In less than a week I will be breathing big city air. I am a little nervous but overall excited. I know this summer will be both hard and good.
I have started narrowing down what I want to take (funny how much harder that feels now that I know I can only take one checked suitcase - which is all that I took to Asia and I did just fine) and so long as I can resist the impulse to bring a thousand books and/or old journals it shouldn't be too bad.
I have full support which is always an exciting feeling but I still have 6 soulariums (an image survey originally created to help us gage what people are thinking about spiritual things) I need to do and that is a little daunting (especially since there are not so many people around with summer school and all).
Ways you can be praying:
That I find people (particularly guys since 5 of those 6 are supposed to be people of the male persuasion) who are willing to talk about life and God through images.
That all of my team members reach their support goals and that our hearts be prepared for the ways God will use and stretch us.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
More introductions .... who I am (the not nearly so brief as I had intended version)
Now that you know what this blog's purpose is, I suppose now would be a good time to clarify who this mysterious "I" is (although I assume that most visitors to this page know me a little, it never hurts to bring clarity).
I am a third year student of photography and anthropology (prior to which I spent two years oscillating between studying math and physics at a tech school close to my home).
Within the first two weeks of my transfer to my current university I got involved with Campus Crusade for Christ and it became one of the most significant parts of my college experience (followed closely by being a Resident Assistant).
I had grown up hearing about Jesus my whole life (living on a Christian camp with do that for you) but it wasn’t until 7th grade that I started to make that knowledge a personal thing. Even then I don’t think I really started to understand what it meant to live life for the author of life until high school, and that was largely under the influence of my best friend and her family.
During this time I began to understand that being Christian was more than just going to church on a mostly regular basis. I started to see the value of spending regular time reading the bible and reflections on it. I started to learn that God was someone who was worth sacrificing for – even if they were good things because his things are better. These six years (from my freshman year of high school through my sophomore year of college while I was living with my grandparents) were a foundational time for me.
When I transferred to a university far enough from home that I would have to live on campus and find a new home church I was a little nervous but absolutely determined to make the best of the much anticipated college experience. At our convocation picnic I gather materials for every college ministry and local church I could find. That night I dumped them all on my bed where I sort through them and vowed to visit everyone and then decide where it would be best to make my niche.
That didn’t play through precisely as I had planned for it to. Of the churches I don’t think I visited more than six before I found a small church with a wise and down to earth pastor, and a Sunday school led by a man who reminded me of C.S. Lewis (except that he was Australian) and I knew that was where I wanted to be.
And as far as trying all of the campus ministries went, lets just say that after my first night at the weekly meeting for Campus Crusade for Christ I just didn’t desire to go anywhere else (particularly anywhere that met at the same time).
That first year went well, but it was a time of many changes. I left the math program to become an art major, I became an RA, and I spent my Spring Break in Mississippi trying to help people get their lives back together in the aftermath of Katrina.
I left Mississippi that week feeling overwhelmed by the amount of things still left to be done, so when I heard that there was an opportunity to do a summer project there I jumped at the chance. Prior to that week I had made up my mind that I couldn’t possibly go this year, too many things to work out, I would just go next year (in fact I was beginning to be annoyed with our staff lady every time she brought it up) – but that week made me realize that next year just wasn’t soon enough.
I got home and started filling out my application, and in the process I began to look at all of the other options for summer project there are and as a whim I decided to fill all the five blanks it leaves for project preferences and my fifth choice was the most whimsical of all – Seattle (fact: my knowledge of the west coast was so poor I don’t I could have told you it was in Washington state prior to all of this). I wasn’t planning to go to any place but Mississippi, but I still put them all down.
When school let out I still hadn’t heard back so I decided that clearly it wasn’t ‘God’s will’ for me to go, but seeking some official closure I called the director of the Mississippi project. She very apologetically informed me that the project was already full and somehow my application had slipped through the cracks before I was told this. All but two of my other choices were also full – would I like her to forward my application to either Chicago or Seattle?
I was still pretty certain I wouldn’t go, but I figured no harm in letting her forward it, Seattle’s dates were more convenient and prison ministry sounded cool so I told her she could pass it along.
It wasn’t long before that project director, Tom Durrant, was calling. He wanted to know if I was serious about the project, I told him I wasn’t. He kept talking to me anyway. He told me they needed an official photographer and that I would be well suited for it, and I started to warm to the idea.
