUS! 

Now that it's been totally confirmed that I'm going away and I can count the days, I think a lot more about the things I'll miss while I'm in Australia. Canadian money (because it's really funny), the bumpy roads (in a really weird way), snow, my family... Essentially my comfortable life, the things I've known. 

Another thing I'll miss is my church. I have an excellent church and an amazing youth/c&c group, and I will miss them greatly! I've been blessed to be a part of this group of people for my whole life and they've impacted my life greatly. 

Something my youth group really preaches is the importance of is mentors. I've been extremely privileged to meet with one incredible mentor for all my high school years. She's blessed me so much! As well, I've been blessed with many other people I can look up to. As I leave my life here behind in almost 3 weeks, I've been busy connecting with all of these excellent women. We've shared laughs, good conversation, prayer, and even just the things from our regular mundane routines. I count myself so incredibly lucky to have these women as a part of my life, and to be a part of theirs. 

And it's all over a cup of Starbucks :) 

I always thoroughly enjoy a coffee date.

To those women who I go for coffee with, thanks. You don't even know how much it means to me and how much I enjoy it! 

To whoever's reading this, if you'd like to go for coffee and talk about my trip or really anything else, I'm so down! Send me a message over Facebook or an email and we'll get right on it. 

On another note, I'm really hoping there's a Starbucks or a good equivelant close to us in Australia. I would go through a ridiculous amount of withdrawal, haha :) 

Blessings,

-Cailey 

"A cup of coffee shared with a friend is happiness tasted and time well spent." 

-Unknown 

Blessed- pre-leaving #2

Believe me, I'm really really not going to be one of those people who are constantly posting on a blog. I'm going to forget about it after awhile and not post for a long time. I realize I did just post yesterday but I just had to make mention of something.

My DTS starts in 27 days. Less then a month. I leave 4 weeks from yesterday. And already, I'm being so blessed by my fellow dts'ers. We have this group on Facebook to post prayer requests and thoughts and just things leading up to dts... They are blessing me each time I log onto Facebook and I haven't even met them yet. We've been open, sharing about the devil's attacks through health issues and anxiety. We've shared about worries with visas and language barriers, and weaknesses we desire to overcome. And every time, people respond to the posts with encouraging words, offering prayer and supportive words.

 The people I'm going to meet desire to serve The Lord with everything they are and I'm inspired and blessed by that. I'm excited to meet them and do life with them for 6 months, to learn from them and maybe teach them something. Thank you, YWAM Wollongong January dts participants. You have given me confidence in coming and this intense joy and desire to live in community with you. Blessings as you prepare for dts. 

-Cailey 

"Let me say first that I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith in him is being talked about all over the world." (Romans 1:8)

Getting Ready- Part One (Isaiah 6:8)

Isaiah 6:8- "And then I heard the voice of the Lord saying "Whom shall I send? who will go for me?" and I said, "here am I, send me."

I have always found this verse to be inspiring. The part that sticks out to me, the part I find the most challenging, is where the Lord asks- "Who will go for me?" I am always challenged by that, because it really looks at our motives. Since going to Guatemala as part of a school mission trip in 2012, I have had the desire to "go", to go out into the world and serve. But am I going for me, because I love the experience of a mission trip? or am I going for Jesus, to serve and love and follow him selflessly? it's a question I ask myself often.

I'm going to Australia, with my best friend. We're going to develop relationships, with Jesus and with our teammates. While i'm nervous to leave home for 6 months, i'm excited to see where God takes us. We're going out to serve, and i'm so excited. I leave in 4 weeks from today, and I plan to dive headfirst into the Word to get to know my Saviour better. While this year hasn't been the easiest, as I've had a lot of health problems, I know there are people praying for me and if one of those people reads this, you have no idea how much it means to me to have your prayers and support. I'm blessed to be a part of so many communities of believers that believe in wholeheartedly supporting each other.

Here's a few things I would appreciate prayer for-
1) Confidence- We're going to have a huge transition to community life in Australia, meeting so many new people and having so many new experiences. Praying for confidence in building relationships and confidence in who we are and where we've come from is going to be huge.
2) no walls- the way we're going to make the most friends and become the strongest team is by being able to be honest with each other. pray for no walls between the team and specifically no walls with each other.
3) Health/safety- something I've been hearing a lot lately is that sickness is not from God and we don't have to accept it. pray that we won't accept sickness as the norm and that we would be healthy and safe as we travel from all over the world to Australia.

And because one of my favourite blogs does this, here are 5 things about me that aren't super public knowledge.
1) I play the ukulele :) I got a ukulele as a grad gift in June and literally played it all summer. I feel really sorry for the people I worked with at camp because my song repertoire was quite limited and I played it all the time... but campers seemed to think it was pretty cool. haha :)
2) I recently cut off all my hair to donate to cancer. I had hair down to my waist and now it's just past my shoulders. I love short hair but I miss my long hair sometimes :)
3) I am literally the least creative/artistic person ever. I once had my biology teacher in high school laugh at one of the drawings I had to do for a personal response... needless to say I dropped art asap.
4) I have two tattoos. on my left wrist I have "He > i", to remind me that no matter my circumstance God is always greater then I am, that He will always have control. On my right wrist, i have a Jesus fish. I always thought the Jesus fish was a symbol for Christianity because of the feeding the 5000, but apparently that's not why. The Jesus fish is a symbol of Christianity because the word for fish in Greek (IXOYE, or "ichthus") is an acrostic for the Greek words that mean "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Saviour". So the fish on my right wrist symbolizes my most important beliefs. also a cool fact about the Jesus fish, in the ancient times when Christians were being persecuted, when they would meet people in the road they would draw the first curved line with their foot to make the fish in the sand. if the person drew the other half of the fish, they were a Christian and could talk freely. if they didn't, then the person knew they weren't a fellow believer. too cool.
5) the thing i'm most excited for in Australia is visiting Hillsong!! BE JEALOUS haha :) i really admire hillsong and all they do. and i love their music. and i'm so excited to go.

i think that's about all i have for now... time to go dive into the word :)
-Cailey
 ^"Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.  Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen."