A Season of Change

  It seems that since I got back from summer project nothing in my life has been the same, it has been a season of change. I'm learning to be a bible study leader, learning, growing, this is a season of change- in every single part of my life. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with all of these changes, but the Lord truly has given me a peace that has taken me by surprise.
   I am unbelievably thankful that my relationship with the Lord is the only constant aspect of my life. I am so thankful for His word.

Proverbs 30:5   Every word of God is flawless; he is a shield to those who take refuge in Him.

A Mighty Fortress Is Our God...

" A mighty fortress" by Christy Knockels


Our God is a consuming fire,
a burning Holy flame with glory and freedom.


We will keep our eyes on You
A mighty fortress is our God,
a sacred refuge is Your name,
Your kingdom is unshakeable,
With you forever we will reign.

Our god is jealous of His own,
none can comprehend His love and His mercy.
our God is exalted above His throne,
high above the heavens, forever He is worthy.


We will keep our eyes on you, 
so we can set our hearts on You,
We will set our hearts on You.

        I love the character and attributes of my daddy, the God that I serve.
        Jesus es mi fortaleza, Jesus is my fortress.
        I love the safety and security that we as His children are able to find, that gives me peace.

Santa Cruz Summer Project Testimony

    On May 25 I boarded a plane to Santa Cruz, California excited and ready to get my hands dirty for Jesus.  The first five days were spent helping to prepare the motel for the students on project and familiarizing myself with the city.             

    In Santa Cruz we worked among young high school and college age students that were residents of Santa Cruz and nearby cities.  Working on the boardwalk was a great way to reach out to the people of Santa Cruz.  I worked for Miller’s Sun Shops, a company that owns several retail stores on the boardwalk.  I had the opportunity to answer my co-workers’ questions about Jesus, share the gospel, build relationships, and encourage them. 

    As a project we invited our co-workers to our meal times and theme parties where we could get to know them better in a fun and casual setting.  At every meal and theme party a student from project would share their testimony.  We also provided breakfast to Hispanic day laborers, sharing the gospel, passing out Bibles, and praying with them. We also held out reaches in downtown Santa Cruz on Saturday nights, using various outreach tools we were trained on at the beginning of the summer. We held a service called Monday Night Live each week which included worship and a message from a local pastor. 

   All fifty-nine students were a part of a leadership committee: housing, Monday night live, outreach, prayer, socials, and special projects.  These committees were seven to eleven students serving the project in various ways.  I was a member of the prayer committee and was encouraged to be in a group with six students who wanted to learn more about prayer.  I was thankful to pray and trust the Lord with these students to do mighty works in the lives of the people of Santa Cruz. 

    I am thankful that the Lord allowed our project to be united under His great name, with one focus; to share the Gospel.  It was remarkable to see the Lord at work in people’s lives; many of our co-workers were receptive to hearing more about Jesus and the gospel. 

   College students from the mid-south region have come for twenty years to be a part of the Santa Cruz summer project.  Many of our co-workers eagerly anticipate the arrival of the “Christian crusaders” to answer their questions and experience the community of the project. We all loved being a part of making an eternal difference, whether by planting a seed, watering it, or praying with them to receive Christ.  This summer we saw over ten people receive Christ as their Savior!

      Words cannot express how thankful I am to have had your support through prayers and financial giving.            There were many times that the Lord reminded me of your prayers for the project and that in itself was an encouragement.  This summer was a very significant season of my life, I am thankful for all the Lord taught me, and I am grateful to have been a part of the 2011 Santa Cruz Summer Project! Thank you so much for partnering with the Lord in His relentless pursuit of the lost in Santa Cruz!

His Daughter

Friend.Sister. Cousin. Leader. Student. Granddaughter. Young woman. 

