Hi friends,
Well there goes one more month, and it's crazy to think there is only one month left! I've thought a lot about what I wanted to share from this month, and I feel like it is just so hard to choose. I feel like I've learned an incredible amount this month and gotten to do some really hard/fun things as well. In a vain effort to be concise, I'll only pick a few to share.
At the beginning of the month I got to share my first sermon in front of FOCUS. It was on Good Friday, so my sermon was over the hope found in the cross and resurrection. I don't think I've ever been so glad to have had to do announcements until that point. I was able to speak comfortably in front of all those people because I've already had to address them almost every week before hand. Also I realized I really like giving/thinking about sermons. That sounds weird. I just never would have thought that would have been the case, but I like sitting and thinking on a subject, then I like sharing those thoughts and emotions.
This month we also started a class over the Holy Spirit. I can't even begin to tell you how confused I am about the trinity. I think on some level that confusion will never go away: God is mysterious and larger, more complex than we can ever fathom. It has been nice actually thinking about him, though. I just never gave the Holy Spirit much credit in my day to day life, but the Bible talks so much about the Spirit and his role in our faith. I think I've just realized that I had this profound ignorance on the subject, and I wasn't giving the Spirit enough power in my life. I think back to my Body Stewardship class, and I think about all the things I wanted to change to be a better steward of the body God gave me. And it comes down to just that. I wanted to make those changes, so I failed. I didn't give those changes to the Spirit. I didn't ask him for his power or strength in making those changes. Yet God has given us this precious blessing of letting His spirit dwell in us for those exact purposes! I still have no idea exactly what that relationship should or will look like moving forward. I still think there is much to think about and change, but now I know that I should be thinking about this.
As this internship draws to a close, I can't help but feel sad. I almost want to start the year all over again. To sit and think about all these great topics because I feel like hearing and reading all that material just once isn't enough. I feel as if I've only retained a very small amount of information. I am excited for next year and all the new possibilities that await, but I am sad that means that this year has to end.
There are a couple of things I'd like you to pray for! We have our Spring Formal coming up this weekend. This is a time where we come together for one of the last times as a community and celebrate/commemorate the year. I'd like you to pray that everything goes as planned, and we can end the year well. I'd like you to be praying for all the students finals and moves. A lot of our students will be going home to difficult situations, so it'd be great if you could pray for their summers as well. In a little over a week, we'll be sending a group of students to Washington for SICM which is basically a Christian leadership retreat. The students learn so much, and I know from personal experience that it can have such a big impact on those going. I just ask that you pray for the trip and for God to be preparing the hearts of the students going, so they can get what they need to take away from the experience. On a more personal note, I'm starting fundraising for being on staff. I'd like to ask that you keep that in your prayers as well. While this is a really great time to see God as provider, I don't always see it as such. So I'd ask that you pray that I keep my spirit's up and be diligent in the work set before me. Also if you know of anyone who would like to support a campus missionary-let me know!
I hope April has been just as good for you. Thanks for all of your support. Ministry can be really hard and knowing that there is a community out there who care makes doing it that much easier. As always let me know if there is anything I can be praying for you about:)
P.S. Sorry for being lame and not having photos! I was such a slacker this month...
You da best!
Friday, May 1, 2015
Tuesday, March 31, 2015
A Million and One Things
Hi Friends,
I think I could probably write 20 pages on all the things that happened in March. I don't know if you had a busy month, but I feel as if the whole month was just a blur because of all the things that we had going on. A few things I'm really excited about and want to share were SSI and the Spring Showcase Event we put on.
I have so many thoughts and feelings about SSI. I had so much fun that week, and I think I learned so much. The three years I was at UTD, I never really participated in it. Now I'm really sad I didn't. Those students are the coolest! If you don't know what SSI is it stands for Spring Student Impact. A group of students from Washington spend their spring break going to other college campuses around the US to do evangelism and bless those students. The fact that students would spend money and time to do that is so humbling. Those students not only made the decision to give up their spring break, but they worked tirelessly, were so bold and committed in their outreach, went super early in the day until late at night, all without complaint. The SSI students were so bold with doing outreach. The ask questions about Jesus. They asked the people they were talking about if they could pray for them. They got numbers and got the people they were talking to hooked up with a student from Denton. They invited the people they had met to FOCUS. Most of all their outreach didn't stop when they had left the outreach times.
