Yesterday we visited the YMCA camp near Boone, IA, and we were all very impressed. We were shown around most of their 370 acre camp by executive director Dave Sherry. They have wonderful facilities, nice new buildings, an open playing field, and a swimming pool.
I think that the thing that impressed me most about the camp is the ingenuity and creativity of the director and how that was put to good use. Everything has a thought through purpose and strategy. They are putting up benches and pavilions wherever they can so that people have a place close by to sit down and talk to encourage relationship building.
They had a waiting list, so they built a couple tree houses connected by walkways, but they built them to look like kids made them, with haphazard boards for railing. They also have the oldest campers stay in them, so when the younger kids walk by and see the older kids staying in the cool tree houses, they'll want to come back year after year, so they can eventually stay there. It'll work, I promise. I want to stay in them!
They go through 1 bus about every 5 years, and the director was getting tired of having to wash it so much because they're on a gravel road. So when they got their newest bus, he took his car out and drove around the gravel. When he was done, he scraped the dust off his car with a note card and took that to the paint store. They matched the color and now the Ycamp doesn't have to wash their bus very often.
He has a philosophy behind everything, and it all makes sense.
One thing I'd like to see implemented here at camp is the "boys will be boys" camp they run. The philosophy is that boys are boys and want to do boyishly stupid things, but they aren't allowed to in today's culture. So for one week these boys are allowed to just simply be boys. They burn things, climb things, run up and down things, blow things up, play in the mud, and they don't have to shower or change clothes if they don't want to. They get to be boys! I don't know if we should have an entire camp, but maybe just let kids go a little more crazy!
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Monday, April 23, 2012
Taking Risks
We talked about taking risks today in class (hence the title). And now for our assignment we must detail two experiences where we took a risk and didn't take a risk and what the outcome was of each.
I took a risk one day last summer while I was working. Myself and two other guys were washing awnings at a mall because our boss owns the property. We were using a forklift with a platform on it to get up to the awnings so we could scrub them. After scrubbing the had to be rinsed off, but for one of the awnings rinsing it from the platform didn't work all that well. So I wanted to get on the roof and rinse it from above. I had one of the other guys raise the platform to a good level and then leaped from the platform onto the top of the building. It wasn't a long jump, however if for some reason I had missed I would have fallen the 15 or 20 feet to the pavement below and might have hurt myself, possibly badly. However none of this crossed my mind. I just wanted to get onto the rooftop, so that's what I did. I jumped, and I made it (the proof is that I'm here telling you about it). I landed in a puddle on the roof, made from us spraying off the awning, which had combined with the dirt already on the roof to make a quite slippery landing pad. My feet went flying out from under me, and I landed on my back with my right arm twisted underneath myself. I didn't hurt anything however, and was able to spray off the awnings to the complete satisfaction of my OCDness.
Now I can't really remember a time that I was faced with a choice of taking a risk or not and not taking it, but not because I always take risks. No, I don't really ever put myself in situations that are risky or where I might have take a risk, and thus far, my life has been pretty boring.
So, what happens when you take risks? You might fall to your death, hurt yourself, or you just might be able to accomplish everything you've ever wanted to do. And what happens when you don't take risks? You'll never know what would have happened if you had taken a chance.
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
Perseverance: Keep on Keeping on
Today in class we talked about perseverance. And our assignment is to write a report about someone exemplifying this character trait. So I am going to tell you the story of Medal of Honor recipient Marine Sgt. Dakota Meyer.
Dakota Meyer was born in 1988 Columbia, Kentucky where he grew up and graduated from high school. After graduating he enlisted in the Marines in 2006. He was sent over to Iraq in 2007 and served in Fallujah.
His Medal of Honor was earned in action on September 8, 2009 in Kunar Province near the village of Ganjgal. Meyer, then a Corporal, and Staff Sgt.Juan Rodriguez-Chavez heard over their radios that a patrol of Afghan soldiers and their American trainers were being ambushed by about 50 Taliban fighters dug in on the slopes above the village. Meyer and the Staff Sergeant repeatedly radioed for permission to move forward to rescue their comrades, but the were denied permission every time. Finally they decided to disobey their superiors and advance into the valley under a hail of gunfire to rescue their trapped comrades and allies. With Staff Sgt. Rodriguez-Chavez driving the humvee, Corporal Meyer manned the gun turret, exposing himself to the enemy's fire. Twice they drove into the heart of the ambush and rescued pinned down and injured Afghan soldiers. After their second trip they had to switch humvees because the first one was too damaged by bullets and shrapnel. A third and fourth time they went in, sometimes fighting the Taliban ambushers right next to the humvee. Each time they came upon trapped or injured soldiers they would expose themselves further to gunfire in order to reach the trapped soldiers and get them back to the vehicle.
Five times they went into the ambushed area, each time with great risk to themselves. Corporal Meyer was injured in the arm by a piece of shrapnel on the third or fourth run through the valley. On the fifth trip Meyer searched the village house to house trying to find four US service men that had been trapped for the entirety of the 6 hour battle. Meyer and Rodriguez-Chavez found all four of the men, dead, and carried their bodies back to safety.
Throughout the whole battle Meyer exemplified perseverance by running through enemy gunfire to save his friends and comrades. Meyer said that the gunfire was so thick and heavy, "I didn't think I was going to die, I knew it." He knew he would die, but he kept going, kept pushing forward to rescue as many as possible. I think many of us as Christians could learn from his example, not only of perseverance, but also of courage and selflessness.
Dakota Meyer was born in 1988 Columbia, Kentucky where he grew up and graduated from high school. After graduating he enlisted in the Marines in 2006. He was sent over to Iraq in 2007 and served in Fallujah.
His Medal of Honor was earned in action on September 8, 2009 in Kunar Province near the village of Ganjgal. Meyer, then a Corporal, and Staff Sgt.Juan Rodriguez-Chavez heard over their radios that a patrol of Afghan soldiers and their American trainers were being ambushed by about 50 Taliban fighters dug in on the slopes above the village. Meyer and the Staff Sergeant repeatedly radioed for permission to move forward to rescue their comrades, but the were denied permission every time. Finally they decided to disobey their superiors and advance into the valley under a hail of gunfire to rescue their trapped comrades and allies. With Staff Sgt. Rodriguez-Chavez driving the humvee, Corporal Meyer manned the gun turret, exposing himself to the enemy's fire. Twice they drove into the heart of the ambush and rescued pinned down and injured Afghan soldiers. After their second trip they had to switch humvees because the first one was too damaged by bullets and shrapnel. A third and fourth time they went in, sometimes fighting the Taliban ambushers right next to the humvee. Each time they came upon trapped or injured soldiers they would expose themselves further to gunfire in order to reach the trapped soldiers and get them back to the vehicle.
Five times they went into the ambushed area, each time with great risk to themselves. Corporal Meyer was injured in the arm by a piece of shrapnel on the third or fourth run through the valley. On the fifth trip Meyer searched the village house to house trying to find four US service men that had been trapped for the entirety of the 6 hour battle. Meyer and Rodriguez-Chavez found all four of the men, dead, and carried their bodies back to safety.
Throughout the whole battle Meyer exemplified perseverance by running through enemy gunfire to save his friends and comrades. Meyer said that the gunfire was so thick and heavy, "I didn't think I was going to die, I knew it." He knew he would die, but he kept going, kept pushing forward to rescue as many as possible. I think many of us as Christians could learn from his example, not only of perseverance, but also of courage and selflessness.
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Courage Epitomized: Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
We talked about courage today, and now our assignment is to write an essay on an event either in our own lives or someone else's life that illustrates courageous leadership.
I cannot come up with an example of courageous leadership in my life, but we just watched a movie clip from "Gettysburg" about one of my favorite historical figures, Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain of the 20th Maine Regiment.
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, born Lawrence Joshua Chamberlain, was a college professor in Maine who left the comfort of his home, family, and career to serve in the Union army during the American Civil War. He joined the 20th Maine Regiment in August of 1862 at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was promoted to Colonel in June of 1863. In July the forces of the North and South met at a small Pennsylvania town called Gettysburg to fight what turned into the bloodiest battle of the war.
The 20th Maine was stationed at the far left of the army on a little hill aptly named, Little Round Top. Now not only was the regiment on the far left of the army at Gettysburg, but they were the end of the entire Union army. If they were pushed back, the Confederates could flank the entire Union army and march into Washington. Holding Little Round Top was critical to the survival of the Union, and Col. Chamberlain understood that. However, he had only so many men at his disposal, and his men only had so many supplies and so much ammunition.
On the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg the Confederacy attacked the hill. The first wave was turned back by the 20th Maine as was the second, and the third, but Colonel Chamberlain saw that his men could only hold out for so long and soon they would start to run out of ammunition. However he also knew that the Union could not, no matter the cost, lose Little Round Top. Since he knew that his regiment could stay and hold off another attack by the Confederates, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain ordered his regiment to fix bayonets and charge the Confederates even while the confederates were charging at them up the hill.
The charge was successful, and the Union retained control of Little Round Top. The 20th Maine captured 101 of the Confederate soldiers, and some of the Union troops didn't even have any bullets to keep their prisoners from running away......but apparently the prisoners didn't know that!
Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain showed true courage and great leadership in the defense of Little Round Top, but his courageous acts didn't start there. He had to have courage to volunteer for the army and learn how to lead his men. But the battle of Little Round Top was what made his courage famous. The Col. had to have been afraid during the battle, afraid of personal injury (a bullet hit his sword scabbard and bruised his thigh) afraid of failing to hold the position and also afraid of losing friends and family in the battle because his brother was an officer in the regiment with him. Despite all that fear he kept his head about him and saw the situation in reality, not as he wished it to be. He knew that they could not retreat and they could stay and defend their position, so he took the only option left, a daring, risky, dangerous charge into enemy fire, and that decision saved the Union and allowed them to win the Battle of Gettysburg.
Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain is my favorite historical figure not only for his courageous leadership at Gettysburg, but also because as General Gordon of the Confederacy said he was "one of the knightliest soldiers in the Federal army." In the movie Gettysburg, after the charge down Little Round Top the Colonel's brother, Tom, introduces him to a Confederate he's holding prisoner. The Confederate man looks just as tired and war weary as the Col. The man asks quietly for some water to which Joshua replies, "Yes, of course. We'll find some water for you." He had no personal enemies among the Confederates. He saw them for what they were, men fighting for a cause just like he was. He was not an enemy of the people of the South, just what they were fighting for. Another (actual non fictional) example of his "knightliness" is when the Confederates were surrendering, Colonel Chamberlain was selected to preside over the parade of the confederate infantry as they came forward and laid down their weapons. When the confederates started marching past Chamberlain ordered his men to come to attention and "carry arms" in a show of respect for the men surrendering. Again, he had no enemies among the men of the Confederate army. He understood that they were simply men just like him fighting for a cause.
Writing all this makes me want to name one of my children Joshua Lawrence! One of my boys, not a girl :)
Oh yeah, just another little tid bit about Col. Chamberlain. On June 18, 1864 he was shot through the right hip and groin. In stead of leaving the battle for help, he pulled his sword and supported himself on it until he passed out from blood loss, so he could encourage his men to stand their ground once again. The surgeon deemed his injury was fatal, and his death was reported to the Maine newspapers. However, through surprising will and courage (maybe not so surprising in the courage department) and with his brother, Tom's, support, Chamberlain pulled through and returned to duty. Apparently on his death bed, he was promoted to Brigadier General, a rank he retained until the end of the war.
I cannot come up with an example of courageous leadership in my life, but we just watched a movie clip from "Gettysburg" about one of my favorite historical figures, Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain of the 20th Maine Regiment.
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, born Lawrence Joshua Chamberlain, was a college professor in Maine who left the comfort of his home, family, and career to serve in the Union army during the American Civil War. He joined the 20th Maine Regiment in August of 1862 at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was promoted to Colonel in June of 1863. In July the forces of the North and South met at a small Pennsylvania town called Gettysburg to fight what turned into the bloodiest battle of the war.
The 20th Maine was stationed at the far left of the army on a little hill aptly named, Little Round Top. Now not only was the regiment on the far left of the army at Gettysburg, but they were the end of the entire Union army. If they were pushed back, the Confederates could flank the entire Union army and march into Washington. Holding Little Round Top was critical to the survival of the Union, and Col. Chamberlain understood that. However, he had only so many men at his disposal, and his men only had so many supplies and so much ammunition.
On the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg the Confederacy attacked the hill. The first wave was turned back by the 20th Maine as was the second, and the third, but Colonel Chamberlain saw that his men could only hold out for so long and soon they would start to run out of ammunition. However he also knew that the Union could not, no matter the cost, lose Little Round Top. Since he knew that his regiment could stay and hold off another attack by the Confederates, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain ordered his regiment to fix bayonets and charge the Confederates even while the confederates were charging at them up the hill.