     I feel like I put on different hats and play different roles through out the week.
     Growing up my dad would tell me before I closed the door on the way out to hang out with friends, Don't forget who you are and whose you are. I am so thankful that I am a daughter of the Most High King and that I can find my identity in Jesus Christ.
    "So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith,  for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.  If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise. "Galatians 3:26-29

Quite the Journey

I found out today that I will be leading a Bible study with one of my friends from summer project on campus at North Carolina State University. I am so excited! I am more excited than nervous at the moment. Tonight some of the leaders for east campus met to put up flyers around campus to get the word out about our first social which will be taking place tomorrow night! I am so excited to meet new people, especially freshmen and reach out to them and invite them to check out Campus Crusade for Christ ministry!

Romans 1:20/ Romanos 1:20

  These are seven of my favorite project pictures that I feel absolutely capture the beauty of God's creation. In Romans 1:20 it is written, For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.  Romanos 1:20 Porque desde la creacion del mundo las cualidades invisibles de Dios, es decir, su eterno poder y su naturaleza divina, se perciben claramente a traves de lo que el creo, de modo que nadie tiene excusa. The Lord has made His existence and presence known through what He has created. Isn't His creation so beautiful?

Re-entry

   Being a part of a summer project was such a beautiful experience. I loved being in California, it was the best summer of my life. It was challenging but also a great season of my life.
  Its hard to describe the community and atmosphere of a summer project, but to sum it all up it truly is a wonderful community. I am so blessed to have had the opportunity to be a part of the  2011 Santa Cruz Summer Project. Please pray for the project as we are now home and are adjusting to our lives and trying to pick up where we left off in a strange, but familiar place. Re-entry is us re-entering our lives and please pray for an easy transition and for the Lord to remind us if what we've learned and how to apply it to our daily lives.
   Thank you so much for praying for me this summer, I am so thankful that you supported me through prayer this summer. It was so wonderful to see the Lord at work this summer.
Thanks once again for your prayers.

Taking This In

Home. Home meaning...

     I am currently sitting in the salt lake city airport. kind of taking all of this in, whatever this is. this being reality. this being the idea and reality that past 11 weeks of my life was a beautiful opportunity,  beautiful season, a challenge, a blessing, a call,  reality check, a life changing new perspective. Leave Santa Cruz was so difficult, it was and has been  roller coaster of emotions and thoughts. If never been on project its really hard to understand.
      As far as I know I am on my way home: home being North Carolina.
Going back to my family, friends, Wake Tech and North Carolina State University.
     To put what I'm feeling and processing into a brief three sentences: Home is North Carolina, I had the best summer of my life I've l earned so much about myself, good and bad. The Lord answered so many of my prayers and He has been so faithful, I' m in awe of Him and I am so thankful to be called His child, Jesus my daddy and i could never thank Him enough for letting me come on this summer project.

Summer Recap #1

A week on project is:
Monday- work, dinner at 6 and one or two students would share their testimony, Monday Night Live (MNL) at 8pm which is kind of like a church service. we have a greeting, a game, praise and worship, speaker, then on some nights we would go out and get ice cream

Tuesday-in the morning we would have our reflection time( quiet time), lunch all together at 12,
and work the night shift

Wednesday- work, dinner at 6, action groups at 8pm ( action group is a bible study with the girls I roomed with)

Thursday- work and then we all had the night off, so we could have dinner and hang out with whoever you wanted to spend time with/ some Thursday nights at 8pm we would all get together to set up for our outreach party on Saturday

Friday- when staff was here we would have training( the first 5 weeks of the summer) but after staff left that was a free morning (I would mostly sleep-in/ do errands) lunch all together at 12, and work the night shift.

Saturday- work, have dinner together, then we would normally do an outreach/ have an event here at the pan= outreach party

Sunday- church, lunch on your own, free time, committee meetings at 8 and action group leader meeting at 9
committee- each person is in a leadership group that all work together through out the summer to make the summer run smoothly. groups are: special projects, prayer, socials, outreach, housing administration, and a couple other groups
     Action group leaders meet with the four leaders and they run through the lesson with us and answer any questions and give us a chance to update them on how our group is doing.
     Each week we get Sunday and another random day off and so that day is often for errands/ traveling in California and doing some sight seeing!