One really cool story I want to share happened on Wednesday. Tuesday through Thursday during SSI week we had outreach going on both the UNT campus and the TWU campus. On Wednesday I had a group out at TWU, and we finish earlier than the UNT group. We headed over to the square where we were going to meet the other group soon. While we were waiting for them, we ran into this guy with three of the cutest, tiniest dogs ever! All of us started playing with the puppies, except for one girl, Lexie. She started talking to the guy, asking him questions. Of course he asks her about herself, so she shares she's from Washington and in Texas on a mission trip. So they start talking about that. They talked for many 30 minutes as everyone else arrived, then he said he had to go eat. The SSI group starts debriefing the day, and maybe 30-40 minutes go by when this guy comes back with fruit and juice for us. He even brought cups and ice. He said he thought what we were doing was really cool, and he wanted to bring us that in order to let us know. I was just so encouraged and challenged by this. Conversations really do matter; they really can have an impact! And God is really cool.
I think I could probably write 20 pages on all the things that happened in March. I don't know if you had a busy month, but I feel as if the whole month was just a blur because of all the things that we had going on. A few things I'm really excited about and want to share were SSI and the Spring Showcase Event we put on.
SSI!!!!
I have so many thoughts and feelings about SSI. I had so much fun that week, and I think I learned so much. The three years I was at UTD, I never really participated in it. Now I'm really sad I didn't. Those students are the coolest! If you don't know what SSI is it stands for Spring Student Impact. A group of students from Washington spend their spring break going to other college campuses around the US to do evangelism and bless those students. The fact that students would spend money and time to do that is so humbling. Those students not only made the decision to give up their spring break, but they worked tirelessly, were so bold and committed in their outreach, went super early in the day until late at night, all without complaint. The SSI students were so bold with doing outreach. The ask questions about Jesus. They asked the people they were talking about if they could pray for them. They got numbers and got the people they were talking to hooked up with a student from Denton. They invited the people they had met to FOCUS. Most of all their outreach didn't stop when they had left the outreach times.
One really cool story I want to share happened on Wednesday. Tuesday through Thursday during SSI week we had outreach going on both the UNT campus and the TWU campus. On Wednesday I had a group out at TWU, and we finish earlier than the UNT group. We headed over to the square where we were going to meet the other group soon. While we were waiting for them, we ran into this guy with three of the cutest, tiniest dogs ever! All of us started playing with the puppies, except for one girl, Lexie. She started talking to the guy, asking him questions. Of course he asks her about herself, so she shares she's from Washington and in Texas on a mission trip. So they start talking about that. They talked for many 30 minutes as everyone else arrived, then he said he had to go eat. The SSI group starts debriefing the day, and maybe 30-40 minutes go by when this guy comes back with fruit and juice for us. He even brought cups and ice. He said he thought what we were doing was really cool, and he wanted to bring us that in order to let us know. I was just so encouraged and challenged by this. Conversations really do matter; they really can have an impact! And God is really cool.
SPRING SHOWCASE
I'm not sure if these photos really show just how packed that auditorium was, but let me assure you it was packed. It was so encouraging to see that many people show up. We had four weeks to plan the event. Two of those weeks had snow days. One of them was spring break, and the other was SSI. Seriously, it was only God who made this event successful. He was able to bring a community together in such weird circumstances in order to get his work done.
The Spring Showcase was an event to raise funds for SICM. We send students there every year, and it is a christian student leadership camp that helps develop student leadership skills. It helps these students think through discipleship while also letting them see God at work in another ministry half way across the country. As someone who has gone to SICM before. I can assure you it is a life altering trip. You learn so much while also being given so many resources on how to keep learning and thinking after you leave. The trip is kind of expensive, and we really don't like money to be an issue. If a person is willing to commit to learning about God, we want to make sure they have an opportunity. This showcase was a way for us to help the students be able to afford this trip, and we were very successful. Sadly I don't have statistics or number yet.
