On the last night during the 7pm Evening Program, they planned to have a number of people get up and share parts of their testimony with the entire English Camp.  At 3pm Leah asked me if I could share part of my testimony with the camp.  Leave it to my sister to make me face one of my biggest fears.

Over 6 years ago I was invited to speak at a woman's conference in Ames.  A few days before that I changed entirely what I was going to share and didn't take the time to have my husband reread through my outline.  Needless to say, moments after sharing at the conference an older woman approached me and let me know I screwed up with what I said BIG TIME.   She was right but to say I felt miserable would be an understatement, I was crushed so deep inside I couldn't see an end.  After that, I swore I'd never speak in public again.

Earlier this year though, I had a heart to heart with my sister Leah on Skype and she called me to the carpet.  Not only did she say everything Josh had been telling me the last 6 years, say I couldn't swear such a thing, but she went one step further and said I had to try and speak in public again, actually she told me I had to speak in public again.  (She even hinted to finding a way for me to speak at English Camp, and I said kindly, "No.")  But a few months ago, by random chance Rachel asked me to share for a couple minutes at a small women's time, in front of about 10 women.  With lots of prayer, Josh's prodding & editing, knowing it was a small/safe environment, I did it.  It was very, very short, I read exactly what I wrote on my sheet and I did it.  While most would have seen it as no big deal, it was a huge step for me.

But now, here it was, 3pm on Friday afternoon, and my sister was taking the opportunity of a hole to fill and asking me to speak in public, in front of a large audience.  With a LOAD of encouragement from Josh, I wrote a short part of my testimony, read it word for word off my sheet, and Eva translated wonderfully.

It really helps that I am forever/eternally grateful for the fact that I have a testimony to share!  I am happy when I can share it with others.  I am also very thankful for the amazing encouragement I got from Josh and Leah in order to even speak in front of English Camp.  While I'm not running to speak in any sort of public setting again, I feel like in these two instances helped me to approach speaking with a prayer-filled, God-centered confidence, as well as a plan of attack on how to do it.

With how much time, effort, heart, prayer, soul, and tears went into me preparing a simple testimony, just think how long it'd take me to give a State of the Union address! HA!

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