Jamie with homeowner
Jamie’s life
was thrown into turmoil with her mom’s pancreatic cancer diagnosis. Her mom was her best friend, and they often
hung out together. They lived in
Illinois, but her dad lived in Arizona. With newfound free time, Jamie started
attending Campus Life at her high school in January 2009. Her heart ached with questions. “Why would God do this to her mom? What did I do? Why is this happening now?” Campus Life welcomed her in as family. They organized a trip to serve in New Orleans
with ReachGlobal Crisis Response starting the end of March through the
beginning of April. The group invited Jamie to help clear her head by getting
away and spending time serving others in another community. This trip changed her life forever, because
on the last day, Jamie accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior.
Her heart
had been captured by the community in New Orleans and how she had witnessed the
love of Christ in action. She knew she
would return, but she had to wait. She
headed to Spokane, Washington to attend Moody and kept a fully loaded schedule
of classes to accelerate her time in college.
Then, in June, she became Katie Manning’s surprise intern. Katie and Jamie were not even sure whether
they had ever met, but Jamie had longingly been following the intern
opportunities online awaiting the day she could come. At Moody, she had learned a lot about God and
His love and had grown in her faith.
Now, she wanted to learn the practical side of doing ministry in a
Christ-like way. She wanted to come and
do what she had done 5 years earlier.
This time,
Jamie had something to share to change lives.
She said, “It was a great blessing just to see how my knowledge of the Lord
and His Word has really impacted New Orleans as well as myself. I’m able to minister because His Word and
love are in my heart. At Moody, you learn,
but you never really learn how to be in community with each other. You don’t learn how to not judge others for
who they are or where they come from. Here,
you learn that very quickly. Just
because this person is different or has a different past than I do doesn’t mean
I have a right to judge them for who they are, where they are going with the
Lord, or where they are at with the Lord.
Everyone is in different places here.”
Interns see French Quarter with Katie
Jamie is
pursuing a degree in counseling and used her training to help homeowners and
staff in New Orleans. She starts graduate
school in September. In spring 2016, she
will be back in New Orleans to intern with Crisis Response for graduate
school. Her special verses she committed
to memory for the summer were I John 4:7-21.
Some of her benefits from her internship were learning to persevere and
move forward in ministry, better time management skills, learning to be
available to follow God’s leading, and taking a Sabbath day with God. She feels better prepared as a counselor.
Interns at work site
Jamie says, “If you want a hands-on way of learning what God’s love is
like, then come down with Crisis Response.
There’s no other way to learn the power of God’s love and the power of
prayer than working with something like Crisis Response.” She added that you need to come with
flexibility and a servant’s heart. Check
out http://go.efca.org/opportunities/internship/crisis-response-internships for more information on internships
with ReachGlobal Crisis Response.
Interns
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