living life to the fullest.

God is so good. I think I learn that more each day. Last weekend, Carolyn and I went for a backpacking trip in upstate South Carolina on the Foothills trail. It was a beautiful trail filled with waterfalls and bridges. We just missed the peak time for the turning leaves, but they were still beautiful. We stopped in Greenville on Friday night to visit with one of my college friends and eat some pizza, then we slept at Carolyn's house that night. Carolyn dad dropped us off at the trailhead on early Saturday morning so that we would have plenty of time to hike. We had quite a long trip planned for the weekend, so we wanted to make sure we would leave ourselves plenty of time to hike in the daylight. We started down a dirt road looking for the trailhead. After a few minutes we passed two trails, but they were not marked for the Foothills, so we decided to keep going. After about a mile of going downhill, we wondered if we were going in the right direction. We stopped and asked a few people for directions, finally someone else pulled up and pointed us to the trails that we had passed earlier. We went back and went down the trail, only to find out that it was just an overlook to a waterfall. We were starting to get pretty stressed out and upset by now. Finally, we went back and found our trailhead and started hiking after an extra 2 hours and 3 miles.

As we started our hike, we ran into a man who warned us of Wild Boar and Bears, so we started to get slightly worried at this point. We hiked about 13 miles that day and made camp for the night at Bear Gap. We woke up early the next morning before sunrise to start hiking. We hiked all day long and stopped at beautiful bridges and falls along the way. We thought we were behind the whole time and didn't want to be late on Monday, so we kept pushing ourselves. We hiked up a challenging set of "Cat Stairs" which seemed never ending, only to keep hiking uphill after that. We found someone at the end of the day that told us we were less than 3 miles away from our trail exit, which we were supposed to hike out the next day. So we stopped and camped for the night after hiking about 18 miles. We were so tired; I think we went to bed around 8:30 that night. We hiked out an hour the next day to our car and traveled home with plenty of time. It was a great trip, although we were pretty tired when we got back.

A few weeks ago, the Lord asked me to step up in obedience and speak in chapel. So this past Thursday I spoke in the St. Christopher Staff Chapel. Leading up to that point, I was pretty stressed and overwhelmed, since public speaking is the last thing I want to do. We are going through the Lord's prayer in a series and it was my turn to speak on Forgiving others as Christ has forgiven us. I was so nervous leading up to it, but as I step behind the podium into the sunlight streaming in with the ocean to my back, the Lord took away my fears and took away my agenda, and I was able to speak His words freely. And guess what? I actually enjoyed it. I spoke truth, made people laugh, and told a few of my stories. I felt so blessed and honored afterward. I received very uplifting encouragement from the staff after the message. My director came up and told me I had the gift of pulic speaking, I almost dropped dead on the floor. If you would have told me that 10 years ago, I would have said you were nuts, but I have to remember I am a new creation in Christ and He has chosen to bless me with gifts to use for His glory. My mentor was filled with praise and said I should expect to give the message again soon. God is so good to us, He is so faithful. Why did I ever doubt He would abandon me and leave me?

God has burdened my heart. I have a friend who is going through a very rough time right now. He is confused about life and God and other things. I had a few deep conversations with him this week. Yesterday during our girls' staff Bible study, we were given time to spend with the Lord. The Lord just broke my heart for my friend. He gave me a small glimpse of the way that He was feeling toward the situation and I cried for a long time. I cried the tears that the Lord was crying for my friend. It was so sad, but so good to drink deeply of the Lord's heart. I feel so blessed.

The Lord is willing, He is waiting to bless you. Will you give it up? Will you lose yourself in Him and allow Him to bless you and free you? He longs for you to drink deeply of His love and His spirit.

Thank you for all your love and prayers, I couldn't do it without you.

beached whale.

Today, we received a call that there was a beached Pygmy Sperm Whale a few hundred yards down the beach. I was on house keeping when we received the call, so we immediately grabbed buckets and ran down the beach to join the effort. We started hauling water from the estuary onto the whale and kept passing water until NOAA arrived at the scene.

By the time they got there (about 1 and 1/2 later), the whale was bleeding quite heavily and there was really no chance of survival. So we watched the team take samples and treat the whale, until finally they put it out of suffering and carried it away in their truck. It was a pretty sad end to a great effort to rescue the whale. It was so cool how people just started to come out and help and we were all working for the same cause because we all had hope that the whale would survive. Even though the whale didn't make it, it was a cool experience to be a witness to the event. It made me think about possibly getting involved in a team like that later on.

the sky is the limit.

God always has something up His sleeve, even when He seems absent or removed, He is always at work for the good of those who love Him. God has been stretching me and opening new doors of possiblities that I never thought were possible here at St. Christopher.



It all started with a conversation with my mentor. We were discussing what my passions are and where I see the Lord taking me in the future. I mentioned my love for the outdoors with young adults; taking students into God's creation for a few days at a time to challenge, grow and stretch them in new ways. My mentor thought I should bring up the idea of starting an adventure education program here at camp. So last week I had a meeting with the camp director to discuss my passions and the possibility of starting something here. I love how God works, He said that He had wanted to start a program like that for a while, but was waiting for someone to step in with passion and initiative to start. We sat down with the Student Ministries director and came up with some great ideas and possiblities. We are looking at offering a Christian Leadership Experience to high school and college-age students. I've been coordinating with my supervisor about incorporating our team building activities and offering trips to area schools and youth groups. Our hope is to have our first group come in the spring. That is my first prayer request...that the Lord would bless the program and our planning, that He would take it the direction it needs to go to glorify Him and reach students. I could also use prayers for peace and clarity, since it's kinda overwhelming to think about all at once.



Obedience. The key to growth and maturity in spriritual insight and wisdom. The Lord asked me to speak in our all-staff St. Christopher chapel a few months ago, and after hesitation and probing from the Lord, I surrendeured and agreed. We are doing a series in chapel focusing on the Lord's prayer and taking it verse by verse. So next week, I will be speaking on "as we forgive those who trespassed against us." It's been fun using my skills from an Inductive Bible Class I had at IWU, but it's also a little nerve racking at the same time. It's just always there, in the back of my mind ya know? That is my second prayer request. That the Lord would speak in me and through me as I prepare and deliver the message next week.

Thank you for all your prayers and support. They are much needed and much appreciated.