The charge was successful, and the Union retained control of Little Round Top. The 20th Maine captured 101 of the Confederate soldiers, and some of the Union troops didn't even have any bullets to keep their prisoners from running away......but apparently the prisoners didn't know that!
Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain showed true courage and great leadership in the defense of Little Round Top, but his courageous acts didn't start there. He had to have courage to volunteer for the army and learn how to lead his men. But the battle of Little Round Top was what made his courage famous. The Col. had to have been afraid during the battle, afraid of personal injury (a bullet hit his sword scabbard and bruised his thigh) afraid of failing to hold the position and also afraid of losing friends and family in the battle because his brother was an officer in the regiment with him. Despite all that fear he kept his head about him and saw the situation in reality, not as he wished it to be. He knew that they could not retreat and they could stay and defend their position, so he took the only option left, a daring, risky, dangerous charge into enemy fire, and that decision saved the Union and allowed them to win the Battle of Gettysburg.
Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain is my favorite historical figure not only for his courageous leadership at Gettysburg, but also because as General Gordon of the Confederacy said he was "one of the knightliest soldiers in the Federal army." In the movie Gettysburg, after the charge down Little Round Top the Colonel's brother, Tom, introduces him to a Confederate he's holding prisoner. The Confederate man looks just as tired and war weary as the Col. The man asks quietly for some water to which Joshua replies, "Yes, of course. We'll find some water for you." He had no personal enemies among the Confederates. He saw them for what they were, men fighting for a cause just like he was. He was not an enemy of the people of the South, just what they were fighting for. Another (actual non fictional) example of his "knightliness" is when the Confederates were surrendering, Colonel Chamberlain was selected to preside over the parade of the confederate infantry as they came forward and laid down their weapons. When the confederates started marching past Chamberlain ordered his men to come to attention and "carry arms" in a show of respect for the men surrendering. Again, he had no enemies among the men of the Confederate army. He understood that they were simply men just like him fighting for a cause.
Writing all this makes me want to name one of my children Joshua Lawrence! One of my boys, not a girl :)
Oh yeah, just another little tid bit about Col. Chamberlain. On June 18, 1864 he was shot through the right hip and groin. In stead of leaving the battle for help, he pulled his sword and supported himself on it until he passed out from blood loss, so he could encourage his men to stand their ground once again. The surgeon deemed his injury was fatal, and his death was reported to the Maine newspapers. However, through surprising will and courage (maybe not so surprising in the courage department) and with his brother, Tom's, support, Chamberlain pulled through and returned to duty. Apparently on his death bed, he was promoted to Brigadier General, a rank he retained until the end of the war.
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Obedience and Truthfulness
Last week in class we talked about obedience in regards to leadership. Our assignment was to tell of a couple times when we had to choose between telling the truth and facing the consequences or lying and trying to cover up our guilt and what the consequences or benefits were to being honest or lying. So I started to try to come up with some thoughts about times in my life, but I was having a hard time coming up with a good example of a time I've been caught in a lie. So being the brave gutsy man that I am, I decided to just skip this assignment (kind of ironic, skipping the assignment on obedience). So I went home for the weekend and had a good time with my family and friends and came back Monday night. And then today in class we talked about core values. We took an assessment that helped us find our values, and then for an assignment we had to take those 3-5 core values and from them come up with a life principle and an application.
My last core value that I came up with is dependability or trustworthiness in me as a person, employee, and I suppose as a student too. So I said the life principle from dependability would be "I will strive to complete any task assigned to me to it's full completion and to do it excellently as working for the Lord." So I'm writing this principle, and I get to thinking, "Hmmmm, what about last week's assignment?" So I decided as an easy application to put down, "Turn in all assignments". So this is me telling the truth about last week's assignment, and I really don't know what any of the consequences or benefits are going to be from telling this story and putting it on facebook.
So I already told you a truth story, but I have another good one, so I'll tell you it too.
Last fall I was driving along one of camp's wonderfully kept straight wide pathed roads when all of a sudden I hit a tree with one of camp's wonderfully taken care of trucks (I won't go into why I hit the tree or where the tree is because frankly it's not pertinent to the story and you don't need to know!). So, adrenaline pumping through my system, I slowly backed up from the tree and drove the truck to the FLC. I am feeling quite sick at the moment (literally almost nauseous), but I knew that I had to tell somebody. So I went into the FLC to talk to my good friend, Jonathon Faust. I told him what happened, and he told me that I should probably talk to somebody higher up the totem pole than him. So I started to leave, but before I got too far I saw my boss, Brett Wiuff (that's pronounced wiff everybody!) coming over. So I started to tell him what happened, and he said that I should pull up to the maintenance shed and tell Jordan (the head maintenance dude) what had happened. So I drove up to the shed, but I couldn't find Jordan. So I called Brett, and he said to just make sure I told Jordan what happened before lunch. Well lunch rolls around and I still haven't found Jordan, so I head to the lodge because that's where Jordan is everyday that he's working, right at noon, for lunch. He's one thing you can depend on at camp (just like our trucks!). So I told him what had happened and why I had hit the tree (no, you still don't get to know) and everybody laughed at me (because the why is a really stupid why). Anyway, nothing really ever came of it. The front of the truck is still smashed in, but Jordan made a new bumper for it. A few months after this all happened though, Brett one day made a little comment that made me sit back and think for a little bit. He said, "You know, if you had tried to lie about the truck in stead of owning up to it like you did, you probably would have been fired." That made me really glad that I took responsibility for me mistake!
I'm sure that there are plenty of examples of me lying to keep from getting trouble, but I can only think of one at the moment. It wasn't a lie about anything huge. I was just trying to save face when in fact it turned out that I really didn't have to.
My father is huge into running, and I mean HUGE! So he likes it when his children share in his hobby of running, and one day my dad told me to run to the high school and back. It's only a mile there and a mile back, but I was only 10 or 12 at the time, and not in very good shape. So I was running along and getting tired, but I wasn't to the high school yet. However I was really tired, so I decided to turn around earlier than I thought I had been told to. So I ran home, and my dad comes over and asks, "Did you make it all the way?" And me not wanting to get in trouble for not running the whole distance and having to face Dad upset for not following his instructions said, "Yup, all the way around the high school and back." And then Dad said, "The high school? You only have to run to the middle school to go 2 miles. Wow, you did good, Chipper!" And me, enjoying Daddy's praise and not wanting to explain anything didn't say a thing to correct him, but it turned out that since I had turned around at the middle school I really had run the full 2 miles. I don't think I ever corrected this lie, maybe it came up in passing one time, but I'm sure Dad doesn't remember the incident. So, Mom, since you're reading this would you be willing to get Dad and show him this? I'm sorry that I lied to you Dad. I should have had more faith in your love for me and realized that it extends farther than the distance I run! You will be proud of me to know that I actually did go running tonight!!!!
My last core value that I came up with is dependability or trustworthiness in me as a person, employee, and I suppose as a student too. So I said the life principle from dependability would be "I will strive to complete any task assigned to me to it's full completion and to do it excellently as working for the Lord." So I'm writing this principle, and I get to thinking, "Hmmmm, what about last week's assignment?" So I decided as an easy application to put down, "Turn in all assignments". So this is me telling the truth about last week's assignment, and I really don't know what any of the consequences or benefits are going to be from telling this story and putting it on facebook.
So I already told you a truth story, but I have another good one, so I'll tell you it too.
Last fall I was driving along one of camp's wonderfully kept straight wide pathed roads when all of a sudden I hit a tree with one of camp's wonderfully taken care of trucks (I won't go into why I hit the tree or where the tree is because frankly it's not pertinent to the story and you don't need to know!). So, adrenaline pumping through my system, I slowly backed up from the tree and drove the truck to the FLC. I am feeling quite sick at the moment (literally almost nauseous), but I knew that I had to tell somebody. So I went into the FLC to talk to my good friend, Jonathon Faust. I told him what happened, and he told me that I should probably talk to somebody higher up the totem pole than him. So I started to leave, but before I got too far I saw my boss, Brett Wiuff (that's pronounced wiff everybody!) coming over. So I started to tell him what happened, and he said that I should pull up to the maintenance shed and tell Jordan (the head maintenance dude) what had happened. So I drove up to the shed, but I couldn't find Jordan. So I called Brett, and he said to just make sure I told Jordan what happened before lunch. Well lunch rolls around and I still haven't found Jordan, so I head to the lodge because that's where Jordan is everyday that he's working, right at noon, for lunch. He's one thing you can depend on at camp (just like our trucks!). So I told him what had happened and why I had hit the tree (no, you still don't get to know) and everybody laughed at me (because the why is a really stupid why). Anyway, nothing really ever came of it. The front of the truck is still smashed in, but Jordan made a new bumper for it. A few months after this all happened though, Brett one day made a little comment that made me sit back and think for a little bit. He said, "You know, if you had tried to lie about the truck in stead of owning up to it like you did, you probably would have been fired." That made me really glad that I took responsibility for me mistake!
I'm sure that there are plenty of examples of me lying to keep from getting trouble, but I can only think of one at the moment. It wasn't a lie about anything huge. I was just trying to save face when in fact it turned out that I really didn't have to.
My father is huge into running, and I mean HUGE! So he likes it when his children share in his hobby of running, and one day my dad told me to run to the high school and back. It's only a mile there and a mile back, but I was only 10 or 12 at the time, and not in very good shape. So I was running along and getting tired, but I wasn't to the high school yet. However I was really tired, so I decided to turn around earlier than I thought I had been told to. So I ran home, and my dad comes over and asks, "Did you make it all the way?" And me not wanting to get in trouble for not running the whole distance and having to face Dad upset for not following his instructions said, "Yup, all the way around the high school and back." And then Dad said, "The high school? You only have to run to the middle school to go 2 miles. Wow, you did good, Chipper!" And me, enjoying Daddy's praise and not wanting to explain anything didn't say a thing to correct him, but it turned out that since I had turned around at the middle school I really had run the full 2 miles. I don't think I ever corrected this lie, maybe it came up in passing one time, but I'm sure Dad doesn't remember the incident. So, Mom, since you're reading this would you be willing to get Dad and show him this? I'm sorry that I lied to you Dad. I should have had more faith in your love for me and realized that it extends farther than the distance I run! You will be proud of me to know that I actually did go running tonight!!!!
Family Faith SomewordthatstartswithFandmeansinterview Pt. 2
So what does this mean for my faith?
Well I have had, at the very least; two people hoping, praying and working to have my faith grow. I have been surrounded for the most part by an environment of faith in Christ, and yet somehow I failed to understand the basic concept of grace. I don’t want to point fingers, and I don’t even know where I could point a finger for this. I’m coming to realize that I never had a faith of my own until this year. I was always living off someone else’s faith whether it was my family’s, my camp friend’s or my youth group’s. All the prayers are finally starting to pay off!
I think that through my parent’s example I have come to hold daily Bible reading, prayer and other spiritual disciplines. I have also been raised to hold Joseph, Mary’s husband, in high regard and to strive to be an upstanding man such as him.
Monday, April 2, 2012
Family Faith SomewordthatstartswithFandmeansinterview
So last week we were talking about faith in class and our assignment was to talk to our family about what they thought of our faith and our faith as a family. So I sent out an email to my family hoping that most of them would answer on time. The four questions are as follows: What does "faith" mean to you? When have you felt God especially close to you as a family? What do you do as a family to nurture your faith? What is your favorite Bible story and what does it say to you?
What does "faith" mean to you? The basic gist I got from my parents is that faith means trusting God and believing that He exists. And believing that He exists and trusting in Him brings comfort and peace through chaos and confusion.
When have you felt God especially close to you as a family? When I was 5 we adopted my little sister, Tori, from China. Adopting her was a long process that required a lot of faith and trust in God to provide the money because we didn't have any money to adopt. But God was faithful and provided everything we needed. After we had gotten Tori home from China, Mom had a hard time that first summer, and she had to get some help. So Dad had to keep the house together. Throughout that whole experience Mom and Dad felt God surrounding our family and holding us together.
What have you done as a family to nurture faith? Beyond the usual habits of going to church and AWANA and youth group, we also, when I was little, Dad would do a Bible lesson with us kids every night. We also just like to sit around and talk about things, current events, movies and entertainment, and other random topics to try and bring a Christ centered focus to our lives and thoughts. We also would go on mission trips, to conferences, and other events to build faith.
What is your favorite Bible story and what does it say to you? My Mom says the story of Joseph, the man engaged to Mary, and how he had a regular life looking him in the face until the Holy Spirit got Mary pregnant. But since he was visited by an angel and told to not be afraid to marry Mary. He believed what God said, and had the courage to follow through on what God assigned to him. My Dad said His favorite is the Easter story and just the humility of Christ descending from heavenly glory to die a brutal humiliating death.