We've also just received a lot of positive feedback from the event which has been so encouraging since we were working under such stressful conditions. It really was a fun event to plan:)
Well to wrap things up, I hope you had a good month. I'd like to ask that you pray for my brother. He's really struggling with drug addiction and mental health. I'd also really appreciate it if you could be praying for my fundraising for staff. If there is anything I could be praying for any of you, please let me know:)
You guys are the best,
Sarah
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Thanks For The Memories
Hey friends,
I only have two things to share with you. The first is a girl from TWU getting baptized!!!! It was so great seeing in happen. The girls name is Adriana, and she's been in my core all year long. At the beginning of the year, she was so unsure about God, but she asked so many questions! You could tell she was really seeking him out, and at the beginning of February she was finally ready to accept him as Lord. Getting to see that transformation was so encouraging. It's so cool to see what God can do. Adriana had contemplated for a long time on whether she was ready or not to actually get baptized (she just felt like the commitment was a really serious one and didn't want to make it haphazardly). When she finally decided to do it, it was soooo cold outside! I was so proud of her though. Instead of postponing the event, she went ahead and got baptized (and let me tell you it was freezing outside)!!!!1
I only have two things to share with you. The first is a girl from TWU getting baptized!!!! It was so great seeing in happen. The girls name is Adriana, and she's been in my core all year long. At the beginning of the year, she was so unsure about God, but she asked so many questions! You could tell she was really seeking him out, and at the beginning of February she was finally ready to accept him as Lord. Getting to see that transformation was so encouraging. It's so cool to see what God can do. Adriana had contemplated for a long time on whether she was ready or not to actually get baptized (she just felt like the commitment was a really serious one and didn't want to make it haphazardly). When she finally decided to do it, it was soooo cold outside! I was so proud of her though. Instead of postponing the event, she went ahead and got baptized (and let me tell you it was freezing outside)!!!!1
The next awesome update is our parent night. I cannot even tell you how encouraging it was to hear parents talk about the transformation's their kids have had since coming to FOCUS. I seriously was tearing up almost every time a parent talked. We had a lot of parents and family members come as well which was really cool!
I hope you had a great February and enjoyed the snow and ice. I got a few snow days out of that; if you did too, then I hope you got to relax and recuperate like I did:) Thanks so much for all your support and prayers.
Sunday, February 1, 2015
Bursting with Excitement
Hi friends,
January was such a cool month! I don't know if it is just me, but I always like the spring semester or months so much better. It's like the year is energizing itself, and you can see the promise of God to make everything new being fulfilled in some small part as all the plants start to come back to life. Anyway I hope your January went well.
To start off our year in FOCUS, we had our Winter Camp. We had all of our six campuses come together for 4 days to learn about God and praise him together. It was so much fun. We had a speaker come all the way down from Canada. His name is Iain Provan, and he is an Old Testament scholar. He teaches at Regent College in Vancouver, and we've been listening to some of the audios from his and other professors from that college for years. We were shocked and excited that he agreed to come and speak. He did such a great job, too. Our theme this year in FOCUS is words of life, and every session he spoke at he revealed how the Old Testament fit into God's words of life. The interns and staff got to have a lunch with him as well, and it was so encouraging, for both him and us. Getting to see him in a more casual light just reminded me that he is just a man doing God's work, nothing more. That may sound weird, but it can be so easy to idealize a person. But he is just a man who had his own journey with God, which to me is so much more encouraging. He has impacted so many people because he listened to God. He shared with us how encouraging it was to see our community. He had no idea about us, yet here we were, listening to his audios, trying to learn more and more about who this God we follow is. Now this really neat relationship is being formed between us and Regent College. When Iain returned back home, he said he put in a good word for us with the other professors in case we wanted to ask someone else to come speak at a Winter Camp in the future! I could seriously keep going on about how great Winter Camp was. Just getting to see a few hundred college students, alumni, and adults praising God together is such an inspiring sight. I'm so glad we do it; all of the hard work needed to put that on is worth it.
