For the Love. Smokey Mountains, Tennessee.

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” – Matt 11:28

I didn’t know what to expect when I arrived in the Smokey Mountains in Tennessee.  I knew only of the vision God had endowed Ginny Corbett and I with months earlier.  I had my ideas as to what I needed from Father, what I desired to receive from this experience, and what I was going to need to be for the attendees.  Most of the time leading up to FTL was spent considering the latter.  This being my first time teaching at a workshop, I spent much thought and energy attempting to be as prepared as possible.  I felt I needed to appear that I had it all figured out, I mean let’s be honest, $2000 is no small price.   But I was not prepared for what happened in the days and nights to come.  To say the least.

I arrived on the mountain and I got to quickly meet the three guys who would be attending the workshop, J Mizzle, Stick and P Tang.  They are also known as Jason Mize, Chris Luk and Glendon Tang, but they are heretofore known as I have named them.   Guys made up about 0.5% of the total workshop attendance, help included, so I knew this would be interesting.  But in all sincerity, I was excited that I would get to spend so much time with the guys in a small group setting.  I just didn’t know how late those sessions were going to go!

Everything started out fairly smoothly that first evening with a “get to know each other” dinner and a game of Catch Phrase, but afterwards we had a time of worship, and looking around the room, I really had a sense of heaviness.  There were faces that read of burdens long carried.  Weary faces, ladened with fatigue.  God was about to do some amazing things.  I stayed up with Ginny and Lauren until about 1:30 am that night.  Initially we began talking about the weather for the next day, as it was supposed to be cold and rainy on the mountains, and we were deciding what to do.  That conversation lasted a short time before God intervened and we ended up praying for each other and worshiping for maybe 2 hours.  A work had begun in Lauren that night.  You really should read her take.

After leaving The women’s cabin at 1:30 am, very tired after a day of travel, meeting new people, and of hours of prayer and worship, I entered my cabin exhausted and ready for bed.  Not so much.  I cleaned up (see: bathed) and as I was getting ready for bed, there was the sound of an elephant stampede.  That was merely the sound of our very loud cabin though, as I went out of my room to see how many people had fallen down the stairs and what amount of luggage was laying on top of them at the bottom, I saw P Tang.  I asked him what he was doing, and he said that he and Stick were upstairs talking.  So I went upstairs, as I really hadn’t had much opportunity yet to get to know either of them.  That was 1:50 or so.  We talked for a while, but I just loved them instantly.  These were my peeps.  I got to bed around 3:30 that morning.

The next day, I was to teach.  I love to teach.  I fear public speaking.  But in a “He is made strong in your weakness” way, it went swimmingly.  I prattled on and on and while normally, I would feel like I was wearing out my welcome, I began to feel very at home.  REALLY at home.  As the workshop went on, I found myself as free to be myself as I had ever been.  I never felt the pressure to know everything about photography.  I don’t.  I was allowed to simply be myself and make no excuses for it. Passionate, loud, silly, crazy, sometimes ridiculous, ALWAYS over the top, me.  This was what I had told myself I needed to be, but I feared this because of the vulnerability necessary to do it.  It was quite liberating.  Funny thing about being yourself.  You can do it, and I almost always am, but it is a VERY different experience when the people around you are doing the same.  There was an authentic spirit here.  An honesty and sincerity that permeated the entire mountain.

It wasn’t all peaches though.

On Tuesday morning I got an ear infection due to a sinus infection that had lingered for two weeks.  It was quite painful, and I couldn’t hear much if anything out of that ear.  That night, I found out the house Destiny and I were going to close on on the Monday when I got back home, appraised for 20,000 less than our already agreed upon price.  With an FHA loan you cannot buy a home for that much more than the appraised value.  The seller, it appeared was not going to sell us the home at the appraised value.  We are currently in a rent house, and due to the fact that we were closing on a house on Monday, the owner of the rental property found new renters, and they are scheduled to move in the following Sunday.  At this point, in less than two weeks, my family would not have a place to live.  The next morning my other ear got infected as well.  Later that day, the woman who was selling us the house decided that she would agree to sell the house to us at the appraised value.  Yay, right?  Except that she will not pay any closing costs any more due to the amount of money she is going to lose on the house.  We were not expecting that, and now if we go though with the purchase, we are out an extra $9,000.  The next evening at around 4 am while hanging out with the guys, my laptop craps out.  It won’t turn on.  The next evening while shooting outside and doing an off camera lighting demonstration, my flash falls and cracks the mount.

And yet, there was this peace.  Phil 4:6-8.

Not everything went according to plan at FTL.  Well, let me restate that.  Not everything went according to OUR plans.  Prov 16:9.

But God did some miraculous things up on that mountain.  Chains were broken, wounds were healed, people set on the path He has for them.  But this was only the beginning.  There were connections made.  Real connections.  Everyone left there with many new friends.  I certainly did.

My ears are better.  My laptop needed a new logic board.  There are 81 days left on the three year apple care plan i bought for it.  No charge.  The house?  We are moving in on Friday and Saturday this week.  I booked two weddings and sold an album after we decided to go for it.  But whatever.  I would rather have a broken laptop, two ear infections, and no place to live in a few weeks, than to give up even one second of the time spent in Father’s presence up on that mountain with my new friends.