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Summertime!

Summer's here, which means my job is shifting gears for the next few months. Since most students go off-campus for the summer (to work, travel, visit family, etc.), I'll be focusing more on my study program and raising support for the 2013-2014 school year. (Thankfully not all of the students are gone - a handful have stayed in town to work or take classes this summer, and orientation sessions for incoming students are being held throughout the month of June. I'd probably spiral into deep depression if I had to be separated from all of my students all summer! Not really. But almost. The students are the best part of my job!)

I'm currently reading God's Way of Peace by Horatius Bonar. It's a short book (only about 100 pages), but it's packed full of wisdom and encouragement. I read it for an RUF small group I was involved in as a freshman (or maybe sophomore?) in college, and I liked it the first time, but I'm developing a new appreciation for it the second time around. In a nutshell, Bonar writes that true and lasting peace doesn't come from looking to anything we do or achieve, but rather from resting in what Jesus has done. Golden. I highly recommend it!

"Accept, then, the character of God as given in the gospel; read aright His blessed name as it is written upon the cross; take the simple interpretation given of His mind toward the ungodly, as you have it, at length, in the glad tidings of peace. Is that not enough?" 

- Horatius Bonar, God's Way of Peace

My goal for the summer is to raise enough support to cover the 2013-2014 school year, so that I can focus on spending time with students and my on-campus ministry responsibilities during the school year. I'll need to raise a total of approximately $30,000 for the next year. I have approximately $12,000 pledged in monthly donations, which leaves me with about $18,000 to raise in one-time gifts and/or monthly pledges over the summer. (Check out the Support Me tab for more information about where that money goes and how to donate! And please don't hesitate to call or email me with any questions!)

So, $18,000. That's a big number. But if there's anything I learned while raising support last summer, it's this: God provides. Also, it all adds up. It sounds cliché, but it's true. Last summer, I had to raise over $28,000, and God provided abundantly - in the form of donations ranging anywhere from $5 to $5,000. So if you have been thinking about donating (or if you've donated in the past and are thinking about donating again), let me unashamedly ask you to please donate what you can. Every donation helps.

Donations can come in the form of one-time gifts (of any size) or pledges to donate a certain amount every month. Here's a breakdown of what that might look like in monthly pledges:

10 pledges of $25/month

9 pledges of $50/month

5 pledges of $100/month

2 pledges of $150/month

In one-time donations, it might look something like this:

10 donations of $1,000

10 donations of $500

15 donations of $100

15 donations of $50

16 donations of $25

35 donations of $10

Of course, these are just here to give you (and me) a practical idea of what I need to be working toward this summer. None of that is set in stone, so if you feel inclined to make a monthly pledge of $67 or a one-time gift of $324, you are more than welcome to do so. :) 

Happy summer, everyone! 

Year One Wrap-Up

Well, I've officially been working for RUF for a year! A year ago, I was finishing up a fun, overwhelming ("drinking from a fire hydrant"), encouraging, scary, and eye-opening week of RUF new intern orientation. At the end of that week, I had made a lot of great new friends (YAY for friendterns!!), and I was excited (and intimidated) about moving to WCU and starting to work with students in the fall, and I was absolutely terrified about raising money over the summer.

If there's one thing this experience has taught me, it's that God is so much more faithful than I could ever know. I learned that raising money is not my forte (there's just something inherently awkward about asking people for money), but God was faithful to provide the needed funds to get me to WCU a few days before the fall semester began. My originally planned living situation ended up falling through a few weeks before I moved to Sylva, but God provided a great alternative just in time. I love my apartment - a roomy duplex with lots of windows in walking distance from downtown Sylva - and my roommate is great!

Fall semester was a time of transition - getting used to the area with all of its perks and quirks, figuring out what exactly my role on campus was, getting to know students, getting to know the campus and culture of WCU, and getting plugged in to a local church plant (Redeemer Church Sylva).

Toward the end of the fall semester, just as I'd gotten nice and comfortable, the campus minister I was working with (Rev. Dave Osborne) accepted a call to pastor a church in Greenville, NC. He and his family were sad to say goodbye to the students at WCU, and the students and I were sad to see them go. Throughout the rest of the fall semester and for the first few weeks of the spring semester, Dave worked with me to prepare me for the transition. A search committee was already working to find a new campus minister for RUF at WCU, but until then, I was going to be the only RUF staff at WCU. The prospect of doing my job (along with the added responsibilities I was picking up) without Dave around absolutely terrified  me. I felt totally unqualified for my job, and I was afraid everything would just fall apart. (I have a mind that tends to head straight to worst-case scenarios.) Dave kept reminding me that it was going to be ok - God would still be at work at WCU, God would continue to provide, and it wouldn't be the end of the world if things didn't always go as planned.

And God certainly was faithful this semester. Yes, life got busier and I had significantly more work to do. Yes, I missed Dave and Jenny and the kids, and at times it was really lonely without "co-workers". Yes, some things didn't go exactly as I planned or hoped. Yes, I made mistakes. But through it all, God continued to provide, both spiritually and practically. Students helped with a lot of the on-campus ministry responsibilities (helping with events, leading music for Large Group, etc), people from my church stepped up to have students over for meals and events, and pastors and RUF campus ministers from around the area came to preach at Large Group each week (some even drove up to 2 hours one way!). I was really blessed by the prayers and encouragement I got from RUF staff, my church, and friends. On top of all that, my supporters continued to give faithfully, so I didn't have to spend much time working on raising money throughout the semester. God is so good!! By the time the semester ended, I was tired... but I was also sad to see the semester end. It was a fun semester, despite all the craziness.