And now I need to figure out what all this means for my faith.
And I think I'm gonna need some more time to process all this, so I'll get back to this hopefully sometime soon!
What does "faith" mean to you? The basic gist I got from my parents is that faith means trusting God and believing that He exists. And believing that He exists and trusting in Him brings comfort and peace through chaos and confusion.
When have you felt God especially close to you as a family? When I was 5 we adopted my little sister, Tori, from China. Adopting her was a long process that required a lot of faith and trust in God to provide the money because we didn't have any money to adopt. But God was faithful and provided everything we needed. After we had gotten Tori home from China, Mom had a hard time that first summer, and she had to get some help. So Dad had to keep the house together. Throughout that whole experience Mom and Dad felt God surrounding our family and holding us together.
What have you done as a family to nurture faith? Beyond the usual habits of going to church and AWANA and youth group, we also, when I was little, Dad would do a Bible lesson with us kids every night. We also just like to sit around and talk about things, current events, movies and entertainment, and other random topics to try and bring a Christ centered focus to our lives and thoughts. We also would go on mission trips, to conferences, and other events to build faith.
What is your favorite Bible story and what does it say to you? My Mom says the story of Joseph, the man engaged to Mary, and how he had a regular life looking him in the face until the Holy Spirit got Mary pregnant. But since he was visited by an angel and told to not be afraid to marry Mary. He believed what God said, and had the courage to follow through on what God assigned to him. My Dad said His favorite is the Easter story and just the humility of Christ descending from heavenly glory to die a brutal humiliating death.
And now I need to figure out what all this means for my faith.
And I think I'm gonna need some more time to process all this, so I'll get back to this hopefully sometime soon!
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
The portrait of a leader
Today in class we were talking about intergrity in a leader, and now for our assignment we have to go through what integrity looks like in different aspects of a leader. So here goes!
A leader's mind: Integrity in the mind would look like a mind focused on prayer and meditation on scripture. Philippians 4:8 says, "Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about these things." That is integrity of the mind, but it also means that you're not thinking about other things that don't matter, or are plain and simple sinful.
A leader's mouth: Ephesians 4:29 (this one's for you dad) "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs that it may benefit those who listen." This means don't be tearing people down with your words, but instead, build them up, encourage them. This does not mean that you don't criticize people. Everyone needs constructive criticism sometimes, but do it in a way that is loving and gracious and not condemning.
A leader's heart: The heart is the center of our motives; it's where our reasons for our actions come from. If a leader's heart is not right, then his actions will not be right. A leader's heart must be guided by the Lord, if he is going to be the leader the Lord wants him to be. He must "hate evil and cling to what is good" if he will lead his followers down the correct path.
A leader's hands: A leader's hands are rough, tough, and gentle. A leader must be a servant to his followers, and if you are serving hour hands will get beat up, but they will eventually become calloused. However, they are gentle also from comforting and helping.
A leader's feet: We talked about Joseph today, and we learned that feet should take you away from evil and towards what is good. The feet "flee from the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness".
A leader's mind: Integrity in the mind would look like a mind focused on prayer and meditation on scripture. Philippians 4:8 says, "Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about these things." That is integrity of the mind, but it also means that you're not thinking about other things that don't matter, or are plain and simple sinful.
A leader's mouth: Ephesians 4:29 (this one's for you dad) "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs that it may benefit those who listen." This means don't be tearing people down with your words, but instead, build them up, encourage them. This does not mean that you don't criticize people. Everyone needs constructive criticism sometimes, but do it in a way that is loving and gracious and not condemning.
A leader's heart: The heart is the center of our motives; it's where our reasons for our actions come from. If a leader's heart is not right, then his actions will not be right. A leader's heart must be guided by the Lord, if he is going to be the leader the Lord wants him to be. He must "hate evil and cling to what is good" if he will lead his followers down the correct path.
A leader's hands: A leader's hands are rough, tough, and gentle. A leader must be a servant to his followers, and if you are serving hour hands will get beat up, but they will eventually become calloused. However, they are gentle also from comforting and helping.
A leader's feet: We talked about Joseph today, and we learned that feet should take you away from evil and towards what is good. The feet "flee from the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness".
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Leadership Types
Today in class we learned about leardership types. The four types of leaders are: doers, thinkers, relaters, and movers. We took an assessment, and I found that I'm 90% doer (big surprise there!). After that we went through strengths and weaknesses of each type, and then we went through a list of ministry responsibilities. We were supposed to go through them and pick out the ones that we like to do, and now we're supposed to give an example of one of them. And talk about if our type changed from going through our experiences.
Well I'm pretty much a doer through and through. Going through the experiences I had five things that doers like to do and three that weren't high on doing. The thing that I like doing best is working behind the scenes doing things that are pretty routine and mundane, but without them stuff couldn't happen on stage. I love to work and do things for people when they don't know who or sometimes even what I do or am.
I also said that I enjoy "acting, singing or performing music". Now I know that I can't act or sing, but I absolutely loved band, and I miss it. I'd really like to learn how to play guitar and continue learning the trap, so I can play music, but at the same time I find that it's the background music that I want to play, not the main stuff. I also enjoy writing which along with performing are things that thinkers usually enjoy.
I had one relater thing that I like to do which is caring for hurting people. Just this past week a student from Clear Lake died, and my heart goes out to all the students and everyone who has been affected by this tragedy. If anyone from Clear Lake is reading this I'd like to encourage you with the verses from Ephesians 4:6-7 "......in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." May the peace of God guard your hearts and minds!
Well I'm pretty much a doer through and through. Going through the experiences I had five things that doers like to do and three that weren't high on doing. The thing that I like doing best is working behind the scenes doing things that are pretty routine and mundane, but without them stuff couldn't happen on stage. I love to work and do things for people when they don't know who or sometimes even what I do or am.
I also said that I enjoy "acting, singing or performing music". Now I know that I can't act or sing, but I absolutely loved band, and I miss it. I'd really like to learn how to play guitar and continue learning the trap, so I can play music, but at the same time I find that it's the background music that I want to play, not the main stuff. I also enjoy writing which along with performing are things that thinkers usually enjoy.
I had one relater thing that I like to do which is caring for hurting people. Just this past week a student from Clear Lake died, and my heart goes out to all the students and everyone who has been affected by this tragedy. If anyone from Clear Lake is reading this I'd like to encourage you with the verses from Ephesians 4:6-7 "......in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." May the peace of God guard your hearts and minds!
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Riverside
So yesterday we went to Riverside camp just north of Story City, IA for a tour. Usually on tours we're supposed to have few questions ready to ask, and then that night we blog about our questions and the camp and cool things like that.
Now I've never really been able to figure out if I am extroverted or introverted. For anyone who doesn't know an extrovert gets energized from being around people, and an introvert is energized by spending time alone. Anyway on Monday I was at Northwestern College in Orange City, IA (which is a pretty sweet school and town) for a scholarship competition, so I had to be around people all day and talk to people and try to impress people. Then yesterday I was just like, "Leave me alone. I want to be by myself." So while we were on the tour I didn't have any questions or comments. I was just tagging along, and I would go check things out on my own while the guy was talking. So I figured out that I'm an introvert, but I didn't complete the assignment very well.
Now for this blog we're supposed to have questions that we asked about the camp, but I didn't ask any. It was also due this morning, and I didn't do that either. So I'm just gonna tell you about Riverside.
Riverside is a Lutheran church camp that was started in 1943 on 120 acres of land. Their main program is summer camp, and probably the biggest thing about summer camp is the mime they do on Thursday night to close out the week. The mime is different every year, but it always depicts the gospel. Many people say it is the highlight of the week. Riverside runs a daycare on their grounds for people in the area. They just built a nice new dining hall about 5 or 6 years ago. They have also had about 10 new cabins built by a church family for them recently, each containing 6 bunkbeds and a bathroom and shower.
I just realized that the only things I'm gonna talk about are their nice buildings, and that helps no one get to know Riverside well. So I'll just skip to what Hidden Acres can learn from Riverside.
I think that Riverside does their buildings MUCH better than we do. Most of their buildings and all of their new ones were built excellently and designed expertly. I think that here at Hidden Acres we put too much emphasis on getting things done quickly rather than doing them well. I have also seen this attitude spill over into other areas of camp like cleaning. I believe we need to slow down a little bit and think about quality rather than quantity. I think that we need to finish the last project before we start another one. I definitely think that when we start designing our new dining hall we should take a look at Riverside's and commit a little construction plagiarism :)
Now I've never really been able to figure out if I am extroverted or introverted. For anyone who doesn't know an extrovert gets energized from being around people, and an introvert is energized by spending time alone. Anyway on Monday I was at Northwestern College in Orange City, IA (which is a pretty sweet school and town) for a scholarship competition, so I had to be around people all day and talk to people and try to impress people. Then yesterday I was just like, "Leave me alone. I want to be by myself." So while we were on the tour I didn't have any questions or comments. I was just tagging along, and I would go check things out on my own while the guy was talking. So I figured out that I'm an introvert, but I didn't complete the assignment very well.
Now for this blog we're supposed to have questions that we asked about the camp, but I didn't ask any. It was also due this morning, and I didn't do that either. So I'm just gonna tell you about Riverside.
Riverside is a Lutheran church camp that was started in 1943 on 120 acres of land. Their main program is summer camp, and probably the biggest thing about summer camp is the mime they do on Thursday night to close out the week. The mime is different every year, but it always depicts the gospel. Many people say it is the highlight of the week. Riverside runs a daycare on their grounds for people in the area. They just built a nice new dining hall about 5 or 6 years ago. They have also had about 10 new cabins built by a church family for them recently, each containing 6 bunkbeds and a bathroom and shower.
I just realized that the only things I'm gonna talk about are their nice buildings, and that helps no one get to know Riverside well. So I'll just skip to what Hidden Acres can learn from Riverside.
I think that Riverside does their buildings MUCH better than we do. Most of their buildings and all of their new ones were built excellently and designed expertly. I think that here at Hidden Acres we put too much emphasis on getting things done quickly rather than doing them well. I have also seen this attitude spill over into other areas of camp like cleaning. I believe we need to slow down a little bit and think about quality rather than quantity. I think that we need to finish the last project before we start another one. I definitely think that when we start designing our new dining hall we should take a look at Riverside's and commit a little construction plagiarism :)
Monday, February 20, 2012
The Big Question............About College.
So I haven't blogged on my own in a while, and I feel as if it would be beneficial te get all my thoughts out in word form in front of me. So here goes!
I've been thinking a lot about colleges recently because I'm planning on attending one next fall. I have really only looked at two colleges, ISU and Northwestern in Orange City (NWC). Along about Christmas time I decided to forget about NWC and just focus on ISU. I was going to live in an apartment with a friend from camp and major in business. I even tore up the housing form that I had filled out for NWC because I was just gonna forget about it. ISU was closer, more affordable, I knew people there, camp was close enough that I could work there on some weekends. It just seemed like ISU was the right school for me. So I forgot about Northwestern.......for about a week. After about a week it popped into my head again, and the next day I received another housing form from NWC. Then I started to remember the year before when I was looking at schools, NWC wasn't on my radar, but my parents made me apply there anyway. "Don't burn your bridges!" So I applied, but I said that I didn't want to go for a scholarship competition. Again, my parents made me. So I went, and I was definitely surprised at how much I liked the school. So I started thinking seriously about NWC, and I was actually prepared to commit to go there. I started having these thoughts that maybe that was where God wanted me to be. But then my financial aid package came, and I didn't get as much scholarship money as I wanted. So instead of going to college I went to camp and got paid to learn how to be a leader. Then during this summer I had a couple guys from my church who I respect very much tell me that I should go to college. So I started looking around again, and ISU came up from a friend of mine. He said that we could rent an apartment together, and I was all like,"Yeah!!!!!" So that was about Christmas, and then Northwestern made a come back, and I started thinking how interesting it was that I could never get rid of Northwestern, even after I had decided to skip college this year and do LAUNCH. I kept having thoughts about how maybe NWC was the place for me, and maybe God wants me there. However I'm glad that I didn't go to college and have had the experiences I've had this year. Anyway, so after I had all those thoughts about not being able to get of NWC it started to warm up to me. I started looking at both colleges and comparing them. I started to think that maybe such a big school like ISU wouldn't be right for me. I know that I don't particularly enjoy driving in Ames, and I like the feel of a small town where everyone knows everyone. I also started thinking that maybe going somewhere where I already know a bunch of people might not be what's best for me. I've never gone somwhere and started over completely, and I think that that experience would be good for me. Then I visited ISU, and I could tell that it's a top notch super quality school. I just didn't feel like it would be right for me. So I went to Northwestern today hoping and praying that something would happen to make up my mind. And I loved my day. I kept meeting new people that I was connected to somehow either through camp or soccer or my last time at Northwestern. I was really impressed how the "higher ups" at the college seemed to remember me either from last year or from sending emails back and forth. I know that I wouldn't get that at ISU. Even though I don't know really anyone there, I felt like I already knew them and really belonged there. I think it'd pretty easy for me to fit in there.
