"Lord, be strong in my weakness"

The adventure module: a five day hiking and camping experience in the woods with the purpose of knowing how to be with God, ourselves and the people around us. This week was the hardest week I’ve had at IMPACT 360 but it was also the most rewarding and fulfilling.

            Throughout the week we learned different Spiritual disciples that as believers individually and corporately we need to embody and practice. The two that were that most helpful to me with my walk with the Lord were solitude and church in session. The reason that these two spiritual disciplines were most influential is because I believe that God did speak to me during these times.

            The spiritual discipline of solitude was done earlier on in the week and it was a time were we took five hours to be alone with the Lord and with our self. Hule gave us three different movements to focus our hearts towards the Lord and to be with Him.. Hule also gave us scriptures to focus us on Gods words. During this time I worshiped, meditated, thought, prayed, and slept. It was a really intimate time with God. But a highlight that surpasses everything else is the Lord spoke to me. I don’t know if He has spoken to me before but during this time He did. The day before Hule was talk about breathe prayers and the whole first day I adopted my breathe prayer as, “Lord, have mercy” or, “Lord, help me.” During my time with the Lord He gave me my breathe prayer; after reading scripture and praying he gave me, “Lord, be strong in my weakness.” This was my heart through the adventure module and continues to be my prayer in my daily life.

            Another spiritual discipline that was really sagnificate for me was what I believe Hule called church in session. On Wednesday we went on a five mile hike and climbed a mountain. It is an understatement to say that that was a stretching experience for me. But the Lord gave me strange in my weakness. That night on top of the mountain we had a beautiful time together of celabration and Hule led us in a service. In his message he talked about the love and forgiveness of God. We also had a opportunity to take the Lords supper. That night I had a heaviness and brokenness come over me even though I had climbed a mountain and we were in a time of celabration. In my own pride and attump to not deal with what was going on inside I got up and took the Lord supper like everyone else. Right after I took the bread and the juice I walked over to the raill that overlook the river and as soon as my hands touched the rail the Lord gave me the verse, “The Lord is close to the broken hearted and he blinds up there wounds.” At that moment I felt such a love from God, an intimacy that He would even speak to me and a rest in what Christ has done for me.

             In conclusion, I have learned that the Lord really does speak to us in a very real way. I have always had a head knowledge that he does through His word and people but I don’t think I ever believed that he would directly speak to me, this week He did. His grace is all-sufficent and His love is over whelming. He shows Himself in personal and imtimate ways. 

This is our God. "For thus says the One who is high and lifted up,

who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly,

and to revive the heart of the contrite." Isaiah 57:15

Introduction to my life

So I'm going to start off by saying that I am not a writer or a blogger. This is pretty much way out of my comfort zone. But I feel that I would be a bad steward of all God has in trusted me with and done in my life if I didn't write down all the awesome things he has done, is doing and will do this year. In my life personally and in the lives of those around me. This is week 5 at Impact 360 and it is a understatement to say that the Lord has done so much already. I have neglected to write down all that He has done but I will attempt today to try and sum up my life in the past 5 weeks.

For those of you who don't know, I am attending a program called Impact 360 in Pine Mountain, Ga. "IMPACT 360 is an academic gap-year experience with the mission of equipping members of future generations to become Christ-centered servant leaders." Here along with 30 other students I will be studying apologetics, worldview, and leadership. Also, in January I will be going to Brazil for a month with my family here at Impact to serve the people of Brazil. We also have opportunities to serve our community here in Pine Mountain as a family and individually. Every Tuesday or Wednesday night we have what we call our "SO's"(service opportunities) where we all pick different places in our community to be apart of. I am serving at a local church in the youth ministry every wednesday night where I will have the opportunity to make relationships with some of the girls there and hopefully begin to lead some small group Bible studies. On monday night we, as an impact community have our own student led bible study and are hosted my different staff members in their homes. My small group is made up of six girls whom I love dearly already. We also have what we call our "C-groups"(community groups). In our C-groups we are responsible for serving each other on campus. Different groups are responsible for different things such as dinning services, hospitality, residents, ect. We serve out two week rotations so we are involved in every aspect of what makes our community function. On more of the academic side, we have class every day from 9 to 12 Monday-Friday. Our schedule has the potential to change every week because every week we have a guest professor. Which is so exciting and I am learning so much, but at times it feels like I am drinking from a fire hydrant. For example this past week outside class we read the book Political Thought by Hunter Baker. Monday- Wednesday in class we had a professor come in to teach on it. Thursday and Friday we had Evangelical Training. Where we were Challenged and equipped to know how to respond to statements like: "There is no truth.", "Nothing is real- everything is an illusion..", "Truth is always changing" and so forth. Then at the end of the week every friday we get together as a class and discuss all that we have learned. This is called the academy. Taken from the idea of Platos academy. So as not to go into to much detail on my first blog entry I'll just leave you with a picture of the books I've read since being here. Maybe I'll get around to writing a short summery or what I thought about the books sometime in the future, but for now here you go.

If you have any questions or comments feel free to share them with me. :) I will write more when i have more time!

Ephesians 1