As you may be aware, I am a little...okay, a whole day late on getting my blog up. After 2 meetings, 4 hours of hectic volunteer work, and an intense (but heartfelt, I am sure) team time, I just crashed. How lucky am I then that I blog on Wednesdays so I have our free day to redeem myself?
The past week has been a mass of craziness - it's been a rollercoaster ride getting through it all. Speaking of rollercoasters, those are exactly what Josh, Bruce, Kelsey, and our buddy David went on ALL day today (it is 11:00 pm and they are just getting dinner). They found this amazing sale on tickets for Six Flags and decided to spend their day fighting two-hour-long lines and repeatedly plunging to their death...(sorry, I much prefer waterslides so I am a little biased). Luke, Thomas and I had some chill time at the church until lunch time. Then follows this EPIC adventure to walk around the corner to a Chinese restaurant Luke had seen previously. So we walk......14th street.....and we walk......22th street.......and we walk.....36th street...NO Chinese! Sadly, we trudge back to the Subway we had spotted and discuss Luke's possible delusions as we chomp into the deli goodness. We ate dinner at an Arab restaurant and I experienced my first ever Shawarma wrap. They were tasty - much like the gyros we sometimes get on Venice Beach.
The part of the evening I wasn't expecting was the deep discussion Luke, Thomas and I began to have on open-theism at Starbucks afterward. I can't even explain the jumble of thoughts in my brain right now as I consider for the first time the ideas of "falling from grace" and the quandary of God as an All-Powerful being v. a Merciful being. Interesting concepts that I will now have to ponder for days, weeks, and months to come...
However, conversations on controversial spiritual beliefs are only one of the challenges that have come up this week for the team. After the push and encouragement from Ken and Bob, the team has really risen to the challenge of overcoming the fear of beginning conversations and bringing up spiritual topics. Team time has been especially focused on spiritual growth within the team. Josh, as the leader, has led us in opening up with our testimonies and truly thinking about the way Christ has influenced our lives. Many people when they hear the word "testimony," automatically think of the generic "how old were you when you were saved?" or "tell all of the bad things that have happened in your life" or "give the perfect Christian answer." But in reality, a testimony isn't about telling a story from your perspective or a chronology of your entire life... it's about looking back and figuring out where God was in your story, what he means to you because of that, and deciding where to go next in your walk with Him.
There has been relational growth as well as spiritual growth, too. Last Sunday we each gathered gifts to bring to our "house church" type meeting, and mine was a little out of the ordinary. I challenged every member of the group to spend the days before our next meeting figuring out the ways in which they value and appreciate every other member of the group. Yesterday, we sat in a circle and focused our time on each person individually - telling them things that they may or may not have known about themselves, but that show how much we care for each other throughout all of the busyness and craziness of living together for a whole summer. To be honest, I didn't expect my suggestion to fly, but the team was very willing and had a great time experiencing some time focused solely on them and their merits. I can't think of a better encouragement to others than to be shown that they matter.
Tomorrow (if we can get the three who went to Six Flags out of bed,) will be filled with field and volunteer work. We can only ask you and thank you a million times for the wonderful prayers we have gotten - especially as there are many individual meetings and personal discussions occurring in the next couple of days.
Love to you all - and check maps for existing restaurants before setting out on foot! :.D
~Storm
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i would just like to add that at no point did we wait in line for 2-hours. for all of you in CA or thinking about a trip to 6 Flags, go on a Thursday! We rode almost every coaster AT LEAST twice and had plenty of time to kill! So, yeah...it was a FANTASTIC day at 6 Flags!
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