eeeeeeh
this weekend was amazing.
after class on friday i went directly to my room, threw a bunch of clothes into a bag and met my mom downstairs. she drove jacob and i over to st. andrew's where the bus was taking both of our groups. i threw my stuff onto the bus and started working on the mound of homework i have every weekend (bleh.). the busride up was... eventful. screaming kids everywhere. i could barely hear the music in my headphones @ full volume. what powerful lungs they have! they brought chick-fil-a sandwiches in a cooler. yum.
when we got there renee sent felicia, tiffany and i to a room on the other side of the conference center. i wanted to collapse into bed, but they had a whole program waiting for us. there was worship and a speaker (Tim Surrat, who was really good.). Afterwards we had a small group meeting with Chris. One of the funny points the leaders made up is that, whenever you have high schoolers and college students on the same retreat, there a point of irritation. the high school students want to stay up all night and the college kids, who do that anyways, want to sleep. that's exactly what we did when we got back.
breakfast was at 8 the next morning, of course i didn't wake up till 8.30. we had worship in the morning and another talk about fixing relationships (after all... what good is it if we do all these things without loving people like Christ does?). i went to a workshop (which I'll talk about later) with Todd Simonis.
lunch was horrible. like... 5 steps down from craig. but hey, charles hatcher was there (incredibly random...). i love his dog... i ate with all the boys and my brother ended up chugging an entire bottle of A1. gross. gross. eh.
another talk and worship session. then there was free time. i ended up reading a chapter from my philosophy book. urg. once i finished that felicia and i went walking on a trail through the woods. it ended up going around the lake, which was so much bigger than we first supposed. the sun was setting and it began to get difficult to see the blue crosses that marked the trail. we started running and simultaneously praying that we wouldn't get stuck in the woods in the dark. felicia led us off the trail at one point, refusing to follow the blue crosses. it ended up just being a giant circle. eventually... with alot of running, we made it. it was wonderful.
we watched the kids play ping-pong till dinner. at dinner my brother chugged an entire bottle of fat-free ranch. ew.
i went back to my room and prayed for a long time. then i went to the second workshop that Todd gave. it was nearly identical to the first. it was a workshop on spiritual gifts. after the lecture part we had a "lab" where we actually put these gifts to practice. words of knowledge were spoken, and people were prayed over and healed of their physical injuries. it was amazing.
at one point during the session felicia placed her hand on my shoulder and i just broke down crying. it was almost as if God was "giving me permission" to just cry. so i did. i cried for my friends, i cried for my bleeding heart, i cried for fear of the power that God has given me, i cried because i didn't know where God was taking me. i just cried.
later that night during worship i asked Todd Simonis and Charles Carmany to pray for alot of the things i listed above. during the prayer God showed them several things.
1. i have a weight on my shoulders that i carry around constantly. i knew this before Charles pointed it out, i’ve known it for several months. we prayed for its release and for my strength to lay it down.
2. we prayed for the complete healing of my heart. i am to be defined by who i am becoming, not who i have been. that’s a big thing. i think it is something we so often forget.
3. i am in a safe, new season of just running through a field. yay! i’m excited about this…
4. i am being called to ministry. where, i’m not certain. but i am fully convinced that God will put the places and people on my heart.
the prayer took a lot out of me. as soon as the service ended, Felicia and i went back to the room and collapsed into bed.
i couldn’t force myself to wake up for breakfast. i must have pushed the snooze button at least five times. i ended up going to Todd’s third workshop that focused specifically on the gifts of healing. after the lecture we had another lab where we just prayed over people. faith was a huge factor in this process, not only the faith of the people praying, but also the faith of the people being healed. it was amazing. there were several people with back and neck problems that were completely healed. my friend john gottshalk had screwed up his knees playing football the day before. There were bruises all over them when he came into the room, and after they prayed for healing the bruises had disappeared completely as well as the pain. two people were healed of their colds, and we prayed for one boy who has ADHD (he has yet to be tested… but he was noticeably calmer afterwards.). God’s presence was very thick in that room.
worship afterwards was simply amazing.
He is on the move.
something big is happening.
afterwards we packed up and headed home. Charles Carmany is one cool kid. even though he’s two years younger than me is at least as, if not more, spiritually mature than i am. when i told him i really admired him for the former reason he almost choked on his hamburger… sorry kid!
i feel that God is calling me to foreign missions. it’s incredibly scary, but exciting at the same time. i have a feeling that my life will be far from boring. wow.
kay, well, i love you kids, and i’m going to bed. God bless.
