Family Time

Well, this weekend is going to be a nice time with my family. About 17 days ago I dropped my parents off at the airport so they could go vacation in Hawaii......must be nice huh?

Well, tonight, my brother and I will be picking them up from the airport. I have spoken to them about four times in the past 17 days and every time I talk to them they say how beautiful Hawaii is and how much they don't want to come back to Indiana. As they were telling me about it, I couldn't help but think how beautiful Heaven is going to be compared to even Hawaii.

I have just stopped and looked at some amazing things God has created (sunsets on Lake Erie, the stars at night, etc.) and just am amazed how awesome our God really is!!! I know I take him for granted a lot and I can't anymore. I am reading a good book right now by Shawn McDonald and it just talks about our Passion for Christ and how we should approach our Heavenly Father on a daily basis.

I have had some unbelievable experiences this summer of drawing closer to him, but I want to have that same passion on a regular basis. Just like anything in life, if you want it bad enough, you have to go after it. I now know I want to passionatley seek his face at all times.

My brother and I are headed to South Bend tonight. It will be a good time to hangout. We both have busy lives and haven't had that much time to hangout this summer. I am looking forward to a good weekend.

Almost August????

Where has the summer gone? Well, I guess when you are busy....time flies by! Here is why the summer has flown by:

-Mission trip to New York
- Summer Camp
- 2 softball leagues
- time with family and friends

and now......SUMMER SCHOOL!

Yes, today marked the beginning of a two-week summer school session. It is so hard to believe that the new school year is right around the corner. It just seems like school just let out!

I need to just take a break and make sure I enjoy this last month before the beginning of school year. I told myself that once summer hit the pace would slow down. Boy, was I wrong!

Pictures from Camp

Summer Camp 2007

I just returned from Summer Camp. Wow, can I tell you how much God was in that place. It was just amazing to see what the Lord did and is going to continue to do through this experience.

This year's camp them was ONE.

-ONE life to live.

-ONE God to serve.

-ONE life changing experience.

The big take away from camp was one word: PRAYER.

We must get back to prayer and realize the importance of it. We set up a prayer room where each cottage group took an hour block of time each morning to pray and to write their prayers on the walls of the room. I can't tell you how amazing that was! My group prayed on Tuesday morning from 3-4 AM. Can I just tell you I am far from a morning person. I figured it would be hard to get my group up to pray at 3 AM, but I was wrong! I can't tell you what an incredible time of prayer we had for that one hour in the middle of the night! The time went by so quickly and we weren't even tired!

This week also focused on not just asking God for little things (pray for my test, pray for my game, pray for my family....etc.) but to make HUGE, 0ut there prayers. We have God in a box a lot of times and think that he can't do all that we ask or even imagine. Our God is a BIG GOD WHO CAN DO BIG THINGS! I believe that will be a huge take away from this week.

Each group that prayed in that prayer room really felt the presence of the Holy Spirit in that place. I will be putting some pictures up of the prayer room for you to see.

I will be updating more later.

Summer Camp "07
ONE

I just returned from Summer Camp at Belluh Beach on the shores of Lake Erie. What an unbelievable experience it was. The theme this year was "ONE"and I will be posting more later about what that meant this week. It was a great week of getting closer to God, getting closer to each other, and preparing for the upcoming school year as a youth group.

I will be posting more about camp soon.