So I was actually gonna post this and ask what other people think I should do, but now that I have it all written out I know what my decision will be. I'm not even sure a full ride to ISU would convince me not to go to Northwestern. I suppose I should wait for financial aid packages to officially make my decision, but in my head I know where I belong.
I've been thinking a lot about colleges recently because I'm planning on attending one next fall. I have really only looked at two colleges, ISU and Northwestern in Orange City (NWC). Along about Christmas time I decided to forget about NWC and just focus on ISU. I was going to live in an apartment with a friend from camp and major in business. I even tore up the housing form that I had filled out for NWC because I was just gonna forget about it. ISU was closer, more affordable, I knew people there, camp was close enough that I could work there on some weekends. It just seemed like ISU was the right school for me. So I forgot about Northwestern.......for about a week. After about a week it popped into my head again, and the next day I received another housing form from NWC. Then I started to remember the year before when I was looking at schools, NWC wasn't on my radar, but my parents made me apply there anyway. "Don't burn your bridges!" So I applied, but I said that I didn't want to go for a scholarship competition. Again, my parents made me. So I went, and I was definitely surprised at how much I liked the school. So I started thinking seriously about NWC, and I was actually prepared to commit to go there. I started having these thoughts that maybe that was where God wanted me to be. But then my financial aid package came, and I didn't get as much scholarship money as I wanted. So instead of going to college I went to camp and got paid to learn how to be a leader. Then during this summer I had a couple guys from my church who I respect very much tell me that I should go to college. So I started looking around again, and ISU came up from a friend of mine. He said that we could rent an apartment together, and I was all like,"Yeah!!!!!" So that was about Christmas, and then Northwestern made a come back, and I started thinking how interesting it was that I could never get rid of Northwestern, even after I had decided to skip college this year and do LAUNCH. I kept having thoughts about how maybe NWC was the place for me, and maybe God wants me there. However I'm glad that I didn't go to college and have had the experiences I've had this year. Anyway, so after I had all those thoughts about not being able to get of NWC it started to warm up to me. I started looking at both colleges and comparing them. I started to think that maybe such a big school like ISU wouldn't be right for me. I know that I don't particularly enjoy driving in Ames, and I like the feel of a small town where everyone knows everyone. I also started thinking that maybe going somewhere where I already know a bunch of people might not be what's best for me. I've never gone somwhere and started over completely, and I think that that experience would be good for me. Then I visited ISU, and I could tell that it's a top notch super quality school. I just didn't feel like it would be right for me. So I went to Northwestern today hoping and praying that something would happen to make up my mind. And I loved my day. I kept meeting new people that I was connected to somehow either through camp or soccer or my last time at Northwestern. I was really impressed how the "higher ups" at the college seemed to remember me either from last year or from sending emails back and forth. I know that I wouldn't get that at ISU. Even though I don't know really anyone there, I felt like I already knew them and really belonged there. I think it'd pretty easy for me to fit in there.
So I was actually gonna post this and ask what other people think I should do, but now that I have it all written out I know what my decision will be. I'm not even sure a full ride to ISU would convince me not to go to Northwestern. I suppose I should wait for financial aid packages to officially make my decision, but in my head I know where I belong.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Doing Flows out of Being
Today in class we talked about how "doing flows out of being". We talked about caterpillars and butterflies and how a caterpillar IS already a butterfly in what it is, and eventually it ACTS like a butterfly. At the end of the lesson there were five suggestions for "being". They were Experiencing (like nature) feeling (keeping track of your feelings throughout the day and bring God into the moment) listening (for God and doing what He says) reflecting (thinking about your day and talking to God about it) and waiting (praying and trusting God to take care of things).
So I have recently been trying (with limited success) to sit down before I go to bed and thank God for the things that happened that day. So I have been doing some reflecting to try and become more thankful and keep things in perspective. I have also been "waiting" to hear from God about college for next fall. A few weeks ago I was totally stressing because I had no idea if I wanted to go to ISU or NWC in Orange City, and my mom reassured me that I didn't have to make a decission and to just trust God. So I have prayed for God's guidance and the last few weeks have been relatively stress free! I had alsorecently been feeling like God wanted me to tell my family about my struggle with lust. But at first I was like, "No, way. That's something I could never do." I grew up under the impression that talking about sex was sinful because it was never mentioned in my house, so for me admitting to my family that I struggle with lust was a giant. But then yesterday I realized that I hadn't shared my first semester of LAUNCH reflective essay with my family, and in it I talked a little bit about my battle with lust, so I emailed it to them. So I guess the cat's out of the bag now, but I'm glad that it is.
So for our assignment I think we're supposed to pick one of the five things that we haven't already tried, and try it out. So since it's still a little bit cold outside, and I don't really like being cold I'm gonna try to notice my emotions throughout the day and bring God in with them. That kinda sounds like an action plan to go with so I believe that I'm done here!
So I have recently been trying (with limited success) to sit down before I go to bed and thank God for the things that happened that day. So I have been doing some reflecting to try and become more thankful and keep things in perspective. I have also been "waiting" to hear from God about college for next fall. A few weeks ago I was totally stressing because I had no idea if I wanted to go to ISU or NWC in Orange City, and my mom reassured me that I didn't have to make a decission and to just trust God. So I have prayed for God's guidance and the last few weeks have been relatively stress free! I had alsorecently been feeling like God wanted me to tell my family about my struggle with lust. But at first I was like, "No, way. That's something I could never do." I grew up under the impression that talking about sex was sinful because it was never mentioned in my house, so for me admitting to my family that I struggle with lust was a giant. But then yesterday I realized that I hadn't shared my first semester of LAUNCH reflective essay with my family, and in it I talked a little bit about my battle with lust, so I emailed it to them. So I guess the cat's out of the bag now, but I'm glad that it is.
So for our assignment I think we're supposed to pick one of the five things that we haven't already tried, and try it out. So since it's still a little bit cold outside, and I don't really like being cold I'm gonna try to notice my emotions throughout the day and bring God in with them. That kinda sounds like an action plan to go with so I believe that I'm done here!
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Leadership Involves Being
So yesterday we talked about how there are two sides to leadership just like the saying there's two sides to every coin, or something like that. And yesterday we talked about the doing side of leadership, so today we talked about the being side of leadership. And the same as yesterday we got a list of ten characteristics for the being leader. They are: humility, commitment, intergrity, faith, obedience, courage, wisdom, compassion, perseverance, and vision. Now I must choose one of them that I am not all that good at (which doesn't make a whole of sense to say because we're talking about being and "good" denotes action) and explain why not and then come up with an "action plan" to become better at it (?).
Now I'm thinking that since I'm having a hard to picking one that I don't have I should choose humility, but I think I'm gonna go with my own answer. I'm going to say that I need to learn HOW to be rather than just doing doing doing. I have been a doer my whole life. My spiritual gift is service which is ALL about doing. I love working and being in action and doing stuff. I'll go crazy if I can't move around and do something. For my whole life I have also been held under the belief that God's love for me and even my salvation depended on how little or much I sinned. Yes, I knew all the verses about how salvation is not able to end, but that's not how I lived my life or what my heart believed. I was always scared that when I sinned God was upset, and I would always get really scared when I would read in Psalms about how "the hand of the Lord is upraised" which would make me try to control my sin which wouldn't work. But I have been learning this year how much that is not true and that in fact the opposite true. So I need to "work on" being a child of God instead of trying to become a child of God. I need to learn how to live out of who God says that I am and trust that His power is sufficient for me.
So I suppose my "action plan" for "learning how to" BE would be spending time with God in His Word soaking it up and learning about God and His grace and love and also praying........a lot.
Now I'm thinking that since I'm having a hard to picking one that I don't have I should choose humility, but I think I'm gonna go with my own answer. I'm going to say that I need to learn HOW to be rather than just doing doing doing. I have been a doer my whole life. My spiritual gift is service which is ALL about doing. I love working and being in action and doing stuff. I'll go crazy if I can't move around and do something. For my whole life I have also been held under the belief that God's love for me and even my salvation depended on how little or much I sinned. Yes, I knew all the verses about how salvation is not able to end, but that's not how I lived my life or what my heart believed. I was always scared that when I sinned God was upset, and I would always get really scared when I would read in Psalms about how "the hand of the Lord is upraised" which would make me try to control my sin which wouldn't work. But I have been learning this year how much that is not true and that in fact the opposite true. So I need to "work on" being a child of God instead of trying to become a child of God. I need to learn how to live out of who God says that I am and trust that His power is sufficient for me.
So I suppose my "action plan" for "learning how to" BE would be spending time with God in His Word soaking it up and learning about God and His grace and love and also praying........a lot.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Things Leaders Do
So today in class we learned about how leaders are doers and got a list of ten things that a leader must do or skills they must have. This list is: focus, mission, risk taking, goal setting problem solving, communication, conflict resolution, modeling, finish strong, and multiply yourself (figuratively, not really literally although that is a command from God). And now for our assignment we get to answer three questions about this list!!!!
Question #1: Which of these actions or qualities am I naturally or deliberately better at? I believe that I am best at modeling or as I like to call it (because I don't want to be a model) leading by example. I may not be the best motivator or problem solver or people person, but if you give me a job I will do it, and if someone else is doing something that I can help with I will be there. This next weekend with the volunteers that I'll be in charge of I'm planning on setting up some visual aids to help with the training, and when we're cleaning up after a meal or doing whatever I will be right there with them working to get the job done and to keep them working.
Question #2: Which of these ten actions or qualities do you need to improve on the most as a leader? I would have to say probably conflict resolution. I totally shy away from conflict. If there is the possibility for conflict I will do my best to avoid that situation either by not saying anything or by saying something else. If I think that something I might say could hurt someone else's feelings very rarely will I say it (although I am getting better at speaking my mind). But I also tend to ignore the "elephant in the room" when there is some conflict.
Question #3: What is you action plan to work on this quality? I think that i need to keep in mind that conflict resolution is a good thing and, yes, it might be uncomfortable and awkward for al ittle bit, but in the long run resolving conflict keeps that awkwardness to a minimum. And as I'm growing and maturing and experiencing life I'm coming to realize that most of the things that I think of as being scary aren't that scary. And this also ties into risk taking because trying to resolve conflict can be taking a risk cause you could end having people hate you or you can get everyone to be friends again. So I think that most of my action plans will be keeping in mind that action is worth it and not really as scary as I've made it out to be.
Question #1: Which of these actions or qualities am I naturally or deliberately better at? I believe that I am best at modeling or as I like to call it (because I don't want to be a model) leading by example. I may not be the best motivator or problem solver or people person, but if you give me a job I will do it, and if someone else is doing something that I can help with I will be there. This next weekend with the volunteers that I'll be in charge of I'm planning on setting up some visual aids to help with the training, and when we're cleaning up after a meal or doing whatever I will be right there with them working to get the job done and to keep them working.
Question #2: Which of these ten actions or qualities do you need to improve on the most as a leader? I would have to say probably conflict resolution. I totally shy away from conflict. If there is the possibility for conflict I will do my best to avoid that situation either by not saying anything or by saying something else. If I think that something I might say could hurt someone else's feelings very rarely will I say it (although I am getting better at speaking my mind). But I also tend to ignore the "elephant in the room" when there is some conflict.
Question #3: What is you action plan to work on this quality? I think that i need to keep in mind that conflict resolution is a good thing and, yes, it might be uncomfortable and awkward for al ittle bit, but in the long run resolving conflict keeps that awkwardness to a minimum. And as I'm growing and maturing and experiencing life I'm coming to realize that most of the things that I think of as being scary aren't that scary. And this also ties into risk taking because trying to resolve conflict can be taking a risk cause you could end having people hate you or you can get everyone to be friends again. So I think that most of my action plans will be keeping in mind that action is worth it and not really as scary as I've made it out to be.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Leadership Style
So today in class we learned about leadership styles. We took an assessment, and I discovered that I am a "balanced leader" but have a very high bent towards task orientation. That means that I can be relational but am mostly focused on getting the job done regardless of if I get to know the people I'm working with. Usually task oriented people have little regard for people's feelings, but I really don't like to hurt feelings, so I can be a little too lenient at times and just take more work on myself. However at my core I am extremely concerned with getting the job done on time and doing an excellent job of it.
