A girl named Sydney and God's Peace

My Experience On Choir Tour (So Far)Liesel Burks
Wow!! What an amazing trip this has been! God has truly blessed us all with amazing people who have planned this trip carefully. God has been with us this entire trip, and everything has gone as planned! We've been to wonderful sites, met unforgettable people, and have experienced so many things! What a blessing!! But out of all the adventures we have been on (which are a lot!), two have stuck out in my mind. The first adventure was on Saturday afternoon. We sang at our first destination, The Genesis Children's Home in Kentucky. We had a pretty small crowd of only nine girls and a few of the faculty. As we did our performance, I was looking at the girls and silently praying that they would "get it". I was afraid that they would mock our performance. However, at the very end, a girl named Sydney came up to the microphone because there had been something she wanted to say. I wasn't sure what she was going to say, but I was incredibly blessed to hear what she said. "Thank you for performing for us. I now know that God is always on my side and I'm not alone." As she said those words, I knew that we had accomplished the goal that we came on this trip for: to spread God's love and his word. The second adventure that will always stick with me occurred on Sunday afternoon. We had visited the Saint Louis Zoo, and it had been a blast! We were all a little exhausted from the late night before and our two early performances, so most of us were wanting to rest up before singing later that night. However, we stopped at a cathedral in the middle of Saint Louis. This had been one of our "detours", according to Mary Lynn, and she believed that we would feel God's presence if we looked for it. As I walked into the cathedral, I was shocked at how vast (and beautiful) the cathedral was! Everywhere you looked, there were beautiful mosaics of Jesus and other important people in the Bible. It was silent in the cathedral, but that was the first time in a while that I experienced peace from God. The week before had been so hectic: Memorial day gatherings, getting all of my things ready for tour, everything was just crazy!! But as I sat in one of the many pews in the cathedral and began to pray, I could feel the Holy Spirit come over me and engulf me in peace. What a great feeling!! That peace has stuck with me throughout the tour and hopefully I will remember that moment to bring back the peace in my life when I need it the most! Of course, there are many other places that we have visited (the Arch, Busch Stadium, and Swifty's just to name a few) but it would take me forever to describe the impact this tour has had on me!! This tour has been an incredible blessing to me and I can't wait to see what God has in store for the rest of our tour!