Take the Dare

It’s difficult to put into words exactly what English Lake Bible School meant to me or to fully explain how it changed me, but I think the best way to describe it is one giant game of truth or dare.

Will you dare to live a life completely sold out for Christ? Will you dare to speak the truth, the whole truth, to those around you? To God? To yourself? 

While at Bible School I made incredible, lifelong friendships that, to this day, have never ceased to dare me to press further, deeper, and harder into the person of Christ. I had the opportunity each day to hunger and thirst for the Lord alongside my peers and teachers. It was an amazing experience to be taught by those who not only knew the Lord, but whom I also knew were still getting to know him.

These people dared me to not settle in my relationship with the Lord, but to endlessly pursue him every day of my life.

They dared me to bring heaven to earth each and every day.
They dared me to live simply and prayerfully.
They dared me to be silent and to listen instead of speak.
They dared me to allow Jesus to interrupt my life and my plans.
They dared me to live a life of adventure with the Lord.  
They dared me to live in freedom.

Reflecting back, I think I took the opportunity for granted. Few other times in my life has the space been created for me to get alone with God and study his word and hear his voice. I hoped and prayed for God to move, but I had no idea just how fiercely and completely he was going to.

In a tiny town, and through ordinary people, God moved in an extraordinary way.

I am still feeling the ripples.

- Ann Chinworth