After we took the assessment and figured out what our leadership style is, we went through the strengths and weaknesses of each style. And now our assignment is to come up with goals and action steps to correct those weaknesses.
Weakness #1: I am not focused enough on the relational aspect of leading. I don't a good enough job of getting to know the people I'm leading. Because I don't know them that well, I cannot address the specific needs that may come up when they are working. So my goal is to get to know the people I lead better. My action step for that will be to intentionally talk to everyone and ask them about themselves.
Weakness #2: Since I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings I will often not point out their mistakes and just take it on myself to correct them or let them slide. This however is not beneficial to the person making the mistake or for the correction of the mistake, and the person will just continue to make the same mistake until someone else tells them. So my goal is to stop being too lenient and to let people know if they are doing something the wrong way or not up to par. I realize that I have very high standards for good work, but I feel like in order to reflect well on Hidden Acres and to serve our guests things should be as perfect as possible. My action step will be to tell people right from the start that I will correct them if I see them doing something not up to par or the wrong way and that they shouldn't take it personally. I should also teach them and show them how to do things correctly before we get into the actual work.
Weakness #3: I can see myself after telling people that I'm going to correct them becoming too bossy and start to order people around. So my goal is to not become too bossy or pushy, and my action step will be to learn how to be gracious while still being firm.
After we took the assessment and figured out what our leadership style is, we went through the strengths and weaknesses of each style. And now our assignment is to come up with goals and action steps to correct those weaknesses.
Weakness #1: I am not focused enough on the relational aspect of leading. I don't a good enough job of getting to know the people I'm leading. Because I don't know them that well, I cannot address the specific needs that may come up when they are working. So my goal is to get to know the people I lead better. My action step for that will be to intentionally talk to everyone and ask them about themselves.
Weakness #2: Since I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings I will often not point out their mistakes and just take it on myself to correct them or let them slide. This however is not beneficial to the person making the mistake or for the correction of the mistake, and the person will just continue to make the same mistake until someone else tells them. So my goal is to stop being too lenient and to let people know if they are doing something the wrong way or not up to par. I realize that I have very high standards for good work, but I feel like in order to reflect well on Hidden Acres and to serve our guests things should be as perfect as possible. My action step will be to tell people right from the start that I will correct them if I see them doing something not up to par or the wrong way and that they shouldn't take it personally. I should also teach them and show them how to do things correctly before we get into the actual work.
Weakness #3: I can see myself after telling people that I'm going to correct them becoming too bossy and start to order people around. So my goal is to not become too bossy or pushy, and my action step will be to learn how to be gracious while still being firm.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Leaders change everything
Today in class the name of the chapter was "Leaders change everything." We talked about the effect that leaders throughout history have had on the rest of the course of history like what would the world be like if John Adams hadn't envisioned a new country and led the break away from Britain. Or what would have happened if Winston Churchill hadn't rallied Britain in WWII and the Germans had taken over the island. And now our blog assignment is to tell about three examples from our lives of leaders who changed everything.
Well I suppose that since I can't think of anybody else at the moment I'm gonna have to go with God and Jesus for me first one. Jesus, because He died for my sins and gave me His righteousness so that I don't have to suffer for eternity in hell. God, because at this moment in my life He is turning everything upside down. I'm discovering things about myself that I never suspected, I'm trying to decide on a college, but He keeps throwing my decisions around like a football in the hands of Aaron Rodgers. This is actually good for me though because it's forcing me to trust God and making me work on not worrying so much but really letting God take care of everything.
I believe that my little sister Tori has also changed everything about my life. Tori was born on June 21, 1997 in Xiamen, China. A few days after she was born, she was abandoned by her parents and taken to an orphanage where she lived for the first ten months of her life. Then on the wonderful day May 4 1998, my mother walked into that orphanage, picked her up, cried her eyes out (sorry mom, had to put that in there) and took Tori home with her to the rest of us waiting in little Clear Lake, Iowa. Tori has changed my life in so many ways, and probably even more that I'm not aware of. If we had not decided to adopt Tori I would be the youngest person in my family. I would not have had the opportunity to be a big brother and learn how to handle living with a little sister. Granted, it took me about twelve years to start being a good big brother, but I was still a big brother. Tori challenged me growing up. Since she was abandoned and missed out on TONS and I mean literally tons of bonding and development that little children need she had issues trusting us. It had been ingrained into her head that in order to survive she had to watch out for herself and fend for herself because no one else was going to. She didn't like listening to me which was frustrating for myself because in my mind the big brother has the authority to tell his little sister what to do, and she would not listen to me for anything. But growing up with her and dealing with all those challenges has blossomed into a desire to adopt children of my own and make the same difference in other children's lives. I understand now that God was not only shaping me as a person when He put Tori in my family, but He was placing the groundwork for my life and my dreams. And for that I will always be thankful that Victoria Jun Fyfe is my little sister!
The third person I will say that has changed my life is actually three people, but they all helped to write a book that is doing God's work in me right now. Bill Thrall, Bruce McNicol, and John Lynch all co-authored the book Truefaced. During LAUNCH we went through Truefaced doing a chapter every week and talking about it. The book is about being who we really are and taking off all the masks that we wear to try and convince people that we don't have problems. The entire theology behind the book is not quite radically different than what I grew up with, but I'm realizing that I either misunderstood everything I read in the Bible and heard from the pulpit or I don't know what happened. But for my entire life I've been focused on works and trying to live without sin, even though I've proven many times that it's impossible. Now I'm learning that since I have been saved from my sin God already sees me as righteous; He sees me as Christ. Everything that I'm learning from this book is life changing, and it makes me wonder how I lived without this theology before, and how many people are living their entire lives without it. It makes me want to bring it to other people.
Well I suppose that since I can't think of anybody else at the moment I'm gonna have to go with God and Jesus for me first one. Jesus, because He died for my sins and gave me His righteousness so that I don't have to suffer for eternity in hell. God, because at this moment in my life He is turning everything upside down. I'm discovering things about myself that I never suspected, I'm trying to decide on a college, but He keeps throwing my decisions around like a football in the hands of Aaron Rodgers. This is actually good for me though because it's forcing me to trust God and making me work on not worrying so much but really letting God take care of everything.
I believe that my little sister Tori has also changed everything about my life. Tori was born on June 21, 1997 in Xiamen, China. A few days after she was born, she was abandoned by her parents and taken to an orphanage where she lived for the first ten months of her life. Then on the wonderful day May 4 1998, my mother walked into that orphanage, picked her up, cried her eyes out (sorry mom, had to put that in there) and took Tori home with her to the rest of us waiting in little Clear Lake, Iowa. Tori has changed my life in so many ways, and probably even more that I'm not aware of. If we had not decided to adopt Tori I would be the youngest person in my family. I would not have had the opportunity to be a big brother and learn how to handle living with a little sister. Granted, it took me about twelve years to start being a good big brother, but I was still a big brother. Tori challenged me growing up. Since she was abandoned and missed out on TONS and I mean literally tons of bonding and development that little children need she had issues trusting us. It had been ingrained into her head that in order to survive she had to watch out for herself and fend for herself because no one else was going to. She didn't like listening to me which was frustrating for myself because in my mind the big brother has the authority to tell his little sister what to do, and she would not listen to me for anything. But growing up with her and dealing with all those challenges has blossomed into a desire to adopt children of my own and make the same difference in other children's lives. I understand now that God was not only shaping me as a person when He put Tori in my family, but He was placing the groundwork for my life and my dreams. And for that I will always be thankful that Victoria Jun Fyfe is my little sister!
The third person I will say that has changed my life is actually three people, but they all helped to write a book that is doing God's work in me right now. Bill Thrall, Bruce McNicol, and John Lynch all co-authored the book Truefaced. During LAUNCH we went through Truefaced doing a chapter every week and talking about it. The book is about being who we really are and taking off all the masks that we wear to try and convince people that we don't have problems. The entire theology behind the book is not quite radically different than what I grew up with, but I'm realizing that I either misunderstood everything I read in the Bible and heard from the pulpit or I don't know what happened. But for my entire life I've been focused on works and trying to live without sin, even though I've proven many times that it's impossible. Now I'm learning that since I have been saved from my sin God already sees me as righteous; He sees me as Christ. Everything that I'm learning from this book is life changing, and it makes me wonder how I lived without this theology before, and how many people are living their entire lives without it. It makes me want to bring it to other people.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Learning Styles
Today in class we talked about the three different learning styles, visual, auditory and kinesthetic. We took an assessment, and I discovered that I am mostly kinesthetic and visual. Our assignment for today is to share the gospel in each of the three learning styles.
I guess I'll start with auditory.
John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have ever lasting life." This verse is the essence of the Gospel if you understand everything that is packed into it. The beginning is pretty self explanatory, God loves us. The next part, "that He gave his one and only son". The word "gave" has a lot of meaning. First we have to talk about the reason that God gave His one and only son. God is holy, or set apart, which means that He cannot stay in the presence of sin. Actually it would probably be more accurate to say that sin cannot stand in the presence of God. Anyway, everyone sins, everyone is sinful, everyone has sin imprinted on their DNA. Since sin cannot stand in God's presence there is no way for us to get to heaven. Only the righteous can stand in God's presence, but we cannot make ourselves righteous. However, God loves us, so He came up with a plan to give us righteousness. This is where God gives us His son. Jesus came down to earth and became a man. He lived and then died to take the penalty for our sin. Since God is holy and just He must punish sin, and the penalty for sin is death. So Jesus came and died to take the penalty of sin for us and give us His righteousness. But He also didn't just die for us to make us righteous; He rose from the dead to give us hope for triumph over the grave. "That whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life." This phrase is a simplified version of Romans 10:9. "If you confess with your mouth "Jesus is Lord" and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved."
Now for the visual!
Picture this. A packed courtroom waiting to hear the trial of a serial killer. The Judge enters and makes His way to His desk. Order is called and the Judge asks how the defendant pleads. The killer stands up and everyone gets ready to hear his not guilty plea. However, as the defendant opens his mouth he starts to cry and says, "I am guilty. I did kill those people, and I take responsibility for all the hurt that I caused. I don't know why I killed all those people, but I don't want to kill anyone anymore. Please help me. I know that I can't change on my own, but please give me some help!" The Judge brings his gavel down, and declares the killer guilty and sentences him to death for his crimes. Everyone in the crowd cheers, and the defendant sits down and puts his head in his hands. From the back of the room a voice starts to shout over the crowd. "MERCY. GIVE HIM MERCY!" A young man stands up from the back and makes his way to the front of the courtroom. The Judges eyes mist over with a look of sadness and pride mixed in them. The young man reaches the defendant and puts his hand on the man's shoulder. "Father, grant this man mercy", He says to the Judge. "You heard what he said as well as I did. He knows he did wrong and desires not to do it again. How can you not grant him mercy?" "Someone has to pay the penalty for his crimes", replies the Judge. "You know the law as well as I do." The young man looked His Father straight in the eye and said calmly and surely, "Then let me take his place. Let me take his penalty, and give him the help he needs to live a right life. Give him mercy."
And for my kinesthetic example I drew a picture and gave it to our teacher because if I described the picture on here then it would become auditory!
I guess I'll start with auditory.
John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have ever lasting life." This verse is the essence of the Gospel if you understand everything that is packed into it. The beginning is pretty self explanatory, God loves us. The next part, "that He gave his one and only son". The word "gave" has a lot of meaning. First we have to talk about the reason that God gave His one and only son. God is holy, or set apart, which means that He cannot stay in the presence of sin. Actually it would probably be more accurate to say that sin cannot stand in the presence of God. Anyway, everyone sins, everyone is sinful, everyone has sin imprinted on their DNA. Since sin cannot stand in God's presence there is no way for us to get to heaven. Only the righteous can stand in God's presence, but we cannot make ourselves righteous. However, God loves us, so He came up with a plan to give us righteousness. This is where God gives us His son. Jesus came down to earth and became a man. He lived and then died to take the penalty for our sin. Since God is holy and just He must punish sin, and the penalty for sin is death. So Jesus came and died to take the penalty of sin for us and give us His righteousness. But He also didn't just die for us to make us righteous; He rose from the dead to give us hope for triumph over the grave. "That whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life." This phrase is a simplified version of Romans 10:9. "If you confess with your mouth "Jesus is Lord" and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved."
Now for the visual!
