Spring Campaigns and Spring Missions Enrich Officer Training
By: Captain Josh Hinson
Each spring the cadets of the Evangeline Booth College (EBC) go out on Spring Campaigns and Spring Missions. During Spring Campaigns firstyear cadets participate in an immersive ministry experience and partner in mission with a local Southern Territory command. Second-year cadets travel outside the Southern Territory to embrace the Salvationist spirit in a different cultural context.
The first-year cadets of the Champions of the Mission session were split into three teams and sent throughout the Southern Territory: McAllen (Texas), National Capitol Area Command, and a tour of Tennessee. The cadets conducted services, shared the Gospel, and engaged in the mission.
The second-year cadets of the Defenders of Justice session partnered with the Latin America North Territory ministering in Costa Rica for their Spring Missions. The cadets were impressed with the dedication of the officers and soldiers, as they ministered together in corps programming, open airs, and social services.
Open the Eyes of My Heart
By: Cadet Susan Garland
Since returning from our trip, the most frequent comment I have heard is we made it back from Spring Missions in one piece. Each time I hear this I find myself wondering if it is true. This was my first time traveling outside the U.S., and I wasn’t sure what to expect. Yes, we were given pieces of information during prep week, but it was just information until I could experience it.
There is a song that became my prayer during our time in Costa Rica, “Open the Eyes of My Heart.” I needed my heart to interpret what my eyes could see because I needed to feel what we were doing. The first day we arrived at the CIDAI Leon XIII center, the director took us on a tour of the neighborhood that this educational center serves. She felt it was important for us to understand where the children come from. We were asked to leave our phones and watches at the center, and a parent from the community went to tell the neighborhood we were coming, preparing the way for us in an area particularly untrusting of strangers.
We left the gate of the center and began our journey through a narrow walkway that would take us down (literally down) through the neighborhood. We walked through liquid we could not identify and took care in taking our next steps. The river that flowed beside the homes was one that you should not drink from and one that during the rainy season would rise and flood the homes of the families living there.
The further we walked on that narrow way, I could feel my heart breaking; not about what I was seeing but about what my attitude about world services has so often been: this is someone else’s problem, not mine. That feeling began to haunt me as the eyes of my heart were opened, and by the time we reached the bottom of our path, my heart was ready for what would happen next.
As we carefully climbed back up the path that we had come down, we took a planned stop. A parent had agreed for us to come in and see her house. Her walls were filled with foto de familia, and her face lit up when asked about them. Her voice filled with pride as she told us about her family, words I recognized as speaking of her grandparents. The house was put together with things they could find, pieces of metal and wood, and with those things she had created a home for her family. You could see the joy on her face showing us her home, and when we returned to the school you could see the joy in the faces of the children and staff.
“Open the eyes of my heart, Lord. I want to see you.” And I did see God in Costa Rica — in the people, the places, and in my session mates. I didn’t want to stay, but I didn’t want to leave… Physically I made it back in one piece, but a piece of me remains in Costa Rica.
Micah 6:8: “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you (and of me)? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your (and my) God.”