January was such a cool month! I don't know if it is just me, but I always like the spring semester or months so much better. It's like the year is energizing itself, and you can see the promise of God to make everything new being fulfilled in some small part as all the plants start to come back to life. Anyway I hope your January went well.
To start off our year in FOCUS, we had our Winter Camp. We had all of our six campuses come together for 4 days to learn about God and praise him together. It was so much fun. We had a speaker come all the way down from Canada. His name is Iain Provan, and he is an Old Testament scholar. He teaches at Regent College in Vancouver, and we've been listening to some of the audios from his and other professors from that college for years. We were shocked and excited that he agreed to come and speak. He did such a great job, too. Our theme this year in FOCUS is words of life, and every session he spoke at he revealed how the Old Testament fit into God's words of life. The interns and staff got to have a lunch with him as well, and it was so encouraging, for both him and us. Getting to see him in a more casual light just reminded me that he is just a man doing God's work, nothing more. That may sound weird, but it can be so easy to idealize a person. But he is just a man who had his own journey with God, which to me is so much more encouraging. He has impacted so many people because he listened to God. He shared with us how encouraging it was to see our community. He had no idea about us, yet here we were, listening to his audios, trying to learn more and more about who this God we follow is. Now this really neat relationship is being formed between us and Regent College. When Iain returned back home, he said he put in a good word for us with the other professors in case we wanted to ask someone else to come speak at a Winter Camp in the future! I could seriously keep going on about how great Winter Camp was. Just getting to see a few hundred college students, alumni, and adults praising God together is such an inspiring sight. I'm so glad we do it; all of the hard work needed to put that on is worth it.
It isn't the best photo, but I hope it gives you an idea of how many people were there.:)
We also had our first TWU and UNT FOCUS' for the year. Sarah King spoke at both of them, and she did an awesome job. We definitely had new faces at both large group meetings, which was encouraging. I just can't wait to see what God does on both campuses this semester. Something that Sarah shared at UNT FOCUS really challenged me, though, and I'd like to share it with you as well. She spoke about truth and how we shouldn't be afraid to search for truth because truth will be truth regardless of whether we admit it or not. With time our understanding of the truth may broaden or completely change, and that shouldn't frighten us, it should excite us. That means we are understanding more and more of God because our belief is that God is truth. With that, Satan has fed us a lot of lies, and often times we don't even realize we are believing lies. They just seem natural. I think the shape of a common lie is that we aren't good enough or we are too much, but either way it leaves us feeling like we don't quite fit. We then find ourselves trying to make ourselves fit, looking to people to satiate our need to be accepted, wanted, or whatever we're feeling at the time. We forget that God thinks we are precious; that he made us uniquely, and that no one in the world is quite like us. Instead of that being a bad thing, we need to see that as amazing. Even if we are the weakest person, and we do everything wrong, God uses the weak to shame the strong. God's power is perfected in our weakness. This lie that Satan has insisted we believe leaves us separate from God, incapable of action, and the body of Christ is much weaker because of it. We need to combat the lies with truth. We don't need to be perfect; we need to trust God and follow him because all things work for his good, even if they look terrible. At the end Sarah gave us the challenge to think of all the lies that Satan has you believing, then go to scripture to find the truth that God has given you. Use the truth to defeat the lies. I sincerely hope you do this challenge:)
Lastly, but certainly not least, this month we found out some of who the new staff members will be and where they will be going! Miriam Freeman will be coming on staff and staying at UNT, Cody McCarty will be coming on staff and going to UNT, Ana Fineout will be coming on staff, and Sarah King, who is already on staff, will be going to UTA to help start that ministry! I will also be coming on staff at TWU, and I'm so excited about it. I just want to ask that you be praying for that transition, with Sarah leaving and me staying on. I'd also ask that you be praying and thinking about continuing to support me next year.