I don’t know precisely what pushed me out of my indecisiveness, but about a month before I was supposed to arrive I knew I had to go so I bought my plane ticket and sent out my support letters. Despite all odds, everything worked out perfectly. While I was in Seattle I was nudged a little bit out of my comfort zone and I was able to experience some beautiful things in the prisons, on the streets, and in our dorm. I learned a lot about everything and God taught me so much about how to rely on him for everything – even loving.
I came back, continued working as a RA, took more art classes, declared a minor of anthropology, and knew that I wanted to spend the following summer doing a summer project in East Asia. I learned a lot about letting go of fear and then found myself spending about 5 weeks in a closed country talking about Jesus with people who could very well loose their physical life as soon as they accepted that eternal life.
More nudges out of my comfort zone, particularly when it came to sharing the gospel in clear direct terms. I was able to realize that the gospel really is so precious and it needs to be shared – always. Some of my friends listened eagerly and asked tons of questions and some avoided me for a week or two after I shared. But it was all so good.
I came back again. I was an RA in a freshmen hall and I was able to co-lead a small bible study with some freshmen and sophomore women. I got to watch them grow throughout the year and I learned how to love the women on my hall who I initially assumed would be the bane of my existence. I was given a glimpse of the excitement God must feel when he looks at the lives of these precious women, some who had accepted him and were seeking him, some who were still running away. In some ways I feel like the entire 22 years I lived were a preparation for this one year of living with those 40-plus women.
But I feel like that often. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if I left this summer feeling that ways again. Funny how God doesn’t waste any part of our past and prepares us for the places he calls us to.
This summer, I have been couch hopping and working anticipating Jun 4 when I fly up to New York City to make my home for 6 weeks among artists seeking to use their calling to the arts to glorify God and help bring some healing to our broken culture. As a student intern I will be able to really pour into other women and grow together with them.
I am excited and scared out of my mind all at once. This summer will have hard times, but I am confident it will ultimately be good. I know God will do big things because that is just how he operates.
I also know that this was supposed to be a brief introduction and it is now fifty years long, so I shall stop.
(I promise I won't always be so longwinded)
I am a third year student of photography and anthropology (prior to which I spent two years oscillating between studying math and physics at a tech school close to my home).
Within the first two weeks of my transfer to my current university I got involved with Campus Crusade for Christ and it became one of the most significant parts of my college experience (followed closely by being a Resident Assistant).
I had grown up hearing about Jesus my whole life (living on a Christian camp with do that for you) but it wasn’t until 7th grade that I started to make that knowledge a personal thing. Even then I don’t think I really started to understand what it meant to live life for the author of life until high school, and that was largely under the influence of my best friend and her family.
During this time I began to understand that being Christian was more than just going to church on a mostly regular basis. I started to see the value of spending regular time reading the bible and reflections on it. I started to learn that God was someone who was worth sacrificing for – even if they were good things because his things are better. These six years (from my freshman year of high school through my sophomore year of college while I was living with my grandparents) were a foundational time for me.
When I transferred to a university far enough from home that I would have to live on campus and find a new home church I was a little nervous but absolutely determined to make the best of the much anticipated college experience. At our convocation picnic I gather materials for every college ministry and local church I could find. That night I dumped them all on my bed where I sort through them and vowed to visit everyone and then decide where it would be best to make my niche.
That didn’t play through precisely as I had planned for it to. Of the churches I don’t think I visited more than six before I found a small church with a wise and down to earth pastor, and a Sunday school led by a man who reminded me of C.S. Lewis (except that he was Australian) and I knew that was where I wanted to be.
And as far as trying all of the campus ministries went, lets just say that after my first night at the weekly meeting for Campus Crusade for Christ I just didn’t desire to go anywhere else (particularly anywhere that met at the same time).
That first year went well, but it was a time of many changes. I left the math program to become an art major, I became an RA, and I spent my Spring Break in Mississippi trying to help people get their lives back together in the aftermath of Katrina.
I left Mississippi that week feeling overwhelmed by the amount of things still left to be done, so when I heard that there was an opportunity to do a summer project there I jumped at the chance. Prior to that week I had made up my mind that I couldn’t possibly go this year, too many things to work out, I would just go next year (in fact I was beginning to be annoyed with our staff lady every time she brought it up) – but that week made me realize that next year just wasn’t soon enough.
