“We were doing for two weeks what Jesus and his disciples did for three years together”

Emma Fetherman, participant on the July 2018 Haiti Volunteer Corps, talks about the power of relationships and vulnerability.
“The thing that struck me most about my Volunteer Corps trip to Haiti with my dad last July was the speed at which relationships formed between me and the other participants. We spent 24 hours a day together, praying, laughing, eating, serving, and drawing closer to God together.
We were doing for two weeks what Jesus and his disciples did for three years together. During those two weeks, I made friendships that will last a lifetime. Something about serving with others brings people closer together than any other activity: throw God in the mix and it becomes doubly true.

About a week before my HVC, I had left teen camp convicted and cut to the heart by my experience there. That teen camp was the first time I had ever been vulnerable about my life. As a result, I resolved to share my life’s story five times during the HVC, in preparation for beginning to study the Bible again. It was like a trial run for my vulnerability.
I ended up sharing my story seven times during that trip, because a couple of people had heard I was sharing, and wanted to hear it for themselves. Each time I was met with empathy, encouragement, thanks, and love. I learned that what I had gone through, some of my fellow participants had gone through too, or were going through as well. They in turn would share their trials and tribulations, and as we sat in silence after our confessions were over, you could feel God with us more clearly than ever: ready to cradle us in his arms.
Those relationships and vulnerable moments are what led me to ultimately resolve to share my story as many times as I could. When I got back to my home in Colorado, I started studying again on August 29th, and got baptized November 17th.
That Haiti trip’s relationships led me closer and ultimately TO God. The material poverty of Haiti was something I was familiar with, having lived in Cambodia while my parents worked for HOPE worldwide, but even so, the different dialect of poverty in each underserved nation was a wake-up call to all the resources I had. Especially church-wise. And when I put them to use I got baptized.

I am currently in my last semester of junior year, getting ready to apply for colleges (another perk of being 16 during the HVC was having the campus participants pitch their schools) and I am in a study of another teen girl. That summer, that trip, and those relationships changed my life, shifting it into a direction that led me into green pastures I never could have imagined a year ago.
My only regret is that I didn’t get baptized in the warm Haitian water: the picture doesn’t accurately portray the twenty degree (fahrenheit) weather I was baptized in.”