Anyway, thanks so much for all the support you've already given. I appreciate it so much, and you really are an invaluable team member:)
You da best
Sunday, January 4, 2015
Ending the Year
Hi friends,
I hope you had a blessed holiday. I got two weeks off and went home to Amarillo to visit my family, so I'm feeling pretty recharged and ready for the new year. I am so excited to see what 2015 brings, even if that means there is only 5 months left of the internship:/
I have a few things I want to share about December. We had our Denton Christmas Party at the beginning of the month. The theme was classy, and the TWU girls all got ready together. It was so much fun. At the beginning of the year I really prayed for community on the TWU campus, and it has been so cool seeing God answer that prayer. While we were shopping together for makeup and stuff for the party, one of our core girls, who is really quiet and reserved, had no makeup and had never used it before. One of the other core girls decided to pay for some makeup for her, so she could have some and not feel weird about getting ready with us. I had no idea this even happened until checkout! One core girl saw anothers need and filled it. Then we went back to the dorm room to get ready all the girls helped with putting on her makeup and doing her hair. It was so cool to see the girls had actually formed friendships and were taking care of each other. The party was so much fun too. We had food and did a devotional, then at the end we had a no talent-talent show. I think everyone really enjoyed the party!
I hope you had a blessed holiday. I got two weeks off and went home to Amarillo to visit my family, so I'm feeling pretty recharged and ready for the new year. I am so excited to see what 2015 brings, even if that means there is only 5 months left of the internship:/
I have a few things I want to share about December. We had our Denton Christmas Party at the beginning of the month. The theme was classy, and the TWU girls all got ready together. It was so much fun. At the beginning of the year I really prayed for community on the TWU campus, and it has been so cool seeing God answer that prayer. While we were shopping together for makeup and stuff for the party, one of our core girls, who is really quiet and reserved, had no makeup and had never used it before. One of the other core girls decided to pay for some makeup for her, so she could have some and not feel weird about getting ready with us. I had no idea this even happened until checkout! One core girl saw anothers need and filled it. Then we went back to the dorm room to get ready all the girls helped with putting on her makeup and doing her hair. It was so cool to see the girls had actually formed friendships and were taking care of each other. The party was so much fun too. We had food and did a devotional, then at the end we had a no talent-talent show. I think everyone really enjoyed the party!
Another thing I want to share is our last core. We read an excerpt from "College Ministry in a Post Christian Culture," then we discussed what it would look like for us as a core to be disciple makers. Before I can continue I have to describe to you one of our girls. She wasn't really Christian before she came into this year, but she's been studying the bible with Sarah King. She believes now and is thinking about getting baptized (total side note, but super cool!). Well once the conversation got started this girl shared about how her family didn't believe, and it was really hard to see the destruction in their lives because of it. It was really encouraging to see her get that and explain why people needed God. I mean a few months earlier she didn't even know if she bought into all this, but now she could articulate why people needed God and was thinking of ways she needed to change that could help get people to him. God is so present on this campus, and I'm so lucky to get to be a part of it!
I'd like to end on some prayer requests. We are leaving for staff retreat today after church, and I'd like y'all to be praying for a safe trip and that the retreat draws us closer as a staff. The second prayer request is for Winter Camp coming up later this month. I'd ask that you be praying that the weather is good, that people will encounter God while they are there, and that people all get there and back safely. Thank you so much:)
Till next month,
Sarah
Monday, December 1, 2014
Holiday Cheer
I wish I could share with you everything that has happened in November because I just feel like it has been such a challenging and encouraging month. I definitely can't, so I'm going to pick and choose just a few things to talk about. First, I want to ask: how has ministry impacted you?
I would like you to think about this question for a second. I'm assuming it has, otherwise you wouldn't be interested in reading this.
