Happy Thanksgiving 08

Jon and I just returned from a thanksgiving service at our church, and I decided....Let's spend the night thinking about all the things that I am thankful for this year. The Lord is Lord, all the time, and God is good, even when life is not. Hold on tight as I think about the past year, and rejoice with me as I remember what I am thankful for, both the small and big things!

-My husband. I will forever be thankful for the love that he gives me. He is the love of my life and never ever want to do life without my best friend.
-Ending my first year on staff at Albion well. It was a hard year, but God was faithful.
-Affordable housing, the ability to pay our bills, give to the expansion of the Gospel, and even splurge our ourselves
-a great new friendship with Melissa, and a new nephew :)
-the mere thought that Jon and I would be able to buy a house
-my cats, yes, I know that I am cheesy, but I love cuddling with them
-coffee
-pumpkin spice creamer
-experiencing the healing of the Lord as I deal with anxiety and depression, and waiting in great expectancy of the Lord's renewal and healing
-a great Compelling conference with InterVarsity students from the state of Michigan. It was a great time to have the Lord move and work in the lives of students. It was so encouraging to see them catch the vision and to care about kingdom values.
-Sweet staff team during SLT. Seriously, best staff ever! Let's do it again.....
-God being faithful, answering prayers and sustaining me during SLT
-family.....family that will love and support us, make us laugh, come to Albion to look at possible houses
-cell phones....makes it great to talk to my family on a daily basis. What? I love them. Deal with it.
-FACEBOOK! Seriously, what else could be so great in stalking all of your friends and keeping tabs on them!
-God's word. My love for God's word has been renewed. I love studying scripture. I love teaching scripture. I love learning more about scripture. EVERYTHING. LOVE IT.
-My bed. I love my down mattress, and down blankets, it makes it so nice to stay in bed all day.
-Candles
-The peace I feel with my journal, and the ability to process all of my feelings on the pages of a simple journal
-The Meyer's Briggs Personality Inventory, it is so helpful in dealing with people, learning that we are all different, and have different ways of viewing things, and making decisions.
-Finding a home church. It has been such a process and a hard road, but God has led us to First Baptist, and we absolutely love it and feel at home.
-My students this year. I have had so much fun getting to know them and see their potentional.
-The Lord keeping me safe while my van was totaled by a UPS truck.
-A husband who walks through life with me, helps me, stands by me, gives me selfless love.
-The people who continue to support me in ministry through prayer and financial support. I want you all to know that you are part of my team. I love you dearly and could not do ministry without you.
-Coffee Tumblers
-Ice Cream
-A visit from Krista when she came back to the motherland :)
-God's forgiveness, redemption and reconcilation
-God allows me to feel how I need to feel. I am able to come before Him in complete brokeness and He brings reconciliation.
-The Holy Spirit's leading and guiding.
-A kitchen table that expands so that we can have people over and eat.
-A husband that cooks so we can have people over and eat.
-A good glass of wine.
-I am thankful that I can sing a joyful noise unto the Lord, even if it isn't joyful to anyone else.
-My camera and the joy that it brings me to take pictures
-The amazing training that InterVarsity gives its staff
-A great breakfast chat with Amber today.....cheers to a new friend
-God's provision
-The love that I have for my students
-Guilty pleasure tv shows
-Safety
-Enjoying time up at the lake this summer, where Jon experienced many firsts with my family...even though he has been a part of the family for about 8 years.
-the power of prayer
-heat
-air conditioning
-Cedar Campus.....well, looking at it through a window
-greeting cards
-indoor plumbing
-getting to go shopping with the missions folk at First Baptist. I felt so blessed and cared for
-Getting super cheap copies at Crossroads.....and Sarah......sacrificing her time. Thanks SARILOU!
-Late night conversations
-The way that music ministers to me

Have I missed anything?

