good-bye 30 …

Well, another year has come and gone … and I must say that with all the hype about turning 30, and a bunch of people who said I should dread it … It has actually been one of the best years of my life!

There has been so much change this year. Some of the major headlines of my year: No Shave November (okay maybe not a major headline, but fun nonetheless), AFRICA, leaving a church position, making some unbelievable new friends, being challenged in new ways, summer in Jeff City, taking a new job – and being stretched by it every day, I trained for and ran in and finished the Chicago Marathon, and I experienced support and love of friends and family unlike many people ever have the fortune of experiencing.

Thank-you 30 for proving all those nay-sayers wrong!  Bring on 31!

Here are some photos to go with the highlights:

The beard:

AFRICA:

Jeff City Friends:

New job:

Marathon:

sorry it’s sideways…

 

Hope your year is great!

-E

A lot…

A lot … has been going on since I’ve last updated. Seems like I’m not getting to write as many of these as I’d like to, but every time I feel like I have time to write something, its late, and I’d just rather get to bed. So, lucky for you (or un-lucky if you don’t like reading my ramblings), I had the rest of the evening for Saturday off, and am taking the time to write a little something …

Well, first off “big” news … I’ve reached 5,000 visits to my blog! I know that may not seem like a big deal, and I’m not doing this for fame or to gather a following or anything, but I was impressed at over 5,000 individual/first time visits to my blog since I started back around November.

Okay, now to some REALLY big news. I can’t say with certainty yet, and therefore must be vague with the details, but it looks like I may have a job lined up for the fall. Things have really come together for that in the last couple of weeks, and I’ve had a couple of really great conversations about it in the last week. Honestly, it kinda scares me to death, but God has really given me a peace about pursuing the opportunity, which has to be from Him because left to myself, I wouldn’t think that I could do this! So, hopefully soon I’ll be able to share more details about that!

We had an amazing time in St. Louis. We arrived there on the 9th of July to prepare for the students arrival the next day. Friday, Saturday and Sunday were spent in training and preparation for the groups to be out on the mission field starting on Monday. Each church/youth group that came was paired up with an inner-city church or location at which they were going to run a Vacation Bible School or Back Yard Bible Club type of ministry. I was put into a group of 3 ministries that were partnered with 15th Street Baptist Church in East St. Louis. It was definitely eye opening. Just a few years ago, the place where we were serving in East St. Louis was one of the top 2 poorest zip codes in the entire United States! Sometimes it is easy to forget that some people right here in our “back yard” live with so little. It wasn’t un-common for us to knock on a door to invite kids to the VBS where there would be anywhere from 7-20 kids in one home/apartment, etc. often from a couple different families. Anyhow, we had a lot of success with our Vacation Bible School and at least 7 kids made professions of faith in Jesus Christ for the first time that week!
The people at 15th Street were great! I got to visit with one of the deacons there name Joulius. He was a man in his late 60’s early 70’s who had graduated with an undergraduate degree in Political Science, studied Law at Harvard and taught law at Southern Illinois University for 26 years. The entire time he was teaching at SIU, he still lived in East St. Louis trying to reach the community and trying to do all that he could to give them more opportunities. He was part of the team that got the public commuter train to come across the river so that people in their community could have transportation to the city and be able to get jobs there. He also wrote the grants that are being used to build new/nicer housing complexes to promote a better community. He was a really cool guy.

The group of interns this summer have realized that we have a lot of things in common as far as our interests go. All of us are musicians of some sort, piano players, guitar players, percussion, vocalists, etc. We all enjoy the artistic side of things ranging again from music to photography to painting, etc. Which brings me to my next topic. Tomorrow we’ll all be painting together! It came to us a while back that we should have a day where we each buy a canvas and just paint … so that idea transformed into us picking a Bible verse as our inspiration and then everyone is going to paint whatever they are inspired to based on that scripture verse. Our verse is Psalm 19:14 “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing to You o Lord my Rock and my Redeemer.” Hopefully I’ll be able to post some pictures of our artwork soon!

I continue to learn SO much this summer as I spend quality time with the Lord, and as we continue to encourage one another on our team as we share what we’re learning and as we continue to walk through “Master Plan of Evangelism.” Sometimes it feels a little bit like trying to take a drink from a fire hydrant, but God has been so faithful in teaching us this summer, and is speaking to us in specific ways. This is one of those experiences that is going to continue to take a while to process, and will be hard to explain to people everything that this summer was for me … but if I get the chance, I’ll sure try.