I got home and started filling out my application, and in the process I began to look at all of the other options for summer project there are and as a whim I decided to fill all the five blanks it leaves for project preferences and my fifth choice was the most whimsical of all – Seattle (fact: my knowledge of the west coast was so poor I don’t I could have told you it was in Washington state prior to all of this). I wasn’t planning to go to any place but Mississippi, but I still put them all down.
When school let out I still hadn’t heard back so I decided that clearly it wasn’t ‘God’s will’ for me to go, but seeking some official closure I called the director of the Mississippi project. She very apologetically informed me that the project was already full and somehow my application had slipped through the cracks before I was told this. All but two of my other choices were also full – would I like her to forward my application to either Chicago or Seattle?
I was still pretty certain I wouldn’t go, but I figured no harm in letting her forward it, Seattle’s dates were more convenient and prison ministry sounded cool so I told her she could pass it along.
It wasn’t long before that project director, Tom Durrant, was calling. He wanted to know if I was serious about the project, I told him I wasn’t. He kept talking to me anyway. He told me they needed an official photographer and that I would be well suited for it, and I started to warm to the idea.
I don’t know precisely what pushed me out of my indecisiveness, but about a month before I was supposed to arrive I knew I had to go so I bought my plane ticket and sent out my support letters. Despite all odds, everything worked out perfectly. While I was in Seattle I was nudged a little bit out of my comfort zone and I was able to experience some beautiful things in the prisons, on the streets, and in our dorm. I learned a lot about everything and God taught me so much about how to rely on him for everything – even loving.
I came back, continued working as a RA, took more art classes, declared a minor of anthropology, and knew that I wanted to spend the following summer doing a summer project in East Asia. I learned a lot about letting go of fear and then found myself spending about 5 weeks in a closed country talking about Jesus with people who could very well loose their physical life as soon as they accepted that eternal life.
More nudges out of my comfort zone, particularly when it came to sharing the gospel in clear direct terms. I was able to realize that the gospel really is so precious and it needs to be shared – always. Some of my friends listened eagerly and asked tons of questions and some avoided me for a week or two after I shared. But it was all so good.
I came back again. I was an RA in a freshmen hall and I was able to co-lead a small bible study with some freshmen and sophomore women. I got to watch them grow throughout the year and I learned how to love the women on my hall who I initially assumed would be the bane of my existence. I was given a glimpse of the excitement God must feel when he looks at the lives of these precious women, some who had accepted him and were seeking him, some who were still running away. In some ways I feel like the entire 22 years I lived were a preparation for this one year of living with those 40-plus women.
But I feel like that often. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if I left this summer feeling that ways again. Funny how God doesn’t waste any part of our past and prepares us for the places he calls us to.
This summer, I have been couch hopping and working anticipating Jun 4 when I fly up to New York City to make my home for 6 weeks among artists seeking to use their calling to the arts to glorify God and help bring some healing to our broken culture. As a student intern I will be able to really pour into other women and grow together with them.
I am excited and scared out of my mind all at once. This summer will have hard times, but I am confident it will ultimately be good. I know God will do big things because that is just how he operates.
I also know that this was supposed to be a brief introduction and it is now fifty years long, so I shall stop.
(I promise I won't always be so longwinded)
Monday, May 26, 2008
Introductions ....
I feel like it is always good for things to begin with some manner of introduction or preamble or such thing. So here it goes.
This is my blog, it is not my first blog but it is a special one, it is one devoted to recording my exploits with summer project (and hopefully ministry/cru stuff at home after I get back). When I began preparing to go on the New York City: Arts track project I started a different blog that was supposed to be summer project and art - but it became so arts focused that I felt like it might be a little overwhelming for people to keep up with if they only wanted to know what was going on and how to best pray for me. Thus this blog.
It is my goal to update between 1-2 times a week while I am in the city ... we shall see what happens.
This is my blog, it is not my first blog but it is a special one, it is one devoted to recording my exploits with summer project (and hopefully ministry/cru stuff at home after I get back). When I began preparing to go on the New York City: Arts track project I started a different blog that was supposed to be summer project and art - but it became so arts focused that I felt like it might be a little overwhelming for people to keep up with if they only wanted to know what was going on and how to best pray for me. Thus this blog.
It is my goal to update between 1-2 times a week while I am in the city ... we shall see what happens.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)