The Best Summer of My Life

I wanted to apologize for not keeping my word and not blogging consistently throughout this summer.
    Today is August 3rd and I feel like just yesterday I was on the phone with my mom expressing that half of the summer was complete. This summer absolutely flew by and I have no idea where to begin expressing what has happened this summer.
  The last week of work was exciting and sad all at the same time. I tried to be really intentional and invite my co-workers to our last events and I was so excited to have a couple of girls come and visit us for lunch and for our last party.
  As I worked my last day at Sun Shops I was able to talk to a co-worker and tell her about the job that she would be doing because it was her first day. It was a really bitter-sweet experience, but I loved every second of it.
---I have a lot of thoughts and things to share, so here we go.

       Thank you so much to all of you who prayed for me, one thing that I am really excited about is the fact that the Lord really changed me perspective about life and specifically about the job.  On day two of my job I had this thought: I really need to do a great job so the owner of Sun Shops will be happy and pleased with me, but the Holy Spirit totally took that thought captive and I had a quick thought and heart change. Right after that thought I understood that my perspective was wrong and that I need to be working and serving the Lord and looking for His approval, I needed to please the Lord. I then realized that the Lord owns everything anyway and that the Lord is my boss and looked at my job like my daddy, my heavenly father is the owner and I get to work at His store. So I would work really hard and make sure that I did my best at work for my daddy.
      My last day of work at Sun Shops was on Saturday July 30 and that night we had our last theme party, a luau and that was wonderful. On Sunday we left for Yosemite National Park. This was a project trip and although we had difficulty getting there we got there in about four hours and we had a relaxed ride over there. We got to the ledge near the park, settled in, packed our Pb&j and had dinner and worship at the park. We got the chance to see clouds and the sunset over the mountains and half dome and it was so beautiful. We got to pray up there and it was so silent besides the rush of the waterfall and it was such a beautiful sound. Then on Monday a group of 19 of us left at 10 am to go on a 13 mile hike in Yosemite! It was so beautiful and we had a great time on an 8 mile hike through the valley and we got to climb rocks onto the waterfall and it was so adventurous and I loved every second of it. I loved being able to take the time to enjoy hiking, taking pictures, and mostly being in awe of the chance to see the Lord's beauty displayed all around me. I loved being at the park. We hiked for a while and we all left the park around 5. We had dinner together, played some games, and then went swimming. We left to come back here to the peter pan at 11. We are back at the pan, I've started packing my suitcase today and tomorrow and Thursday we are cleaning up the peter pan. If we finish on thursday then on Friday we get one final fun day together as a project on the beach and enjoy Santa Cruz. Saturday will be a long day waiting for my flight back home and I get back on Sunday.
     I know that this summer is just one season of my life and it was been absolutely wonderful, but I'm almost ready to go back home, get in the swing of things, and live life intentionally for Jesus.
     This has been the most difficult, but most beautiful summer of my life and I feel like I could never thank Jesus enough for letting me come on this project.  I am so humbled to have had the opportunity to come on a summer project! Thank you Jesus for the best summer of my life. Amen.

One More Week of Work!

     I am sad and excited about this coming week. It will be our last week of work and last chance to invite coworkers to different events and share the Gospel. I love being here and I am excited to continue to have great conversations with co-workers. I enjoy talking with them and I have made a few friends that I am really going to miss!
    Please pray that we will love them with the love of Christ and have opportunities to share the Gospel with our coworkers in the days to come.

The Word Is Alive!

Since I have been on project I have really grown to appreciate the Bible. I have a hunger to read the word, to dive into it and pick it apart. And I love that its the only book that answers all of my questions, that leaves me refreshed, sometimes encouraged and convicted all at the same time. I love Hebrews 4:12: For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to the dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.


Please pray that this project as a whole would have a love, appreciation and longing for the word of God. Pray that we will be thankful that the word of God is alive and so powerful!