Fight on.
after class on friday i went directly to my room, threw a bunch of clothes into a bag and met my mom downstairs. she drove jacob and i over to st. andrew's where the bus was taking both of our groups. i threw my stuff onto the bus and started working on the mound of homework i have every weekend (bleh.). the busride up was... eventful. screaming kids everywhere. i could barely hear the music in my headphones @ full volume. what powerful lungs they have! they brought chick-fil-a sandwiches in a cooler. yum.
when we got there renee sent felicia, tiffany and i to a room on the other side of the conference center. i wanted to collapse into bed, but they had a whole program waiting for us. there was worship and a speaker (Tim Surrat, who was really good.). Afterwards we had a small group meeting with Chris. One of the funny points the leaders made up is that, whenever you have high schoolers and college students on the same retreat, there a point of irritation. the high school students want to stay up all night and the college kids, who do that anyways, want to sleep. that's exactly what we did when we got back.
breakfast was at 8 the next morning, of course i didn't wake up till 8.30. we had worship in the morning and another talk about fixing relationships (after all... what good is it if we do all these things without loving people like Christ does?). i went to a workshop (which I'll talk about later) with Todd Simonis.
lunch was horrible. like... 5 steps down from craig. but hey, charles hatcher was there (incredibly random...). i love his dog... i ate with all the boys and my brother ended up chugging an entire bottle of A1. gross. gross. eh.
another talk and worship session. then there was free time. i ended up reading a chapter from my philosophy book. urg. once i finished that felicia and i went walking on a trail through the woods. it ended up going around the lake, which was so much bigger than we first supposed. the sun was setting and it began to get difficult to see the blue crosses that marked the trail. we started running and simultaneously praying that we wouldn't get stuck in the woods in the dark. felicia led us off the trail at one point, refusing to follow the blue crosses. it ended up just being a giant circle. eventually... with alot of running, we made it. it was wonderful.
we watched the kids play ping-pong till dinner. at dinner my brother chugged an entire bottle of fat-free ranch. ew.
i went back to my room and prayed for a long time. then i went to the second workshop that Todd gave. it was nearly identical to the first. it was a workshop on spiritual gifts. after the lecture part we had a "lab" where we actually put these gifts to practice. words of knowledge were spoken, and people were prayed over and healed of their physical injuries. it was amazing.
at one point during the session felicia placed her hand on my shoulder and i just broke down crying. it was almost as if God was "giving me permission" to just cry. so i did. i cried for my friends, i cried for my bleeding heart, i cried for fear of the power that God has given me, i cried because i didn't know where God was taking me. i just cried.
later that night during worship i asked Todd Simonis and Charles Carmany to pray for alot of the things i listed above. during the prayer God showed them several things.
1. i have a weight on my shoulders that i carry around constantly. i knew this before Charles pointed it out, i’ve known it for several months. we prayed for its release and for my strength to lay it down.
2. we prayed for the complete healing of my heart. i am to be defined by who i am becoming, not who i have been. that’s a big thing. i think it is something we so often forget.
3. i am in a safe, new season of just running through a field. yay! i’m excited about this…
4. i am being called to ministry. where, i’m not certain. but i am fully convinced that God will put the places and people on my heart.
the prayer took a lot out of me. as soon as the service ended, Felicia and i went back to the room and collapsed into bed.
i couldn’t force myself to wake up for breakfast. i must have pushed the snooze button at least five times. i ended up going to Todd’s third workshop that focused specifically on the gifts of healing. after the lecture we had another lab where we just prayed over people. faith was a huge factor in this process, not only the faith of the people praying, but also the faith of the people being healed. it was amazing. there were several people with back and neck problems that were completely healed. my friend john gottshalk had screwed up his knees playing football the day before. There were bruises all over them when he came into the room, and after they prayed for healing the bruises had disappeared completely as well as the pain. two people were healed of their colds, and we prayed for one boy who has ADHD (he has yet to be tested… but he was noticeably calmer afterwards.). God’s presence was very thick in that room.
worship afterwards was simply amazing.
He is on the move.
something big is happening.
afterwards we packed up and headed home. Charles Carmany is one cool kid. even though he’s two years younger than me is at least as, if not more, spiritually mature than i am. when i told him i really admired him for the former reason he almost choked on his hamburger… sorry kid!
i feel that God is calling me to foreign missions. it’s incredibly scary, but exciting at the same time. i have a feeling that my life will be far from boring. wow.
kay, well, i love you kids, and i’m going to bed. God bless.
Fight on.