Before this time I had never traveled out of Michigan. It took around 13 hours to get to our destination, and by the time we arrived we were all exhausted. Since this was a four day event, we had to get a hotel room. My friends from the youth group and I all just slept on the floor, leaving the beds to my pastor and some other older women who came along. That night when I went to sleep, I realized there was a slight soreness in the back of my throat. When I woke up, I found myself with a terrible cold. My throat was so sore that morning that I couldn’t drink water because of the weird feeling it …show more content…
I was nervous and excited all at the same time. As I looked around me, everyone started speaking in a strange language that I couldn’t understand. The leaders were shouting praises to God for giving the gift to these people. I tried and tried to receive this “gift” like everyone else was, but nothing happened to me. A leader noticed me standing silently looking around, so he came up to me and started praying and telling me to just accept the gift. Again, I tried as hard as I could to be open to it, but nothing happened. Why couldn’t I receive this amazing gift just like everyone else was? Was I not as important? Was I doing something wrong? Was everyone else just faking it and I was the only one being real about it? The man continued on for a long time insisting that all I have to do is “let God in.” In that moment I felt extremely pressured and as if I were letting people down from my youth