God also continued to work in the hearts and lives of students. At the last Large Group of the semester, we had a time for students to share how God had been faithful to them throughout the past year. It was so sweet to be able to sit back and listen as students talked about how God had provided them with a community in RUF, how God had been teaching them about Himself and about His grace, and so many other things. (We eventually had to stop for time's sake, but we could've stayed all night!)

God has also been faithful to provide RUF at WCU with a new campus minister!!! Brian Thomas and his wife Jessica and their two children will be moving here next week! Students are excited to have them here, I'm excited to begin working with them, and they're excited to be coming here! Please be in prayer for them over the next few weeks and months as they make the transition.

This post is already much longer than I was planning (there was a lot of catching up to do!), so I'll leave you with a few pictures of highlights of this past semester... this has been one of the best and most challenging years of my life, and I'm excited about this coming year!

Night Skiing at Cataloochee!

Hiking!

Not-A-Date Night (photo scavenger hunt)

RUF Summer Conference in Panama City Beach!

Update & Pictures!

Dear blog readers, I have a confession:

I'm not doing a very good job at keeping up with this blog. There is SO much that has happened this semester that I'd like to tell you all about... given the time (and motivation), I could probably write a book about all that I've experienced, learned, and seen God do since I began working with RUF at WCU. 

Since I don't plan on writing a book anytime soon, here are some pictures of some of the highlights of the semester. (They say a picture is worth a thousand words, right?)

(Photo credit for a lot of these pictures goes to the one and only Morgan McCool!)

Tailgating!
Fall means football and football means tailgating!

WCU has had a less-than-impressive football season... but the band is awesome!
(And check out that view!)

Fall Conference!
In September, we joined the RUFs from Duke, NC State, Wofford, UNC Chapel Hill, and Wake Forest (about 300 students total!)  for a weekend retreat at Camp Greystone (in Tuxedo, NC). John Pearson (the RUF area coordinator for NC and VA) was the speaker for the weekend. He focused on the book of Hebrews and tackled the question, "What does it mean to live in light of God's promises?" Most of the students that came from WCU were new to RUF, and I really enjoyed having the opportunity to spend the weekend with them and get to know them. 

No RUF retreat is complete without a dance party!!

Not-A-Date Night

One of my favorite events of the semester (so far) was Not-A-Date Night at the end of September. The point of Not-A-Date Night was to give students the opportunity to meet and get to know one another, and to help newer students to get more plugged in. We had about 50 students sign up, and we divided them up into groups of about seven. The evening was split up into three stages:

Stage 1: Each group decided on a time and place and ate dinner together.

Stage 2: After dinner, the groups had to go shopping: everyone had to find and wrap a random object as a "gift". (Creative wrapping methods were encouraged!)

Stage 3: Once everyone had a "gift", the students all gathered at the Osbornes' house for desserts and a giant White Elephant gift exchange. 

Not-A-Date Night was a success! We had a good mix of new and "old" students, and it was overall a fun evening. Since it was a few days after my birthday, they surprised me with a cookie cake! We are hoping to do another Not-A-Date Night soon!

Pumpkin-Carving Party!

Last weekend, we had a pumpkin-carving party just for the girls. We had so much fun hanging out, carving pumpkins, and eating some delicious homemade twix bars and other fall goodies, courtesy of the Jenny Osborne. :)

Thank you all for your prayers! I know I say this all the time, but God is at work at Western! Sylva feels like home now, and I can honestly say that there is nowhere else I'd rather be living and nothing else I'd rather be doing right now. God is good!

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Putting Amazing Back into Grace

Part of the RUF internship is the study program: each month, I have assigned reading consisting of one or two books, certain sections of the Bible (by the end of these 2 years, we will have read the whole Bible), and portions of the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Westminster Shorter Catechism. I must confess, as much as I would like to be, I'm not much of a reader. When I was younger, I was a giant bookworm; I read pretty much anything I could get my hands on. (And often got in trouble for staying up reading waaaay past my bedtime.) Somewhere in the past 10 years or so, I stopped loving reading. (I blame my highschool teachers and assigned reading.) It's sad, really... I want to be a bookworm, but I'm just not. I could go off on a tangent about how media/information overload has killed our attention spans and makes reading seem boring... but that's another conversation. :) Thankfully, the RUF study program is phenomenal - I've really enjoyed these books! (Most of them anyway.) Who knows? Maybe there's hope for his backslidden bookworm! ;)

The purpose of this post is to share a quote from Putting Amazing Back into Grace. It has been my favorite book in the study program so far. It's written by Michael Horton, and I really love his writing style. Its hard to describe, but if you're looking for a book on reformed theology (everyone's favorite topic, I know) that's practical, applicable, and interesting (because let's be honest, not all theological books are), then I STRONGLY recommend this book! (Don't judge it by it's 90s-tastic cover!)

So without further ado, here's a quote from chapter 10, titled "No Lost Causes":

"In the matter of justification, we see Judge; we picture a courtroom. In the matter of sanctification, we see a Father and the image of home. I referred I the ugly duckling's becoming the beautiful swan. Sanctification involves that kind of transformation. Don't lose heart! If God starts this thing, He will finish it!"

Maybe this quote is just beautiful to me in the context of what I've been learning throughout it the rest of the book... but it just resonated with me. My day-to-day relationship with God has the nature of a parent-child relationship, not that of a criminal and a judge. God has already justified me; I am no longer in the courtroom. God is at work in my heart, sanctifying me to be more like Christ, and He is not going to give up on me! I can come to Him freely, I don't have to try to hide my shame from Him. God's not done with me yet; I still sin. A lot. But God doesn't see me as the sinner I am; He sees me as someone who has been redeemed, a work in progress... and He has promised that He will finish what He started!

"And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you
will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ."

 - Phil. 1:6

If that's not encouraging, I don't know what is!


Things have been busy here; I'll be back soon with a ministry update!