Got through midterms...

Can you believe it? My first semester of seminary is already half over! AND I lived to tell about it.

I'm doing pretty well in my classes, which is my excuse for not having logged on here in ages. Actually, I have thought about logging on here a ton of times; even started to write posts in my head, but something would always come up or I'd be too dang tired.

But, enough excuses.

Life is treating me pretty well. I just got done being part of a prayer team for a Renovare conference, which was pretty awesome. I had never done anything quite like this before. Renovare, by the way, is a Christian organization headed by folks like Richard Foster and Dallas Willard that encourages spiritual renewal through the grace of Christ Jesus via a variety of spiritual disciplines. I've attended two such conferences, both in California, so I didn't know how much I would get out of attending a third one. So, I held off on registering. But about a week ago I got an email asking if I'd like to be on the prayer team and that just sounded like a really cool ministry opportunity.

So, we gathered before the conference started and prayed for the people attending, the people presenting, even the technology functions. We prayed over the chapel where it was being held. We prayed over the prayer chapels. And then we prayed during the event itself for God's work to unfold and for lives to be changed. We made ourselves available to those who sought prayer and also worked as altar ministers when people came forward.

Having little experience at this, I was a bit concerned about my ability to meet people's needs, but I trusted on the power of the Spirit and the support of my prayer partners to get through it. As I listened to the others pray, their words always sounded more eloquent than mine. But, in hindsight, I figure they may have felt the same way. Besides, it's not about impressing anybody, not even God. It's just about communicating with him honestly.

As Providence would have it, I did have several opportunities to pray with people and even to follow up a little bit when I "coincidentally" ran into them later. I was excited about the opportunity to speak truth into people's lives, people who who were seeking the truth. As someone who has needed that soooo much -- I still need it! -- and has received it, it felt so good to be able to give a bit of what I have received.

Praying with the others, I just felt God's presence and was filled with amazing joy. It just felt so good to be talking with God on others' behalf, asking Him to fill us with His Spirit so that we could minister to others. It kinda reminded me of just how cool, how awesome it is to serve God! :)

In other news, I've got a job at a local elementary school where I actually get paid by the seminary through the federal work/study program to work as part of the America Reads program. It's kinda like getting paid to do volunteer work, which is pretty cool. Because of my background in writing and editing, they have me working a lot with fourth graders who have to produce writing portfolios as part of the state assessment process (it goes along with their standardized tests). Because it's part of a standardized test to evaluate the school, there are limits on what we can tell the kids in coaching them.

So, for example, If iwasluking a t Students paper and it hd this sintins in it, I could say, "Hmmm, let's look at the capitalization in that sentence. Can you tell me which words you capitalized and why?"
Or I could say, "Why do you think 'sintins' is underlined?" (The spellcheck underlines mispelled words.)

So, that's kind of interesting. It's fun, though. Most of the kids are really good sports and some of the things they write about are pretty endearing. I also help teachers out by being in the classroom, answering questions, keeping certain kids on task and going over material with the "low performers."

I am making friends here. I've got a couple women that I feel like I can pretty honest with and a couple more that I am pretty comfortable with. I really, really like my church and there's a lot of cool people who go there, both seminarians and real world folks. I'm part of a small group with my church that meets weekly and we're working through a workbook called "On Mission with God." We're not too crazy about the tone of some of the writing, but the concepts are pretty good. It's pretty much about conforming your life and your will to God's will for your life and how he wants to use you in the world for his kingdom.

Speaking of kingdom, we had this thing here a few weeks ago called "Kingdom Conference." It was actually the week before my midterms or maybe it was the week of my midterms. Anyway, I was pretty stressed academically when it was going on, but was able to enjoy it anyway. The theme of Kingdom Conference -- it's an annual event -- is the global community of Christians as well as working social justice ministry. This is really cool, considering that Asbury is an evangelical school and, unfortunately, evangelicals are not always known for their social concerns. (Just a stereotype, I know it's not true everywhere.) So, there were people from tons of missions organizations and other ministries helping the down and out. I touched base with an organization in Ohio that works with homeless people and other people in crisis. I'm interested in checking out that ministry at some point. I'll keep you updated on that.

I got to do a little hands-on ministry last weekend when I and three other students hit the streets of downtown Lexington with some jackets and coats we had collected. It's something we're doing for our Kingdom, Church and World class -- called a Kingdom Project. We met some pretty interesting people in difficult situations and were able to minister to some of them and give them a few things to keep them warm. I'd like to say it was satisfying, it was in some ways, but it was heartbreaking. Some of the girls I met... in some ways their lives seemed so messed up... and in other ways, they didn't seem that different from me.

I want to thank everybody who's supporting me with prayer and other gifts. I was walking to one of my 8 o' clock classes last week and I just thought, "Wow! This is so cool, that I'm at seminary, that I'm actually getting to do this."

God is doing some incredible work in my life and your prayers are really, really appreciated. Incredible works usually involve some struggles and this is no different. But God is faithful and I am blessed. I appreciate your friendship so much.

Well, maybe this long post made up for time lost. I love you guys and I'll talk to ya soon.

Blessings,

Michelle