Without ministry I would be in a much different place. I'm not really sure if I would have graduated college or would even be alive right now. I was making some pretty stupid, dangerous decisions in high school. What was worse, no one really knew about them except for me. To the world I seemed fine. I ran cross country. I was on science bowl. I finished high school with a full year of college credit. But I can tell you underneath all of that there was a chaos and destructiveness even I didn't fully understand. God really did change all that, and he used campus ministry to do it. I've seen so many lives changed just like mine, and it just amazes me over and over again what God can and is willing to do. Now each of those people is out there impacting others for God in the same way they were impacted. That is just so cool to me, and I think that is what college ministry is all about. We get to impact so many different types of people: jocks, loners, fraternity and sorority people, atheists, muslims, international students, and the list could go on and on. The possibilities are endless. Once students are impacted, the gospel never stays with them. They become compelled to share it with as many people as they can. It isn't just the school that becomes impacted, but families as well. The families the student has and will have. FOCUS is doing its first annual fundraising initiative. In order for us to keep growing and impacting students, we need money. We need you to send out the video anyway that you can: Facebook, twitter, instagram, and especially email. Email it to everyone you know who would be interested in keeping college ministry possible. Thank you for all that you do, as well. Without your belief and investment in college ministry, the people on these campuses would have a lot less people working to bring them closer to God which is such a sad alternative reality. You have already made such a difference to these students.
On a lighter note, I hope your holidays went well. I got to spend Thanksgiving with my brother which was a lot of fun, then I flew home to Amarillo to spend time with my dad, stepmom, and sister. It was a very busy break, but I think it was exactly what I needed to keep me going until Christmas break. Ugh, I can't even believe Christmas break is so close! We just had our last Friday night FOCUS before we left for the Thanksgiving break, and we're having our Christmas party on Friday, December 5th! This semester has literally flown by.
So I want to share a really cool story with you about our outreach. The last week we were doing our questions on display boards at TWU it was so incredibly cold. It was just going to be Kaitlyn and I standing in the cold, so we weren't really sure if we wanted to switch to campus conversations. We thought not a whole lot of people would have stopped since it was so cold outside. Well people did stop, and we also had the most student help with working the boards at TWU since we started in August. While we were all trying to engage people, this girl stopped and hung around for a little bit, trying to read what all the boards said. I asked her which board she was going to pick as most challenging to her, and we started talking about her faith. I ended up getting her number and inviting her to our TWU FOCUS that night. One of our other students, Adriana, did a similar thing, and we had two girls from outreach come to our FOCUS that night. They both attended FNF, too. It was just so incredibly cool to see what happens just by showing up and being faithful with what you're given.
Another thing I'd like to share is what we are doing in Ronnie's class. We just finished reading all of the gospels, and we are working on sermon's that explain the gospels in our own words. We are basically answering the question I asked you previously, and I can tell you it is not an easy question to formulate an answer for. Having this assignment has been so good, yet so challenging because I've had to sit down and think through why I do and believe what I do. Some scary questions can occur when you look deeper into Christianity. There are a lot of inconsistencies or unknown subjects that seem so important, and this year Ronnie has really helped us ask those scary questions while navigating us to the important answer: Jesus is Lord. Writing this sermon has just helped consolidate all the thoughts, fears, emotions, and convictions I've come away with since becoming a Christian. I'd highly recommend for you to think through what your own gospel is if you haven't already.
Lastly I want to share an encouragement I received. So at the beginning of the month I was just under $300 short a month. I had so many stressful things going on that fundraising had changed from this gift from God to something else I had to worry about. I asked God to help me out and show me who he wanted to join his team. His response was someone showing up at my house and asking me if I still needed supporters. I literally had to do no work! I'm still $200 short, but God helped me change my thinking pretty darn quick. I know money is probably about to get really short for you with the holidays coming up, so I hope this reminder I received helps you as well. God will provide, so go ahead and be generous:)
Well that is all I have for you. Thank you for reading. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and safe travel! See you again next month:)
I would like you to think about this question for a second. I'm assuming it has, otherwise you wouldn't be interested in reading this.