Picture this. A packed courtroom waiting to hear the trial of a serial killer. The Judge enters and makes His way to His desk. Order is called and the Judge asks how the defendant pleads. The killer stands up and everyone gets ready to hear his not guilty plea. However, as the defendant opens his mouth he starts to cry and says, "I am guilty. I did kill those people, and I take responsibility for all the hurt that I caused. I don't know why I killed all those people, but I don't want to kill anyone anymore. Please help me. I know that I can't change on my own, but please give me some help!" The Judge brings his gavel down, and declares the killer guilty and sentences him to death for his crimes. Everyone in the crowd cheers, and the defendant sits down and puts his head in his hands. From the back of the room a voice starts to shout over the crowd. "MERCY. GIVE HIM MERCY!" A young man stands up from the back and makes his way to the front of the courtroom. The Judges eyes mist over with a look of sadness and pride mixed in them. The young man reaches the defendant and puts his hand on the man's shoulder. "Father, grant this man mercy", He says to the Judge. "You heard what he said as well as I did. He knows he did wrong and desires not to do it again. How can you not grant him mercy?" "Someone has to pay the penalty for his crimes", replies the Judge. "You know the law as well as I do." The young man looked His Father straight in the eye and said calmly and surely, "Then let me take his place. Let me take his penalty, and give him the help he needs to live a right life. Give him mercy."
And for my kinesthetic example I drew a picture and gave it to our teacher because if I described the picture on here then it would become auditory!
Friday, February 3, 2012
Abilities Assessment
Today in class we talked about unique abilities and how to use them. We took an assessment, and now we have to blog about our top five abilities and how God might be able to use them.
Ability #1: Assisting/Helping- My REAL spiritual gift (it's an inside joke, don't worry if you don't understand!) For me being able to jump in and help someone with something is extremely satisfying. One time on a Sunday some people were moving tables and chairs to set up for a potluck later that night, and I couldn't stand around just talking with people while someone else was working, so I went and helped. I missed some of the chruch service, but I wouldn't have traded sitting and listening or standing and singing for helping.
Ability #2: Being Adaptable- I have the ability to jump from project to project effortlessly. In fact, if I'm stuck doing the same job for an extended period of time I get really really bored. Monotony kills me. For example, the past couple of days this week I was splitting wood all afternoon by myself for two days straight. I nearly went crazy. But then yesterday I split wood with someone else for an hour before lunch, worked on our deck with someone else for a couple hours, then helped someone else finish doing dishes, and then went back out to the the wood pile with the same guy for another hour and never once did I feel the urge to take a sledge hammer to the wood pile! I can also take problems in stride. If something comes up, it doesn't faze me. I just say, "Ok, we have a problem, how can we fix it?"
Ability #3: Learning- Now I might not be particularly good at learning, but I love learning new skills and getting better at doing things. I do get frustrated because I like being good at things, and when I'm learning something new most of the time I'm not very good at it. But I really like the opportunity to learn something new that I will put to use sometime later. For example, the other week I spent a couple days screwing in pieces of cement board in the bathrooms of the new chapel here at camp. I had not grown up using a drill, so I had issues, but the fact that I was getting better at a skill was great!
Ability #4: Summarizing/Reporting information- This ability I did not credit myself with, but the other LAUNCH people pointed it out. I do have the ability to pick up on someone else's idea and put it in simple terms. For example, last weekend I over heard a couple of the other LAUNCH students trying to explain to the volunteers where the break room is in the lodge. They were like, "So you know where the piano used to be in the dining room?" "No." "Ok, well the break room is right through the wall that the piano used to be against. There's a door in the wall that leads to the break room." And I went in and said, "You know the swinging door in the serving area that leads to the ice machine?" "Yes." "Just go through that door and keep going straight." "Ooooooh." So yeah..........
Ability #5: Working with my hands- Now again this might not be an ability that I have right now, but it is one that I have a passion to learn and get lots of satisfaction when I do work at something with my hands. Physical labor is something that I think I'm pretty good at and love to do. I'd rather go build something, which I don't know how to do, so it would take me a while to finish because I'm OCD, than sit in an office and crunch numbers every day. I need physical stimulation, like the other day when I was splitting wood all day, sure i had to lift the logs onto the splitter, but that just wasn't enough for me. So that night after I got back from Cubbies, I went and used someone's punching bag to get some exercise and release all those moments when I wanted to take a sledge hammer to the wood piles!
How God could use me and my abilities, I have no idea. But I do have a dream of being married and having a family, living out in the country, maybe breeding dogs, adopting a child or six, being a foster parent, and basically just helping people who need it. I hope that I would be able and willing to open my home to anyone who is in need of help. I could see maybe opening a school or college for underprivileged or poor kids who still want an education. Yeah.........
Ability #1: Assisting/Helping- My REAL spiritual gift (it's an inside joke, don't worry if you don't understand!) For me being able to jump in and help someone with something is extremely satisfying. One time on a Sunday some people were moving tables and chairs to set up for a potluck later that night, and I couldn't stand around just talking with people while someone else was working, so I went and helped. I missed some of the chruch service, but I wouldn't have traded sitting and listening or standing and singing for helping.
Ability #2: Being Adaptable- I have the ability to jump from project to project effortlessly. In fact, if I'm stuck doing the same job for an extended period of time I get really really bored. Monotony kills me. For example, the past couple of days this week I was splitting wood all afternoon by myself for two days straight. I nearly went crazy. But then yesterday I split wood with someone else for an hour before lunch, worked on our deck with someone else for a couple hours, then helped someone else finish doing dishes, and then went back out to the the wood pile with the same guy for another hour and never once did I feel the urge to take a sledge hammer to the wood pile! I can also take problems in stride. If something comes up, it doesn't faze me. I just say, "Ok, we have a problem, how can we fix it?"
Ability #3: Learning- Now I might not be particularly good at learning, but I love learning new skills and getting better at doing things. I do get frustrated because I like being good at things, and when I'm learning something new most of the time I'm not very good at it. But I really like the opportunity to learn something new that I will put to use sometime later. For example, the other week I spent a couple days screwing in pieces of cement board in the bathrooms of the new chapel here at camp. I had not grown up using a drill, so I had issues, but the fact that I was getting better at a skill was great!
Ability #4: Summarizing/Reporting information- This ability I did not credit myself with, but the other LAUNCH people pointed it out. I do have the ability to pick up on someone else's idea and put it in simple terms. For example, last weekend I over heard a couple of the other LAUNCH students trying to explain to the volunteers where the break room is in the lodge. They were like, "So you know where the piano used to be in the dining room?" "No." "Ok, well the break room is right through the wall that the piano used to be against. There's a door in the wall that leads to the break room." And I went in and said, "You know the swinging door in the serving area that leads to the ice machine?" "Yes." "Just go through that door and keep going straight." "Ooooooh." So yeah..........
Ability #5: Working with my hands- Now again this might not be an ability that I have right now, but it is one that I have a passion to learn and get lots of satisfaction when I do work at something with my hands. Physical labor is something that I think I'm pretty good at and love to do. I'd rather go build something, which I don't know how to do, so it would take me a while to finish because I'm OCD, than sit in an office and crunch numbers every day. I need physical stimulation, like the other day when I was splitting wood all day, sure i had to lift the logs onto the splitter, but that just wasn't enough for me. So that night after I got back from Cubbies, I went and used someone's punching bag to get some exercise and release all those moments when I wanted to take a sledge hammer to the wood piles!
How God could use me and my abilities, I have no idea. But I do have a dream of being married and having a family, living out in the country, maybe breeding dogs, adopting a child or six, being a foster parent, and basically just helping people who need it. I hope that I would be able and willing to open my home to anyone who is in need of help. I could see maybe opening a school or college for underprivileged or poor kids who still want an education. Yeah.........
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Leadership Lesson #3
Today in class we talked about the tasks of a leader. And the assignment is to use the list of tasks for a leader, and plan a fake supply run to Guatemala.
The first task is to come up with the scope and goals of the project. The goal is to collect basic life necessities and ship them to Antigua, Guatemala. As for scope, we will need to find donors and sponsors to collect all the items. We will pack all of the supplies in a crate or box of some kind and fly it into Guatemala City and then drive the crate to Antigua.
The second task is to think of how many people and how much money we will need. First of all we will have to have the people to donate and collect the supplies. We will also need to find a pilot for our plane and a person or three to drive the crate to Antigua and distribute supplies. We will have to raise money to rent a plane and pilot and automotive transportation to Antiuga. We should also provide people who can teach the Gutemalans how to build the houses out of the supplies we're sending.
The third task is to cast a compelling vision. We are trying to help needy families and children to survive, thrive, and share the love of God with them.
The fourth task of a leader is foreseeing obstacles of the project. Now I'm somewhat of a pessimist so I could come up with a lot of stuff. We could have people not find our vision compelling enough in which case we will need to either come up with a different way of communicating our vision or we might have to take trips and tell people personally about our project. We would have to get passports and possibly visas in order to get into Guatemala, so we would need to order them quite far ahead of time. we would also need to work around the language barrier, so we might need to to hire a translator which would take more money. And, let's be honest, Central America can be a dangerous place, so that means that we bathe the trip in prayer, and don't take any stupid chances and send three or four people down with the crate because there is strength in numbers.
And the fifth task of a leader is to evaluate performance. We could evaluate our performance if the container of supplies actually makes it to Antigua, and also by the connections we make down there and the help that we give. We could count the number of houses that we build or the amount of food we give out. But I think that ultimately success comes down to the question, "Did we love them with the love of God, and did they know that it was God's love?"
The first task is to come up with the scope and goals of the project. The goal is to collect basic life necessities and ship them to Antigua, Guatemala. As for scope, we will need to find donors and sponsors to collect all the items. We will pack all of the supplies in a crate or box of some kind and fly it into Guatemala City and then drive the crate to Antigua.
The second task is to think of how many people and how much money we will need. First of all we will have to have the people to donate and collect the supplies. We will also need to find a pilot for our plane and a person or three to drive the crate to Antigua and distribute supplies. We will have to raise money to rent a plane and pilot and automotive transportation to Antiuga. We should also provide people who can teach the Gutemalans how to build the houses out of the supplies we're sending.
The third task is to cast a compelling vision. We are trying to help needy families and children to survive, thrive, and share the love of God with them.
The fourth task of a leader is foreseeing obstacles of the project. Now I'm somewhat of a pessimist so I could come up with a lot of stuff. We could have people not find our vision compelling enough in which case we will need to either come up with a different way of communicating our vision or we might have to take trips and tell people personally about our project. We would have to get passports and possibly visas in order to get into Guatemala, so we would need to order them quite far ahead of time. we would also need to work around the language barrier, so we might need to to hire a translator which would take more money. And, let's be honest, Central America can be a dangerous place, so that means that we bathe the trip in prayer, and don't take any stupid chances and send three or four people down with the crate because there is strength in numbers.
And the fifth task of a leader is to evaluate performance. We could evaluate our performance if the container of supplies actually makes it to Antigua, and also by the connections we make down there and the help that we give. We could count the number of houses that we build or the amount of food we give out. But I think that ultimately success comes down to the question, "Did we love them with the love of God, and did they know that it was God's love?"
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Leadership Lesson #2
So it looks as though I will be putting up a new blog every day for this second semester, so prepare for lots of random assignments!!!!
Today in class we talked about 2 different expeditions to the south pole and compared the two to see which one would have the better chance of success. After doing that our homework for today was supposed to be planning a trip to Mars, however Brett, our wonderfully wise superbly smart teacher, decided we should plan a mission trip to an unreached people group.
I have decided to take my trip to Djibouti. It is a tiny country sandwiched in between Ethiopia and the Red Sea or the Gulf of Aden with Yemen just across the water in Northeast Africa. Djibouti is a hot dry desertish country where 97% of the population is Muslim, but 55% has been unreached by the Gospel.
Now as leader of this expedition I would want to have a background in Bible teaching, maybe a little medical background and some mechanical stuff too. I would like to have a 5 person team, 2 of which would be me and my wife. It would be nice if someone on the team was a linguist and could learn the language quickly, someone who knows the area, and someone who can fix things. It wouldn't take too horribly long to plan, just long enough to raise support, find a job and transportation for when we're there, and make reservations for plane tickets. Once there we would have to take some time to learn the language, the culture, and get grounded in the area. Once we have earned people's respect or at least gotten people used to the idea that we're staying. After we have built connections and repute and learned the language then we could start doing ministry. As for technical aspects of the trip, we would have to find a place to stay, and mode of transportation. It is a very hot climate, so we would have to adjust to that and make sure that we have access to lots of clean water whether that means flying in bottles of water or building a well. So yeah, there's my fantasy mission trip to Djibouti!
Today in class we talked about 2 different expeditions to the south pole and compared the two to see which one would have the better chance of success. After doing that our homework for today was supposed to be planning a trip to Mars, however Brett, our wonderfully wise superbly smart teacher, decided we should plan a mission trip to an unreached people group.
I have decided to take my trip to Djibouti. It is a tiny country sandwiched in between Ethiopia and the Red Sea or the Gulf of Aden with Yemen just across the water in Northeast Africa. Djibouti is a hot dry desertish country where 97% of the population is Muslim, but 55% has been unreached by the Gospel.