Okay, that’s going to be it for tonight … I’m tired. I’m still training for the marathon in October, and I had to run 12 miles this morning. . . my legs are sore and I’m tired so I’m going to bed! Blessings to you all!
-E

Post about a 4 a 5 and a 1 1/2 …

The 4 is for the 4th of July! We traveled to St. Louis area to spend the day with one of the Collegiate Regional Directors for the Student Ministry team. He directs the greater St. Louis area ministries. His family lives on a horse ranch just outside of St. Louis. We went up on the 3rd, stayed in a hotel on that evening and then spent the day with he and his family. Their farm was great, his 5 kids were awesome, and we had such a good, relaxing time with them … all capped off by shooting off fireworks with the kiddos.

The 5 is for $5 Prom! Last night we had a $5 prom here in the house. The deal is that everyone has a $5 limit to buy an outfit (plus using things already in their wardrobe) for our “prom.” We had a blast shopping at goodwill. Then when we got home from there, Angela had set the table with the dishes and silverware, candles, place cards, etc. After decorating the basement, we got dressed up and went upstairs for dinner … we even had Chocolate covered strawberries! When dinner was finished we moved the party downstairs and had a little dance party in the basement … and finished off the night with an “after prom” party of watching The Princess Bride! So fun …

The 1 1/2 is for the amount of weeks that we are preparing to spend in St. Louis. We are leaving today to travel up there to prepare for the St. Louis Project. It is a mission project that youth groups from all over bring their students to St. Louis to be paired up with a church in the St. Louis Metro area to run a VBS for the week, do community outreach etc. We’re going up tonight to get ready for the arrival of the church groups tomorrow, and then the rest of the weekend will be a training weekend focused on evangelism before they go out starting Monday to lead their VBS or Back Yard Bible club. I’ve been a part of the St. Louis, Denver and Houston projects several times in the last 6-7 years and I’m looking forward to this week as well!

Another brief update from this neck of the woods. Still praying about the Fall and where/what God is leading me to. Hope everyone is great!

-E

scripture.

What’s the last scripture that you memorized?
-E

here comes week one of camp…

This past week was spent in preparation for our first week of Super Summer camp, which will be at the SBU campus in Bolivar starting Monday.
So far this weekend we had training for the Super Summer Small Group Leaders. The leaders all showed up for the Friday-Saturday training on Friday evening, and we completed training last night. It was a good time for the teams to all get together, begin to get to know one another and for them to start making plans for camp this coming week. I was given the awesome privilege of leading worship for this training. I love doing that, and honestly am always stunned and honored when I’m asked to do that. It was fun though. I led and had my new friend AJ (who is one of the interns I am working with this summer) played guitar with me as well.
This morning the rest of the crew headed over to Bolivar to get things set up on the campus, however, I stayed behind to help lead worship for church here in Jefferson City (our church meets in the evening) and will head to Bolivar tonight after our service.

I could go on about the details of what is going ON here(which I’m sure have you sitting on the edge of your chair) but I won’t. Instead I’ll share a little about what God has been doing IN my life in the last few weeks:
I think God is making some major changes in my life. My perspective is changing, my attitude towards God and those things that are in opposition to Him and His Word are changing, I’m learning a greater dependence on Him, I’m longing for the Word every day, I’m learning more about what discipleship is and looks like, I’m starting to have new dreams and goals for life (albeit vague at the moment), and I’m learning to live every day (and trying to live every moment) looking ahead, toward the return of Christ which is why I live, and longing for that time to come and to be able to hear “well done …”. Life changes a lot when you put thoughts, actions, behaviors, etc through that filter. Priorities change. Things that once seemed important now find their way to the back of the line, and the things that really matter come into view.
I’m excited for this journey … life, and for whatever it is that God has in store for me. I wish I was in a place to say that I knew where that would be in the next 2-3 months, but I don’t right now, and I’m okay with that, b/c I know that for right now, I’m exactly where God wants me to be, and I trust Him totally that He will show me the next step.

Side note:
I sprained my ankle a few weeks ago, and this week was the first time I had run since then … I’ve done 15 miles this week, and our official training for the Chicago marathon starts this coming Tuesday!!! Only 4 months away until the big race and running 26.2 miles for Africa!