Without ministry I would be in a much different place. I'm not really sure if I would have graduated college or would even be alive right now. I was making some pretty stupid, dangerous decisions in high school. What was worse, no one really knew about them except for me. To the world I seemed fine. I ran cross country. I was on science bowl. I finished high school with a full year of college credit. But I can tell you underneath all of that there was a chaos and destructiveness even I didn't fully understand. God really did change all that, and he used campus ministry to do it. I've seen so many lives changed just like mine, and it just amazes me over and over again what God can and is willing to do. Now each of those people is out there impacting others for God in the same way they were impacted. That is just so cool to me, and I think that is what college ministry is all about. We get to impact so many different types of people: jocks, loners, fraternity and sorority people, atheists, muslims, international students, and the list could go on and on. The possibilities are endless. Once students are impacted, the gospel never stays with them. They become compelled to share it with as many people as they can. It isn't just the school that becomes impacted, but families as well. The families the student has and will have. FOCUS is doing its first annual fundraising initiative. In order for us to keep growing and impacting students, we need money. We need you to send out the video anyway that you can: Facebook, twitter, instagram, and especially email. Email it to everyone you know who would be interested in keeping college ministry possible. Thank you for all that you do, as well. Without your belief and investment in college ministry, the people on these campuses would have a lot less people working to bring them closer to God which is such a sad alternative reality. You have already made such a difference to these students.
On a lighter note, I hope your holidays went well. I got to spend Thanksgiving with my brother which was a lot of fun, then I flew home to Amarillo to spend time with my dad, stepmom, and sister. It was a very busy break, but I think it was exactly what I needed to keep me going until Christmas break. Ugh, I can't even believe Christmas break is so close! We just had our last Friday night FOCUS before we left for the Thanksgiving break, and we're having our Christmas party on Friday, December 5th! This semester has literally flown by.
So I want to share a really cool story with you about our outreach. The last week we were doing our questions on display boards at TWU it was so incredibly cold. It was just going to be Kaitlyn and I standing in the cold, so we weren't really sure if we wanted to switch to campus conversations. We thought not a whole lot of people would have stopped since it was so cold outside. Well people did stop, and we also had the most student help with working the boards at TWU since we started in August. While we were all trying to engage people, this girl stopped and hung around for a little bit, trying to read what all the boards said. I asked her which board she was going to pick as most challenging to her, and we started talking about her faith. I ended up getting her number and inviting her to our TWU FOCUS that night. One of our other students, Adriana, did a similar thing, and we had two girls from outreach come to our FOCUS that night. They both attended FNF, too. It was just so incredibly cool to see what happens just by showing up and being faithful with what you're given.
Another thing I'd like to share is what we are doing in Ronnie's class. We just finished reading all of the gospels, and we are working on sermon's that explain the gospels in our own words. We are basically answering the question I asked you previously, and I can tell you it is not an easy question to formulate an answer for. Having this assignment has been so good, yet so challenging because I've had to sit down and think through why I do and believe what I do. Some scary questions can occur when you look deeper into Christianity. There are a lot of inconsistencies or unknown subjects that seem so important, and this year Ronnie has really helped us ask those scary questions while navigating us to the important answer: Jesus is Lord. Writing this sermon has just helped consolidate all the thoughts, fears, emotions, and convictions I've come away with since becoming a Christian. I'd highly recommend for you to think through what your own gospel is if you haven't already.
Lastly I want to share an encouragement I received. So at the beginning of the month I was just under $300 short a month. I had so many stressful things going on that fundraising had changed from this gift from God to something else I had to worry about. I asked God to help me out and show me who he wanted to join his team. His response was someone showing up at my house and asking me if I still needed supporters. I literally had to do no work! I'm still $200 short, but God helped me change my thinking pretty darn quick. I know money is probably about to get really short for you with the holidays coming up, so I hope this reminder I received helps you as well. God will provide, so go ahead and be generous:)
Well that is all I have for you. Thank you for reading. I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and safe travel! See you again next month:)
Saturday, November 1, 2014
What a busy month!
October was such a busy month! We had fall retreat, we made the new boards for questions on display, we had all church leadership conference, and we finished off the month with a Halloween Bring Your Own Friend outreach event.
Our retreat went great. I had two core girls go, and they loved it. Ann Haven and Karla's core also had two girls go, so in total we had 8 girls from TWU at camp!!!!! My core girls went back and told the rest of the core how great of a time they had, and the girls are now excited for Winter Camp. We've been announcing that camp since we finished Fall Camp, and I think we are going to have double the girls go to that one.