Compelling 08 Updated

Compelling was a great conference for both students and staff. It was the Fall Conference for the Michigan Division of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. There were nearly 400 people in attendance. The schools represented were:

Grand Valley
Western Michigan University
Hope College
Kalamazoo College
Grand Rapids Community College
Delta College
Central Michigan University
Michigan State University
Albion College
Hillsdale College
UM Flint
UM Dearborn
UM Ann Arbor
Oakland University
Wayne State University

During the conference, I was a part of "Sexy on the Inside" (a seminar). Each student chose a track/seminar that they were to be a part of...
Sexy on the Inside
Windows to the World---learning the Christian Worldview
Philippians--- inductive study of the book of Philippians
Missional Prayer
Leadership Essentials
The Joy of Following Jesus
Finding God

Duing the Sexy on the Inside track, we learned about God's design of human sexuality, and unfortunately it has been broken. Many students had a chance to come before the Lord, and admit past mistakes, and hurts, in their lives, including sexual promiscuity, sexual abuse, temptations, etc. It was a joy to watch them seek the Lord, and to pray over these students.

Picture to the right....a cross. Students had a chance to write down their hurts, sins, things done to them....anything that they needed healing from. They wrote them down, and tacked them to the cross, signifying that Jesus has control of their situation, and they no longer need to hold onto it.



The 9 Albion Students that are so excited to be a part of the conference! It is exciting for me to see that this group exists of students that are seniors, juniors, sophomores, and freshmen!!!








Students had a chance to worship God through artwork










Learning to arm wrestle? Really, they were having a great time!


Some of my favorite moments:
-Students are committing to prayer!
-Relationships were built!
-Students began to see the truth in the kingdom of God and were excited about telling people about it on campus.
-Saturday night we had chapter time. I arrived at chapter time late, but only a few minutes, and one of the seniors had started leading it. It was so encouraging to see leadership development work!!! This leader asked students what they would like to see in the chapter back on campus. They all shared and then spent lots of time in prayer. Then, this leader shared his concerns with the chapter, that he feels that students are not committed and therefore we will always lack growth. This leader challenged them to make a commitment to the chapter and being a part of its growth. And then...this leader had us meet in our campus small groups to evaluate how we were doing and what we could do to better reach the campus!!! WHAT???? This made my heart swell with joy, encouragement, as I thought....this is why I do what I do---to help students develop their own leadership. These students are going to be leaders in YOUR churches!

Thank you so much for making this possible. It is because of your prayers and financial support that this is possible. Thank you.

It is early in the month, and already I am failing on my commitment to blog everyday. Feels like that a lot lately....not so much failing.....just lots of commitments and trying to see which ones to keep....

Speaking of commitments, I spoke at Albion's chapel service last night. It is a place where about 40 students come to worship, and hear a message. My message was called "Seeing your campus as a Mission Field." I asked all of the students to commit to a list of things.....many committed to praying for their lost friends, many committed to being a missional Christian on campus and some even said that they wanted to learn more about Jesus! I am hoping to do some great follow up and meet with each of these students. Pray that they would want to meet with me, and that I can start forming a relationship with even more students!

N or S?

For all of you Meyers Briggs fans, you know what I mean, when I say that I am an ISFJ. However, my husband is convinced that I am an INFJ. I think he might convinced me of that today as well.

You see, I have to give a talk on campus this week, and I have the big picture all planned out, but am having trouble plugging in the details....yes, miss detail is having trouble filling in the details.

Today was spent mostly at home....getting lots of prep work done for Small Group, Compelling (Fall Conference) a talk I am doing on campus, phone calls, emails, etc. A good day with lots of coffee.

And...I still want to buy the house.....please pray that God blesses us!

Sunday Home Cooked Meals

This morning in church, a couple invited us over for an old fashioned Sunday meal. It was a grand meat and potatoes meal.....and it was delicious!!! It was great to be in fellowship with other people and of course.....hold a baby. Jon and I definitely have the baby bug, so if anyone has a baby that they want to donate.....errr... have us babysit, that would be great!!!

Jon's parents came and visited today. It was great to see them. We took them through the "potential house." The house that we really would like to buy. Pray that we do!

So what would you guys like to hear about this month...as I blog everyday?

UPS drama

This past Monday was the Monday of all Mondays :)

I was driving and out of nowhere a UPS truck ran through a stop sign..result a totaled car, but absolutely NO INJURIES! Praise the Lord for protecting, both myself and the UPS driver. I do not take safety lightly at all. It was all God!

It is national blogging month.....that means, I am going to try to post one post each day for the month....and today counts as Nov 1, because I still haven't gone to sleep yet!