Now as leader of this expedition I would want to have a background in Bible teaching, maybe a little medical background and some mechanical stuff too. I would like to have a 5 person team, 2 of which would be me and my wife. It would be nice if someone on the team was a linguist and could learn the language quickly, someone who knows the area, and someone who can fix things. It wouldn't take too horribly long to plan, just long enough to raise support, find a job and transportation for when we're there, and make reservations for plane tickets. Once there we would have to take some time to learn the language, the culture, and get grounded in the area. Once we have earned people's respect or at least gotten people used to the idea that we're staying. After we have built connections and repute and learned the language then we could start doing ministry. As for technical aspects of the trip, we would have to find a place to stay, and mode of transportation. It is a very hot climate, so we would have to adjust to that and make sure that we have access to lots of clean water whether that means flying in bottles of water or building a well. So yeah, there's my fantasy mission trip to Djibouti!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Leadership Lesson #1
So today we started our second semester of LAUNCH, and this semester we're doing Leader Treks. So today for our first lesson we had to come up with a definition of leadership as a group. We also had a few quotes about leadership to help us along in the defining process. So our assignment for today was to ask three people outside of class read and tell us what they thought about our definition of leadership, pick one of the quotes that we didn't like and one that we did like, and thirdly, we had to choose a leader and tell why you like them.
First our definition of leadership is having influence over followers.
So I asked Judy, Steve, and Michelle in the office at camp. Judy thought that we might have wanted to include how you influence because people will be more likely to follow someone who leads through caring and compassion rather than through intimidation. Steve talked about whether you are having a positive or negative influence on someone, and Michelle really really liked our definition. She did say that we may have wanted to phrase it some other way than "followers" just to try and make people sound more like people.
I think that my favorite quote tht we read today was, "In order to be a leader a man must have followers. And to have followers, a man must have their confidence. Hence the supreme quality for a leader is unquestionably integrity." -Dwight D. Eisenhower. Now I couldn't really find one that I disliked or disagreed with, so I just went with " Trust is the essence of leadership" -Colin Powell.
As for the leader I admire, I chose Col. Robert Gould Shaw, commending officer of the 54th Massachusets Volunteer Regiment in the American Civil war. Shaw was the commanding officer of the 54th Massachusetts, an entirely colored regiment. It's incredible to think that he agreed to lead these men when the President of the Confederacy had promised the death sentence to any captured white officers of a colored regiment. The volunteers signed up under the impression that they would be paid the same as the white soldiers. But when the colored volunteers were paid nearly half as much, Shaw led a boycott of payment until the government agreed to pay them the same as the white soldiers. Col. Shaw never saw the day that his men were paid equally because he was killed leading his regiment into battle at Fort Wagner on July 18, 1863. It was reported that Col. Shaw was killed leading the charge when his regiment hesistated in the face of heavy fire. His body was stripped and robbed before being thrown into a mass grave along with the rest of the soldiers killed at Fort Wagner. Usually an officer's body would be sent back for a proper burial, but because he was the CO of a colored unit, the Confederates buried him like a common soldier. This man possessed great courage and the willingness to face death to lead his men. If you like Civil war stuff and found this interesting then I would recommend that you watch the movie "Glory". It depicts the journey of Col. Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Massachusetts regiment.
First our definition of leadership is having influence over followers.
So I asked Judy, Steve, and Michelle in the office at camp. Judy thought that we might have wanted to include how you influence because people will be more likely to follow someone who leads through caring and compassion rather than through intimidation. Steve talked about whether you are having a positive or negative influence on someone, and Michelle really really liked our definition. She did say that we may have wanted to phrase it some other way than "followers" just to try and make people sound more like people.
I think that my favorite quote tht we read today was, "In order to be a leader a man must have followers. And to have followers, a man must have their confidence. Hence the supreme quality for a leader is unquestionably integrity." -Dwight D. Eisenhower. Now I couldn't really find one that I disliked or disagreed with, so I just went with " Trust is the essence of leadership" -Colin Powell.
As for the leader I admire, I chose Col. Robert Gould Shaw, commending officer of the 54th Massachusets Volunteer Regiment in the American Civil war. Shaw was the commanding officer of the 54th Massachusetts, an entirely colored regiment. It's incredible to think that he agreed to lead these men when the President of the Confederacy had promised the death sentence to any captured white officers of a colored regiment. The volunteers signed up under the impression that they would be paid the same as the white soldiers. But when the colored volunteers were paid nearly half as much, Shaw led a boycott of payment until the government agreed to pay them the same as the white soldiers. Col. Shaw never saw the day that his men were paid equally because he was killed leading his regiment into battle at Fort Wagner on July 18, 1863. It was reported that Col. Shaw was killed leading the charge when his regiment hesistated in the face of heavy fire. His body was stripped and robbed before being thrown into a mass grave along with the rest of the soldiers killed at Fort Wagner. Usually an officer's body would be sent back for a proper burial, but because he was the CO of a colored unit, the Confederates buried him like a common soldier. This man possessed great courage and the willingness to face death to lead his men. If you like Civil war stuff and found this interesting then I would recommend that you watch the movie "Glory". It depicts the journey of Col. Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Massachusetts regiment.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Twin Lakes Christian Center
Today we (LAUNCH) went to Twin Lakes Christian Center (TLCC) in northwest Iowa to visit their camp.
TLCC was started back in the 1950's when the Covenant churches decided they wanted their own camp.
They have 65 acres near Manson, Iowa of quite flat, windy land. They are situated on a lake (with another smaller one close by, hence the name), and can hold up to 200 people at once. The biggest draw to Twin Lakes is the lake that they are connected to. They utilize the lake very well all year long with sking, tubing, and wakeboarding in the summer along with a couple slides. In the winter they use the lake for toboganning, skating, and probably coolest of all, kiting. Now, kiting is way cooler than it sounds. It's not just a regular kite but one of the ones that will pull you along when you're on a board or skis. Actually it can pull you a little bit even if you're just standing on the ice; I know. It happened to me today!
The atmosphere of Twin Lakes is much different than that of Hidden Acres, and one of the things that lends to the difference is the fact that there are many different vacation homes placed around the lake. Most of the homes are not occupied during the year, but when they weekends in the summer hit, they are packed along with the lake. They really don't crowd the lake that much during the week when camps are going on, but TLCC does run a wakeboarding camp on the weekends, and that can get a little interesting. But the vacationers are also helpful because some of them choose to send their kids or grandkids to day camp at TLCC, or some of the older gentlemen who don't have all that much to do will volunteer to mow the grass just to have something to do! And sometimes TLCC will drum up some more business from the community when they open their espresso machine to the vacationers.
A couple ideas we could plagiarize from them are perhaps putting an indoor climbing wall in somewhere in our facilities or coming up with some decorations to match the theme for the summer or having a set decor or ambience for our facilities like at Twin Lakes everything is very rustic and barnish.........yeah, it's cool! Overall I really enjoyed TLCC, and I would love to go back some day!
TLCC was started back in the 1950's when the Covenant churches decided they wanted their own camp.
They have 65 acres near Manson, Iowa of quite flat, windy land. They are situated on a lake (with another smaller one close by, hence the name), and can hold up to 200 people at once. The biggest draw to Twin Lakes is the lake that they are connected to. They utilize the lake very well all year long with sking, tubing, and wakeboarding in the summer along with a couple slides. In the winter they use the lake for toboganning, skating, and probably coolest of all, kiting. Now, kiting is way cooler than it sounds. It's not just a regular kite but one of the ones that will pull you along when you're on a board or skis. Actually it can pull you a little bit even if you're just standing on the ice; I know. It happened to me today!
The atmosphere of Twin Lakes is much different than that of Hidden Acres, and one of the things that lends to the difference is the fact that there are many different vacation homes placed around the lake. Most of the homes are not occupied during the year, but when they weekends in the summer hit, they are packed along with the lake. They really don't crowd the lake that much during the week when camps are going on, but TLCC does run a wakeboarding camp on the weekends, and that can get a little interesting. But the vacationers are also helpful because some of them choose to send their kids or grandkids to day camp at TLCC, or some of the older gentlemen who don't have all that much to do will volunteer to mow the grass just to have something to do! And sometimes TLCC will drum up some more business from the community when they open their espresso machine to the vacationers.
A couple ideas we could plagiarize from them are perhaps putting an indoor climbing wall in somewhere in our facilities or coming up with some decorations to match the theme for the summer or having a set decor or ambience for our facilities like at Twin Lakes everything is very rustic and barnish.........yeah, it's cool! Overall I really enjoyed TLCC, and I would love to go back some day!
Monday, January 23, 2012
Can't see what's right in front of my face!
So today I had basically all day to myself and my thoughts, and it took me until about 3:30 to come up with anything deeper than the lyrics to Josh Kelley's song Naleigh Moon (which by the way is a GREAT song). But when I did have a deep thought it was about the study we are doing in LAUNCH called Truefaced. I;ve talked about Truefaced here before, but I'll explain about it a little again. Truefaced is about being real and taking off the masks that we hide behind. Something that it talks about is the "rooms" that we all live in. There are two different rooms; the room of good intentions where you try to live a better life on your own power. Then there's the room of Grace where we have all our problems out in the open and we work on them with Jesus at our side helping us. The way we get to the room of Grace is through humility, trusting God and others with who we really are. One day in class I mentioned that I hadn't ever heard of any of this, and they weren't using any scripture to back up what they were saying. Our teacher then informed me that he has a whole cd of another guy preaching about this stuff with boatloads of scripture.
Now to my significant thought of the day! I was thinking about all of that stuff I just talked about when Micah 6:8 popped into my head. It says, "He has shown you O man what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God." Did you pick up on that last part? "Walk humbly with your God." What I'm learning this year has been staring me in the face my whole life. I've tried and tried and tried to work my way free of sin, but that is not what God wants of me! What He wants, no requires, is to WALK HUMBLY WITH HIM through life. What a thought!
Now to my significant thought of the day! I was thinking about all of that stuff I just talked about when Micah 6:8 popped into my head. It says, "He has shown you O man what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God." Did you pick up on that last part? "Walk humbly with your God." What I'm learning this year has been staring me in the face my whole life. I've tried and tried and tried to work my way free of sin, but that is not what God wants of me! What He wants, no requires, is to WALK HUMBLY WITH HIM through life. What a thought!
Sunday, January 22, 2012
It's really not that bad :)
So today was Sanctity of Human Life Sunday. I don't really know what all this Sunday means or implies, but it's basically just celebrating human life and bringing awareness to options other than abortion. At least that's what I pick up every year.
I went home this weekend with a few things on my mind and a realization that real life isn't all roses and fun stuff like you believe when you're a little kid. I had been saying that real life just kinda stinks because I've got issues to deal with and decisions about college and relationships. But if you think about all the children who were never given the opportunity to live their lives, there's really not that much that we can complain about. Just think about all the living that we get to do because our mothers were commited to life. Think about every feeling, excruciating or joyful, every thought, brilliant or mundane, and every action, exciting or ordinary, that you have gotten to experience and learn from because you are alive. How grateful should we be for every moment we are alive, and instead I waste time complaining about how hard life is and what a pain real life is. Real life is real life; there's not much I can do about the stuff that just happens, but what I can do is be grateful for my life and make the most of it, maybe by helping others to choose life for their children or maybe in something else.
So yeah, that's really all I have to say, just be grateful for your life and don't waste it. God gave you life for a reason!
I went home this weekend with a few things on my mind and a realization that real life isn't all roses and fun stuff like you believe when you're a little kid. I had been saying that real life just kinda stinks because I've got issues to deal with and decisions about college and relationships. But if you think about all the children who were never given the opportunity to live their lives, there's really not that much that we can complain about. Just think about all the living that we get to do because our mothers were commited to life. Think about every feeling, excruciating or joyful, every thought, brilliant or mundane, and every action, exciting or ordinary, that you have gotten to experience and learn from because you are alive. How grateful should we be for every moment we are alive, and instead I waste time complaining about how hard life is and what a pain real life is. Real life is real life; there's not much I can do about the stuff that just happens, but what I can do is be grateful for my life and make the most of it, maybe by helping others to choose life for their children or maybe in something else.
So yeah, that's really all I have to say, just be grateful for your life and don't waste it. God gave you life for a reason!
