Welcome to Bosnia

Well, the title of this post is really just a bit of a joke about what has been going on in my ministry lately. Let me assure you that you will soon understand.

I am so pumped! Last Friday night at First Apostolic Church here in Bowling Green we had our first annual "Harvest of Youth." It was a talent show and trunk-or-treat activity for the young people, an alternative to the usual Halloween festivities. It was a great success! Let me also say here that I really had nothing to do with the planning or any of the work that went into this special night, so a big "Thank you" to all the adults at FAC in BG who put it all together.

Now, let me just cut to the chase. The talent show was great (tons of talent), the food was good (who doesn't love a good hot dog?), and the trunk-or-treating was a blast (no knocking on random doors). But the best part? How about the twenty something Bosnian kids that decided to come and promised me that they would be coming to youth on Wednesday nights? YEAH! That was the best part for sure!

I mean, why wouldn't I be excited? These kids are awesome. They know little to nothing about the Gospel and they are so hungry for the Lord. They might not know it, but they are.

I really don't have much else to say about this just yet. Tomorrow night will be my first Wednesday with them. I guess I really just want to call on you, as my reader, to pray for me. Just pray that God will lead me and guide me as an effective teacher. I am desperate for these kids to be saved. I think I would give just about anything for it to become a reality!

Overwhelmed

Well, I have no updates about the youth group this week. I didn't get to go to church tonight because I had to go home to a funeral visitation for my great aunt. (By the way, whoever decided it was a good idea to pictures and music together at a funeral... you are insane). I also had a staff meeting for work tonight, it was just your average staff meeting, I'm sure you are uninterested in it.

I don't know if I have ever blogged about my actual job here on campus that pay minimum wage (no, I'm not complaining!). I am a PASS Leader. PASS stands for Peer Assisted Study Sessions. So, twice a week I lead a study session for students in Professor Joseph Trafton's New Testament (Rels 100) class. It's a blast and I thoroughly enjoy it. I took Dr. Trafton's class last semester and when I discovered that the previous PASS Leader was getting married, I applied for the job, and by the grace of God, I got it! Yay! I really, really enjoy my job. I mean, I get to teach kids about the Bible. What's better than that right?

However, I did not start this blog entry to write about my job (that was free). I entitled it "Overwhelmed" because that is what I am. In good ways and bad ways. Lets start with the bad ways. No, lets just not even talk about the bad ways, I just want to dwell on the good things.

One good thing is that, after 12 days in the hospital, my Granddad came home today! Yay! Plus, the Lord really spoke to him while he was there, and that is always good.
Another good thing is that my weekends are freeing up from now on. My younger sister is in the marching band, so the past several weekends we have been traveling all over Kentucky for marching band competitions, and though I LOVE marching band, I have other things to do! So I'm happy my weekends are going to be a bit more free (even if I will be spending them doing homework).
A third good thing: my reading for my C.S. Lewis class this week was The Chronicles of Narnia! What?! That is so stinking awesome. After reading "Miracles" last week (or four chapters of it) I just couldn't handle another intensely dense book like that again. So Narnia was a great break. We only read two of the books in the series for class, but I'll be honest, I am so tempted to read the rest of them (okay, I admit, I started The Voyage of the Dawn Treader today :).

So, there are three good things. I guess the lesson I need to learn here is that in this life we will often be "Overwhelmed." But we get to choose whether we will be overwhelmed by the great things God is doing in our lives or the attacks of the enemy. I choose the first of the two. I will be overwhelmed, but because of the amazing works God is doing.

" We do not always get what we want, but that does not mean that we no longer want. It means we stay awake to the unmet longing and ache. Wait there. Invite Jesus to come there. "

This too Shall Pass... But bring it on!

This has been a long week. I was looking forward to it being over, until Friday got here, and the week decided it didn't want to be over. My granddad has been in the hospital this week; it has been really strange. He is 68 years old, and this is the first time in his life he has ever even been to the doctor (amazing right?).

Friday night we had a service at our church and my granddad (who is also my pastor) was complaining of a stomach ache. After church, he still had a stomach ache. At four o'clock the next morning he still had a stomach ache. He was in a tremendous amount of pain, it was really scary to me, because I had never seen him like that. So my grandmama took him to the ER, where he was admitted into the hospital with a complete blockage of his small intestine. At the hospital, they pumped his stomach and put him on some pain medicine, hoping his body would just heal itself, but it didn't, and he went into surgery on Sunday morning.