-E

weekends …

I’m heading out for weekend 6 (out of the last 7) for traveling to lead worship or give an Africa presentation. I’m blessed to be able to have the opportunities to do what I love to do with music and students. However, I am looking forward to next weekend … where I have nothing scheduled!
What should I do?
Any suggestions for fun weekend activities?

Hope yours is great! See you Monday!
Eric

Africa Journal: Day 7 – January 2, 2009

From my journal:

“Today we spent A LOT of time playing with and sharing with the children of Sebekoro … I played a lot of soccer today!  We also helped Bill and his family with another skit, this time it was the Good Samaritan.  It has been really cool to see how God is using everyone’s individual talents and abilities while we have been here, and on the flip side, it’s been cool to see God stretching each of us and forcing us out of our comfort zones too!

It’s been so neat to look over and see different people taking the initiative to share with a group of kids . . . Today I’ve seen 2 or 3 of our team sharing using the Evangecube or the soccer ball …

… another really cool thing that happened today was Pastor Andre got a motorcycle.  We gave some extra support money from our church and that money went to help Pastor Andre purchase a motorcycle.  Until this point their family did not have a vehicle of any sort, so any travel between villages to check in on/disciple believers had to be done via donkey cart or walking . . . this motorcycle will literally help to expedite the Gospel to the lost areas of Mali!  They were so proud of it!  I think I’ve seen 3-4 people trying to keep it clean today!”

We did a lot of the same type of ministry on this day as we had the day before.  While we were ministering with children and prayer walking the village Randy, the leader from Stonebridge, was leading a Discipleship Conference for Pastor Andre and the known believers from the area.  It was encouraging to see those believers show up early every morning, excited for and anticipating the teaching they would get that day.

I remember being so proud of everyone on our team, but especially Mark and Tracy.  I know how long we had prayed for this opportunity, and how many obstacles had to be jumped, but to see them really putting their whole lives into loving these people was a big encouragement for me.

I met my little buddy Madu on this day.  He became my right hand man for the rest of our time in Sebekoro … every time we would walk through the village or sit down for a little rest, he was right there at my side.

I miss the people.  Pray with me today for the people of Sebekoro, many of them still do not know Jesus as Lord and Savior.  Pray that He would continue to reveal Himself to them!

-E

Pastor Andre’s new “moto”:

Me and my buddy Madu:

Tracy sharing with the Evangecube:

He’s baaaaaccckkk …

Well, after nearly two months of slacking/processing/thinking/(insert excuse here) … I’ve been challenged by a few people to get back to my blog.  LOTS has happened since my last post, and if I sat down and just started blogging from here on out, chances are that it would just be a muddled mess of thoughts and confusion for those of you who actually read this thing.  SO, I’ve decided for my return to the blogging world to share with you some insights into my personal journal from my trip to Africa at the beginning of the year.  So, for the next couple weeks (give or take a few days) I’ll be sharing with you some of the things that I was learning at the time, and some of the stories from my trip.

In the meantime, here is a link to a video that Stonebridge church made of our trip:

http://www.schooltothenations.com/Africa_Video.html

It is the “Africa January 2009″ video.

Enjoy, and see you again soon!

-E

chosen

As I was having my quiet time this morning, I came across a passage that I’m familiar with, and was really encouraged by on little word today.

John 15:16  “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit – fruit that will last …”

Rejoicing today that God CHOSE me.

What is God encouraging you with today?

Reading/Listening

It’s been a little while since I’ve updated my “reading/listening” posts . . . so here are a few of the things that I’ve been into lately . . .

Humility by Andrew Murray

Great 105 page book to challenge you to turn from pride, empty yourself, and be filled with His grace.

Wild Goose Chase by Mark Batterson

A good friend gave me this to read, and it really encouraged me to break out of the “cages” that I’ve allowed myself to remain in, and to chase the Wild Goose … I guess you’ll just have to read it to understand.

Uprising by Erwin McManus

I’m currently reading this book about realizing the divine potential that was placed within us at our creation, and moving from an ordinary life to an extraordinary one.

Here are a few of the things that I’ve been listening to lately . . .

Glory Revealed – a collection of artists got together for this tour to present songs riddled with Scripture.  I’ve had the album for a while, but just recently started to listen to it again.  Good stuff.

Pocket Full of Sunshine by Natasha Bedingfield

She’s got a great voice, and I love the lyrics on the album.

Some of my favorites … Pages by Shane and Shane

Great album.

So that’s me.  What have you been reading/listening to lately?  Any suggestions?