It's been three weeks since I left Memphis. Things back at Cedarville are a little different than inner city Memphis. It's a lot quieter here. I don't hear gunshots anymore. I don't see homeless people everywhere anymore. I don't spend five days of the weeks working next to a drug house run by the Crips anymore. Random guys don't ask me out when they walk by. But all jokes aside, it really is a different culture here. Truth is, I miss Memphis. Memphis was broken. It was dark. It was evident that Satan was at work in that city. But it was also a place that God was redeeming. God was calling people in that city to Himself. God was moving. I was such a small part of that this summer, and I saw God do amazing things.
When I drove out of Memphis at the end of July, I started praying. There was something that I prayed for my campers every week, and I began to pray that same prayer for myself. I prayed every week that my campers would not have a once-in-a-lifetime experience at SOS. I prayed that they wouldn't look back at the one week they spent in Memphis and think about how cool it was, but that they would look back at that one week and think about how God changed them that week and used that one week to set the trajectory for the rest of their lives. I began to pray that same prayer for myself. I prayed that God would use this summer to change my heart for good.
The longer I spend away from Memphis, I think that I can honestly say that this summer was not just another summer. It is going to set the trajectory for the rest of my life. I can already see the different ways that I am responding to people around me and dealing with situations with more love and grace. I can also see that my eyes have been opened to the unspeakable brokenness in Memphis. I saw pain that I will never forget. But I don't want to just come back to "real life" and be unchanged. I want what I saw this summer to motivate me to make a difference in Memphis. I am already searching and looking for options of what I can do in Memphis when I graduate. I don't know how that is going to play out after I graduate in two years, but I have never felt so strongly that God is calling me somewhere. I have no doubt in my mind that at this point in my life, God is calling me to Memphis, and I can't wait to grow and learn more as I pursue that calling.
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