We built new Question on Display boards, and I think they are turning out perfect. We picked 6 themes, and we found one challenging verse Jesus said about that theme. Then we asked people which was the most challenging. We had people rate which one was the most challenging by placing a button in a jar next to the verse they picked. The boards caused people to have to stop and look at all the verses which kept them around longer. It made it so much easier to talk to them.
The leadership conference was so encouraging. Having all the churches and focus groups together made me see how much God was working. This community started off small with a big vision, and we have expanded so much. It just really made me realize God can do anything with anyone. We just have to be willing to follow. We watched two awesome videos about getting people to catch the vision. One of them was about repetition and how we need to not only repeat it verbally, but also with our actions. He made a great point that if something fails it is because our strategy failed, not our vision that failed. If we really believe our vision is from God, then it can only be refined. The second video talked about how we need to go out and do stuff. He made this analogy between sports and christians. Sports players start out in a huddle, discussing their tactics and plays, but they do this with the sole purpose of playing the game. It would be totally bizarre if the team just stayed in the huddle the whole time, and they never went out to play the game. He made a point that christians often only ever stay in the huddle. We are meant to be players on Gods team, but we never really join the game. As leaders we need to be pushing people out of the huddle.
Lastly to share is our Halloween BYOF outreach event. It was so challenging learning how to think through all the small details. The interns were in charge of getting that planned and executed. None of us had ever thought through all the steps it takes to throw a party, make an event budget, or work an event that large. It was so great to be able to get that experience. I think it really made me gain respect for all the people who help with making our camps and events a success. My core girls and I dressed up as beanie babies. The girls at TWU are really starting to form a community, and it so great to see. I think the event was a success; it really allowed the students to come together and mingle. I saw the TWU girls not only interacting in there own small community, but finally start branching out into the larger UNT community. The event was split between four houses. Each house had its own theme: dancing, creepy tv, s'mores, and games. I was in charge of the dancing house, so I didn't see much of what was going on in the other houses. We had so many people coming into the dancing house, so I can only imagine how many more people were in the other houses. I'm so thankful people in our community were willing to let us borrow their houses for a night, so we could make that outreach event happen
Our retreat went great. I had two core girls go, and they loved it. Ann Haven and Karla's core also had two girls go, so in total we had 8 girls from TWU at camp!!!!! My core girls went back and told the rest of the core how great of a time they had, and the girls are now excited for Winter Camp. We've been announcing that camp since we finished Fall Camp, and I think we are going to have double the girls go to that one.
We built new Question on Display boards, and I think they are turning out perfect. We picked 6 themes, and we found one challenging verse Jesus said about that theme. Then we asked people which was the most challenging. We had people rate which one was the most challenging by placing a button in a jar next to the verse they picked. The boards caused people to have to stop and look at all the verses which kept them around longer. It made it so much easier to talk to them.
The leadership conference was so encouraging. Having all the churches and focus groups together made me see how much God was working. This community started off small with a big vision, and we have expanded so much. It just really made me realize God can do anything with anyone. We just have to be willing to follow. We watched two awesome videos about getting people to catch the vision. One of them was about repetition and how we need to not only repeat it verbally, but also with our actions. He made a great point that if something fails it is because our strategy failed, not our vision that failed. If we really believe our vision is from God, then it can only be refined. The second video talked about how we need to go out and do stuff. He made this analogy between sports and christians. Sports players start out in a huddle, discussing their tactics and plays, but they do this with the sole purpose of playing the game. It would be totally bizarre if the team just stayed in the huddle the whole time, and they never went out to play the game. He made a point that christians often only ever stay in the huddle. We are meant to be players on Gods team, but we never really join the game. As leaders we need to be pushing people out of the huddle.
I wanted to end by just thanking you for making all this happen. None of this ministry would be possible without people who had caught God's vision and believed this community was fulfilling a small part of it. Because people were willing to invest with their time, finances, and prayer into this community, God has been able to work wonders. I'm just so glad I get to see a small amount of the cool things God is doing.:)
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