Order in the Chaos

Hello, friends! I'm writing to you from my living room couch, and I'm surrounded by a variety of interesting objects: a hammer, my Bible, my work notebook, some white ribbon, a pincushion, my favorite baseball cap, a synopsis of the Gospels, an iron, a hot glue gun, a list of all the LCMS churches in Florida, and the back of a picture frame. Let me tell you how all of these things came to be in my living room!

The hammer, ribbon, pincushion, iron, hot glue gun, and back of a picture frame are all ingredients for my long weekend activity: crafting. I made a few items for all of the babies in my life, although from that list of things I bet you'll never guess what I made (and I can't tell you, or it would spoil the surprise for the babies). I also made a craft apron for myself, because when I start making crafts, cleanliness is not my priority. I bet you couldn't tell that from my description of my living room!

My Bible and my work notebook are normally seen together. As usual, this week I wrote four devotions. My favorite one was probably the devotion for Tuesday. It involved the Ezekiel story about prophesying to dry bones. When I searched for a picture of dry bones, it came up with this:

Naturally, I thought this was hilarious and used it as the illustration.

My favorite baseball cap, which is a Harry Potter cap from Universal, is in my living room for two reasons. One, I wear it during our delightful hours spent in the Union handing out football magnets. Two, I wear it when I go to the Frenchtown community garden. Today the five of us (Maddie, Burgen, Megan, Mark and I) weeded one of the beds. With all of us working, we were able to clean it out pretty much completely. We also hunted down caterpillars in the tomato plants and ate some cucumbers and green beans. I brought back a small pile of green beans for myself.

The highlight, however, was watching the kids play a game of basketball and several of the girls perform a steps routine during their halftime.

The synopsis of the Gospels is the topic for this summer's Bible study, which I get to help teach. I led our discussion for the first time this Sunday, and I think it went pretty well! Luke 1 and 2 were on the agenda. We tend to overlook those passages because we hear them so much, but it was nice to take the time and examine them more closely.

And lastly, the list of all the LCMS churches in Florida. Tomorrow, I get to (read: have to) continue to work my way down the list, calling churches to ask if they have students heading to college in the fall. Last Friday, I knocked out 48 churches. Hopefully I get through at least that many again tomorrow. 

There you are, a sum-up of my week based on my messy living room. Until next week, farewell! 

Football schedule? Football schedule?

Hello, friends! It's so nice to sit down in a nice, quiet, shaded, air-conditioned room and write after a few hours spent saying nothing but "Football schedule?" in a sunny, hot, crowded student union.

(I really shouldn't complain -- we were in the shade today. However, it's Florida, and I reserve the right to say "It's too hot" basically every day!)

Anyway, Tuesday started our twice-a-week orientation schedule. We stand outside in the heat and hand out football magnets to people walking by. Sometimes that's new students, sometimes that's the new students' parents. Sometimes it's random staff people and other campus ministers! It gets a little tedious, but we've found ways to amuse ourselves. We chat with the people tabling next to us, who have included a pre-med group, an acapella group, and a Jewish group. Today Liz and Cricket came to visit us, and of course, Cricket was immediately the star of the show.

In other news, I volunteered to help with the Sunday morning Bible study for the summer. This Sunday will be the first one I get to lead. We're going through a synopsis of the four Gospels, discovering which writer included what and why. So far, it's pretty interesting!

And since it's summer, I get to do my favorite job: church calls. Tomorrow I'll start on the nice long list of all the churches in Florida, letting them know about LCMS-U and University Lutheran. I just can't wait. I'm very, very excited.

This Sunday I'll be doing a church swap with my friend Emily. She'll come to our worship service, and I'll go to hers over at the Mormon church. It should be very educational for both of us! I'm looking forward to it.

That's all for today -- I need to go dunk my head in cold water or something. Have I mentioned it's hot in Florida? ;)

My Shiny New Phone

Hello, friends! Today I've decided to write my blog from my shiny new phone. This gives me the opportunity to mourn my old phone, which died tragically in an accident yesterday. It fell out of my pocket as I got out of Pastor Jay's car and subsequently got slammed in the car door. This blog also gives me the opportunity to beg for your phone numbers, as I lost quite a few of my contacts because of this sad incident. (If you text me in order to give me your number, please identify yourself, otherwise I will have your number but not know who it belongs to!)

Moving on from my phone woes... On Friday I went to Yogurt Mountain with Evan to celebrate his new summer internship. It's a good thing for him my phone broke, because the embarrassing picture of him devouring delicious yogurt is now inaccessible. Friday night I spent at a going-away party for Gary and Jessica. Gary recently got a job in Washington, D.C., and they started their move today. On Saturday, Anna, her roommate Hillary, and I went to the Tallahassee Museum to do the zip line course, which was super fun!

I haven't done too much this week- volunteered at the Children's Home Society on Monday, had lunch with Justin on Tuesday, went to a circuit meeting with Pastor Jay yesterday, and had lunch with Laura today. I've also written my normal number of devotions and worked on some young adult ministry network stuff. Hopefully there will be some joint young adult stuff happening before I leave!

During our drive to and from Tifton yesterday, Pastor Jay and I decided to forego regular Vespers this summer. Instead, we're going to do trivia night at Brooklyn Water on Thursday nights, starting tonight. If you're in the area, feel free to join us! (I'll need all the help I can get...)

That's all the news from Tallahassee, except for this great story: http://m.wtxl.com/mobile/news/man-wearing-only-underwear-claims-to-be-god-tased-at/article_f623444a-fa49-11e4-8094-fb59da6c07a1.html

Until next week, friends!

New Friends

Hello, friends! As it so happens, I had the opportunity to make some new friends this week. Monday afternoon through yesterday afternoon I attended the Youth and Family Ministry Association retreat at Luther Springs camp in Hawthorne, FL. Let me tell you what I learned: youth ministers are crazy.

I did learn more than that, but that was the most amusing revelation of the retreat! By default, youth ministers are certifiably insane (myself included). No one else would willingly go into the profession. We had great fun together as we ate junk food and swapped ministry horror stories. I would tell you some of them, but you might require counseling afterwards and I don't have that kind of money.

In all seriousness, the retreat was a blessing. Our theme was "Detox." We talked about identifying the toxic things in our lives (words, thoughts, relationships, and culture), guarding our hearts against those things, and replacing them with life-giving, life-affirming, and life-changing things. Our small group discussions were wonderful and insightful. We were able to listen to, support and encourage one another in our various struggles. I appreciated the opportunity to learn from youth ministers who have been in the field a bit longer than my 10 months.

The retreat also gave me a new appreciation for prayer. I have, of course, always known that prayer is a powerful thing -- but it's one thing to know that, and another thing to see it in action. Simply the act of one youth minister saying to another, "I'll continue praying for you, and I want to know when your prayer needs change," is life-affirming. It gives validity to a youth minister's needs, which often go overlooked in favor of the needs of the congregation.

On the way back from the retreat, I gave myself a brief driving tour of the University of Florida, just to say I'd been there. If you're worried about me becoming a Gator fan, remember that my boss is a Gator fan, and therefore I must placate him until July (when I can return to not caring).

I've included two pictures for you this week. One is the YFMA crowd during one of our sessions; the other is the best picture I could get at UF without getting out of my car.