I'm not exactly sure what they found or why his intestine was blocked in the first place. I'm not fluid in the medical lingo and I'm not even going to pretend like I know what I am talking about. All I know is there were no tumors, Praise the Lord! So they fixed him up and said he would probably be released on Friday.

Today is Friday, my granddad is still in the hospital. They had started to give him food, but he then started having pain again. As it turns out, his intestine has not "woken up" since the surgery. So they had to keep him. Let's be honest, this makes me sad, I feel like a little kid. I want him to come home.

However, his being in the hospital has opened my eyes so much to so many things. Ultimately, I have learned that God takes care of his people and he can use the most undesirable situation to teach us that. My granddad is such a wonderful man of God, he is a rock, and yet he is so humble. Today I sat in the hospital room next to him as he told me what God has been speaking to him through his sickness, tears streaming down his face.

I am so privileged, so blessed, to be a part of such a wonderful family. I have such a great heritage. I feel like I have rambled a bit, but I am blown away by God. I can't begin to even do justice to the description of God's grace and mercy in my life. I am so undeserving, yet God sees me and he has shown me favor. This ultimately has come about because of the sacrifice, the willingness, the hard work of the generations before me. I could look at this situation and say "it will pass, it will all be over soon" but instead I choose to say, "lets stay here a little while, lets learn all we can." God wants to reveal himself to us, he wants to show us the true extent of his power.

Blown Away by God

I never thought it would come down to this, but I'm actually blogging instead of doing homework. I feel like I'm using my blog... but it's my blog right? So I guess it doesn't matter how I treat it :)

I had a really cool experience with the youth group last night. I was teaching on worship and I made three points:

1. Worship is an expression of a relationship with the Lord
2. Worship is an expression of appreciation towards the Lord
3. Worship is an expression of "Awe" or being blown away by God

Well, when I got to the end, I asked the kids how often they felt like they were in Awe of God, like they had been blown away by God. I got a few kids who said "sometimes" but I'll be honest, the best answer was from a little boy on the front row who said "never."

Now that is refreshing. What a lesson I could learn from that child. I have learned that I can't help the youth if they don't tell me how they really feel. So for him to say he never felt blown away by God gave me a foundation on which to build. The best part came next though. There is a little girl who comes on Wednesday nights named Alyssa. Alyssa is ten years old and lives in the low-income housing across the street from the church; she walks to church every Wednesday night on her own. I asked the class why they thought they never felt blown away by God during worship and Alyssa said "Because God is up in Heaven and I can't see him so I don't know what to do. It's hard to believe He is there."

Wow, I was so blown away by this answer, but it opened up such an opportunity for me to tell the kids about how God lives inside of us through His Spirit and that He is always with us. I just felt so much of the presence of the Lord in that room when Alyssa told me that. I knew the kids didn't have much knowledge of the Spirit, but I didn't want to force it on them; I wanted them to come to me, and they did.

Every week God just shows me how powerful he is through these young people. Its is so refreshing to know that even if I don't understand what God is doing in my life, in my personal life, I can see his hand in my ministry. It is probably what I would consider the best feeling in the world. I am just so excited to see what else God has in store.

" Whom have I in Heaven but you, and there is nothing on earth I desire besides you? " Psalm 73:25


" There are tears from the saints for the lost and unsaved, we're crying for them come back home. Father, we will lead them home."

Changes

The past few weeks have been absolutely insane. My life has undergone many changes and I know that God has even more in store. At my home church, we just celebrated twelve years of being in Barren Plains, Tennessee. We did so by having a whole weekend full of celebrating with an evangelistic service, a singing, and a church dinner. Oh, and I was ordained as a minister on Sunday, October 3rd.
Yep, you really did read that right. I know, I'm blown away by it too. It was the most liberating and frightening experience of my young life (well, maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but seriously...) It was liberating because I know it is what God wanted me to do and because now I feel as though I have really accepted the calling on my life. It was frightening because I realize how important the duty of being a minister of the gospel really is.
I really just feel so blessed to be a part of the ministry, and so humbled that God would choose someone life me. I am also so thankful for my church family and all the support they have shown and all the prayers they have prayed for me. I just love the Lord so much and I am so excited about what he is going to do in my life and in my community!