Summer Leadership Project 2015

   I would like to take a minute to talk about my summer vacation. It was extraordinary and was a special one, an incredible one, an intense one, but a rewarding one. I was a part of Summer Leadership Project 2015 through Campus Outreach (CO). Summer Leadership Project runs from June 1^st all the way to the end of July. CO is a campus ministry at several colleges. CO is an incredible ministry and not only focuses on the college campus but also different parts of the world. It’s really easy to join as well, all you have to do is show up to our weekly meetings and events that we have. There is a CO at Georgia Southern and even as an East Georgia student you can still become a part of this growing campus ministry.

First off, what I learned was what impacted me the most and was what the summer was all about. We had several different “training packages” that we went through during the summer: Theme training, Bible study training, Prayer training, Evangelism training, and Life training. Our theme for the summer was “Fully Persuaded” based off of Romans 4:20-21. We had our theme training meetings on Monday nights; my favorite one was our second theme training “Fully persuaded that God Loves Me.” The Word of God is filled with so many promises and learning about those promises is something that will stick with me for the rest of my life. Knowing God’s promises truly brought comfort to me during the beginning of the summer. The training package “Evangelism” was another one that impacted me very deeply this summer. If anything it took me out of my comfort zone by teaching me that sharing my faith is scary but in the end rewarding. It also showed me that the end results of sharing my faith are completely up to God, not me. On Saturday afternoons we would go out onto the beaches of Daytona and share the gospel to people. It was extremely frightening and hard at times, but there were times that I saw God really working in me and the people I reached out to. A very important aspect to the Evangelism training was being able to share our faith to people at work and within the community

             The summer was filled with new experiences and new changes in my life. I worked at McDonalds during the summer as my very first job. Let’s just say I’m not fast food material. Sure it wasn’t all that great but an experience that I am thankful for and will never forget. It taught me so much about myself and taught me patience for others (co-workers, managers, and customers). I met a girl that worked there named Nacole, a college student just like us, she was one of my trainers and now a very good friend. Work was filled with many challenges and struggles but also filled with some learning experiences and some amazing opportunities. I never thought I would have worked at McDonalds or any fast food place for that matter. However, I wouldn’t have traded that for the world because it taught me so much. It taught me patience, how to work quickly but efficiently, but more importantly it made my weaknesses stronger. There were days that I didn’t want to go but I knew that they needed hard workers and besides, who doesn’t like getting a paycheck? My co-workers and managers are a part of a special family that I developed while I was down there and now they are some very close friends of mine.

            Aside from work we also did volunteering within the community of Daytona. Mostly it was manual labor like yard work and things of that nature. I’ll be honest with you I actually enjoyed volunteering more than work because being out within the community you meet all sorts of people. It humbles you when you see homeless people just lying in the parks trying to find somewhere to sleep or stay for a while. It reminded me of all that I have and how grateful I should be. Also, I grew in compassion for them and wanted to help them. Although I wasn’t actually able to help them in the way I wanted to, I did get to show them Christ through the work that I did and how my attitude was when I did volunteer. I know you may think that doing yard work isn’t all that fun, but we had some awesome people to work with and they made it enjoyable. I was always excited when I had to go volunteer because of the reward I got. The reward was compliments from complete strangers about the work that I was doing.

            Friday nights were my favorite part. We had what they call “socials” and we would all dress up in whatever the theme was for the social and go out as one big huge group and do something fun together. My favorite one was a Disney social that we had towards the end of the summer. We all dressed up as different Disney characters and went ice skating. I had one of the best times of the whole summer that night. Just hanging out with friends and building friendships also having a fun time was just what I needed to end the week. Another one of my favorites was the last one we had which was Christmas in July. We decorated with Christmas decorations, had cookies, and played some Christmas type games. It was so much fun and a great way to end an incredible summer. It was so funny to see the different outfits that people would come up with and how they took time into to making them.

            Coming home was very difficult because I didn’t want to leave all the new friendships that I had made and how many memories I made down there. Even though there were struggles and it was hard at times; the experience was something that I couldn’t have received anywhere else. I could go on and on about my whole summer because God taught me so much and I learned so much from some of the leaders that are older than me and farther along in their faith than I am. I grew a ton spiritually, mentally, and emotionally; I learned how to live on my own, manage money for the most part, also how to prioritize my time better. I am definitely going to go back as many summers as I can in the future. Everyone in Campus Outreach invites you to look into becoming a part of our growing campus ministry and come on Summer Leadership Project. Applying doesn’t start till late in the spring for those who are going on their first Summer Leadership Project. Trying to find the right words to describe the summer and what all happened and all that I learned is so difficult because there’s so much detail that I want to say. It’s hard to explain and even harder to really put into words what exactly happened during the summer. Overall though, my summer was an impactful, intense, extraordinary event in my life that I will never forget and can’t wait to have again.