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
components of an effective team
so this assignment is about what it takes to have a good team. we went through 8 components of an effective team in class today, and we are suppose to summarize them for you. we also got a few worksheets about those components rating our team (LAUNCH) on the 8 components. for the second and third parts of the blog, we have to say which component we think that LAUNCH does best at and which component we think that we do worst at. "SO LET'S DO THIS THING!!!"
component #1: Direction: direction is basically where are we going, how are we gonna get there, what's gonna help us and what's gonna hurt us?
component #2: Talent: talent is basically do you have the skills needed to do what this team does, are those talents known and are they being developed?
component #3: Work Process: work process is how do we do what we do?
component #4: Roles: roles is knowing where you fit and what you're supposed to do.
component #5: Team Process: team process is basically how the team communicates with each other.
component#6: Team Norms: team norms are the regular behavior patterns and communication styles within the team.
component #7: Reinforcement: reinforcement is basically encouragement.
component #8: External Relations: external relations is basically where do we fit in the big picture.
i think that our team really doesn't do all that well at reinforcement or encouragement. it's not that we're always tearing each other down; we just don't speak up and praise someone when they do something well. that can be fixed though by simply paying attention and intentionally complimenting each other on a good job.
i think that we definitely do external relations well. we know exactly where we are on the "food chain" (at the bottom) and all of us (i'm pretty sure) embrace our roles and don't mind them at all.
component #1: Direction: direction is basically where are we going, how are we gonna get there, what's gonna help us and what's gonna hurt us?
component #2: Talent: talent is basically do you have the skills needed to do what this team does, are those talents known and are they being developed?
component #3: Work Process: work process is how do we do what we do?
component #4: Roles: roles is knowing where you fit and what you're supposed to do.
component #5: Team Process: team process is basically how the team communicates with each other.
component#6: Team Norms: team norms are the regular behavior patterns and communication styles within the team.
component #7: Reinforcement: reinforcement is basically encouragement.
component #8: External Relations: external relations is basically where do we fit in the big picture.
i think that our team really doesn't do all that well at reinforcement or encouragement. it's not that we're always tearing each other down; we just don't speak up and praise someone when they do something well. that can be fixed though by simply paying attention and intentionally complimenting each other on a good job.
i think that we definitely do external relations well. we know exactly where we are on the "food chain" (at the bottom) and all of us (i'm pretty sure) embrace our roles and don't mind them at all.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
social styles
ok, so in class todayand yesterday we were talking about behavior styles or personality traits or something along those lines, i can't quite remember what they're called, and i didn't write them down. however our assignment is to assess ourselves and see where we land on the personality chart.
the first criteria is about responsiveness, between control and emote (definition: to express emotion especially in an excessive and theatrical manner). it's basically, do you let your emotions dicide things for you or do you think about things objectively. i don't think that i generally lean one way or the other. maybe i just don't know myself very well, but i think i'm pretty close to right in the middle of them.
the second criteria or whatever is about assertiveness, between asking and telling. it's basically do you tell people what you're doing or just simply talk to let people know that you're there, or are you a quiet person and don't really make yourself known or your opinion heard. i'm pretty sure that i fall farther on the side of asking or not really talking all that much.
now in the curriculum there was a cool little diagram with an x-axis and a y-axis. on the right side is "tell", the top "control", on the left "ask", and on the bottom "emote". now i know that i fall one side of asking, and i'm realy close to the middle of control and emote. i would have to say that i fall closer to the emote side of the diagram than the control side, which means that i'm called an "amiable" more than an "analytical". i have characteristics of both, but i think i have more of the amiables than analyticals. the strengths of an amiable that i feel apply to me in the area of emotions are being calm, cool, and collected, being patient and well balanced, and i think i have a pretty consistent life. as a parent (even though i'm not a parent yet) i can't really tell how i'd be with children.......or children of my own. at work i think that i'm pretty competent and steady, i don't really mediate problems, but i don't actively try to make problems in fact i try to avoid conflict a lot, and i think that i'm pretty good under pressure. and as a friend i think i'm pretty easy to get along with, i don't talk a whole lot which i guess means i'm listening a lot, but sometimes i don't really listen, i just look like i might be (yes, mom i guess you're right), and i do have a lot of friends, but i don't have a lot of really GOOD friends. my weaknesses being an amiable person with emotions are that i can appear unenthusiastic, i can be indecisive about things mostly just because i really don't care one way or the other about most things, i suppose that i could be seen as self righteous sometimes which i suppose i can be at times. as a parent you i really don't know yet, but i do know that with my cubbies students i am pretty lax on discipline and my room is the loudest and probably the most unorganized, and i do think that i could look like i take life too casually. at work i suppose i'm not goal oriented i just do whatever job i'm told to do, i don't really like change, but i won't resist it mostly because other people know more than i do and i don't really speak up a whole lot either. as a friend i can see myself appearing uninvolved and indifferent to plans mostly because i don't care what we do and think that if anyone has strong opinions about them they should have there way, i can judge others unfairly, but i'm starting to try and correct that realizing that everyone has their own issues and who am i to look down on anyone, and YES, i can DEFINITELY be sarcastic and teasing AT TIMES.......just once in a while ;)
and when i'm interacting with other social styles i should try to speak up a bit more and if i disagree realize that that is ok and someone might miss out on something if i don't speak up, but i do have to learn how to offer my opinion graciously and not too forcefully.
the first criteria is about responsiveness, between control and emote (definition: to express emotion especially in an excessive and theatrical manner). it's basically, do you let your emotions dicide things for you or do you think about things objectively. i don't think that i generally lean one way or the other. maybe i just don't know myself very well, but i think i'm pretty close to right in the middle of them.
the second criteria or whatever is about assertiveness, between asking and telling. it's basically do you tell people what you're doing or just simply talk to let people know that you're there, or are you a quiet person and don't really make yourself known or your opinion heard. i'm pretty sure that i fall farther on the side of asking or not really talking all that much.
now in the curriculum there was a cool little diagram with an x-axis and a y-axis. on the right side is "tell", the top "control", on the left "ask", and on the bottom "emote". now i know that i fall one side of asking, and i'm realy close to the middle of control and emote. i would have to say that i fall closer to the emote side of the diagram than the control side, which means that i'm called an "amiable" more than an "analytical". i have characteristics of both, but i think i have more of the amiables than analyticals. the strengths of an amiable that i feel apply to me in the area of emotions are being calm, cool, and collected, being patient and well balanced, and i think i have a pretty consistent life. as a parent (even though i'm not a parent yet) i can't really tell how i'd be with children.......or children of my own. at work i think that i'm pretty competent and steady, i don't really mediate problems, but i don't actively try to make problems in fact i try to avoid conflict a lot, and i think that i'm pretty good under pressure. and as a friend i think i'm pretty easy to get along with, i don't talk a whole lot which i guess means i'm listening a lot, but sometimes i don't really listen, i just look like i might be (yes, mom i guess you're right), and i do have a lot of friends, but i don't have a lot of really GOOD friends. my weaknesses being an amiable person with emotions are that i can appear unenthusiastic, i can be indecisive about things mostly just because i really don't care one way or the other about most things, i suppose that i could be seen as self righteous sometimes which i suppose i can be at times. as a parent you i really don't know yet, but i do know that with my cubbies students i am pretty lax on discipline and my room is the loudest and probably the most unorganized, and i do think that i could look like i take life too casually. at work i suppose i'm not goal oriented i just do whatever job i'm told to do, i don't really like change, but i won't resist it mostly because other people know more than i do and i don't really speak up a whole lot either. as a friend i can see myself appearing uninvolved and indifferent to plans mostly because i don't care what we do and think that if anyone has strong opinions about them they should have there way, i can judge others unfairly, but i'm starting to try and correct that realizing that everyone has their own issues and who am i to look down on anyone, and YES, i can DEFINITELY be sarcastic and teasing AT TIMES.......just once in a while ;)
and when i'm interacting with other social styles i should try to speak up a bit more and if i disagree realize that that is ok and someone might miss out on something if i don't speak up, but i do have to learn how to offer my opinion graciously and not too forcefully.
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
New life.....even if it doesn't look like it ;)
in my last blog post i mentioned the study called Truefaced that LAUNCH is going through right now. i just read something from it last night that gave me hope and really made me want to share it with anyone who might happen to think that reading this could be worthwhile.
"if we brought a caterpillar to a biologist and asked him to analyze it and describe it's DNA he would say, "i know that this looks like a caterpillar to you, but scientifically, according to every test, including DNA, this is fully and completely a butterfly." God has wired into a creature that looks nothing like a butterfly, a perfectly complete butterfly "identity". and because the caterpillar is a butterfly in essence, it will one day display the behavior and attributes of a butterfly. the caterpillar matures into what is already true about it." (TrueFaced p. 47-48)
when i read this the other night, my heart nearly sang to realize that promise from God. now i do have to confess that that came from last week's assigned reading, but i didn't get to it until this week. however, i think that the important thing is that i read it! i also have a little story from today about how that example from nature is coming true in my life!
at the beginning of the year we took some spiritual gifts tests, just to find out about ourselves. so i took them and had my suspicions confirmed that my strongest spiritual gift is service or helps. but what i wasn't expecting was my secondary or weaker gifts being discernment, comforting, and most surprising, prophecy, or speaking truth into a situation. well at the time i agreed with the discernment, and maybe the comforting, but probably not the prophecy because i just do not really like talking all that much in front of other people, let alone saying something that could be controversial. well, today in class we were going through some behavior examples about the way that some people are, and we were sharing about what sort of person we thought we were. i was sitting by quietly, letting everyone else answer the question as i usually do, and i heard someone answer the question, but they're assessment of themself was way off from what i had observed of that person so far in our five months of being here at camp. and all of a sudden i could not keep my mouth shut, and i informed that person that they were not what they thought they were. now, let me be honest, i did not do it in the most gracious way, and i'm sorry for that, but it was also my first time really doing something like that, and i could use a little practice. but i guess that i really do have the gift of speaking truth into a situation. it just hadn't shown itself yet. that doesn't mean that i wasn't gifted in prophecy, it was just that i hadn't had it manifested in my life yet.
it's the same way with a christian's new life in Jesus Christ. after Jesus has saved, we might still look like a non christian or act like a non christian or even smell like a non christian (just kidding, everybody has their own smell regardless of whether they're saved or not). but all of that does not mean that you are not a Christian. if you still struggle with sin even when you're supposed to be a Christian and reflecting the image of Jesus, that doesn't mean that you are a hopeless cause. you are saved, and God sees you as a reflection of His Holy Son. that is who we really are, not what we look like on the outside, but what God says we are on the inside. and one day, someday in the distant future, we'll finally actually reflect our Lord and Savior on the outside just like God says we do!
"if we brought a caterpillar to a biologist and asked him to analyze it and describe it's DNA he would say, "i know that this looks like a caterpillar to you, but scientifically, according to every test, including DNA, this is fully and completely a butterfly." God has wired into a creature that looks nothing like a butterfly, a perfectly complete butterfly "identity". and because the caterpillar is a butterfly in essence, it will one day display the behavior and attributes of a butterfly. the caterpillar matures into what is already true about it." (TrueFaced p. 47-48)
when i read this the other night, my heart nearly sang to realize that promise from God. now i do have to confess that that came from last week's assigned reading, but i didn't get to it until this week. however, i think that the important thing is that i read it! i also have a little story from today about how that example from nature is coming true in my life!
at the beginning of the year we took some spiritual gifts tests, just to find out about ourselves. so i took them and had my suspicions confirmed that my strongest spiritual gift is service or helps. but what i wasn't expecting was my secondary or weaker gifts being discernment, comforting, and most surprising, prophecy, or speaking truth into a situation. well at the time i agreed with the discernment, and maybe the comforting, but probably not the prophecy because i just do not really like talking all that much in front of other people, let alone saying something that could be controversial. well, today in class we were going through some behavior examples about the way that some people are, and we were sharing about what sort of person we thought we were. i was sitting by quietly, letting everyone else answer the question as i usually do, and i heard someone answer the question, but they're assessment of themself was way off from what i had observed of that person so far in our five months of being here at camp. and all of a sudden i could not keep my mouth shut, and i informed that person that they were not what they thought they were. now, let me be honest, i did not do it in the most gracious way, and i'm sorry for that, but it was also my first time really doing something like that, and i could use a little practice. but i guess that i really do have the gift of speaking truth into a situation. it just hadn't shown itself yet. that doesn't mean that i wasn't gifted in prophecy, it was just that i hadn't had it manifested in my life yet.
it's the same way with a christian's new life in Jesus Christ. after Jesus has saved, we might still look like a non christian or act like a non christian or even smell like a non christian (just kidding, everybody has their own smell regardless of whether they're saved or not). but all of that does not mean that you are not a Christian. if you still struggle with sin even when you're supposed to be a Christian and reflecting the image of Jesus, that doesn't mean that you are a hopeless cause. you are saved, and God sees you as a reflection of His Holy Son. that is who we really are, not what we look like on the outside, but what God says we are on the inside. and one day, someday in the distant future, we'll finally actually reflect our Lord and Savior on the outside just like God says we do!
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