Holm on the Hill

Summer 09

2009-08-27T15:18:00.002-06:00

This summer I lived in Raleigh with 9 other Campus Outreach Staff members. We did a lot of work through the church and spent time doing 3 main things:
1. Living in community together (aka a massive house and cooking together at night, laughing all day, praying )

2. Learning through classes at the church and theology (which means the study of knowing God) at a seminary

3. Reaching out to the community, we got involved with a lot of stuff, I loved it!

75 of our students went to the Summer Project this summer... they worked at Sea World. They loved it! Here is a video they made, it is awesome!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5xfuJnjgX8

important words to know:
root beer: there is an A & W next door, people go there at night to get fast food and hang out

breezeway: it is an outdoor corridor leading from our hotel to the pool

shagging: a southern dance we all learned in Charleston! (it is basically the same as swing dancing, at least the way we do it)

Old Town: the community we live in

Some new pictures...

2009-02-04T15:35:00.003-06:00

Our UNC-Chapel Hill Staff Team!

Some of the girls that came with us to our Atlanta Conference (Lauren in the center with the Carolina sweatshirt gave her life to Christ while we were there and is now experiencing the joy of discipleship with some of our student leaders. She came to college not looking for anything spiritual but came to the conference because of the friends she had made in CO)

A Winter Update!

2009-02-04T15:03:00.002-06:00

What's been going on in Chapel Hill? 10 things!

1. It has snowed here twice and both times people have teetered close to the edge of insanity and North Carolina actually declared a state of emergency... it barely covered the ground.

2. Basketball season has started, which means me re-learning the names of all the players.

3. Our house has decided to be a safe zone for all the neighborhood mice, we've caught 4 :(

4. We hosted a super bowl party that 70 students came to

5. God provided my roommate Ashley's support and tonight will be her first time on campus, she will be going into Craige dorm to meet freshmen and we're praying that she meets lots of people who don't know Jesus.

6. I'm helping 3 sophomore girls start up Bible Studies for the freshmen they've met!

7. Our sophomore girls are studying the life of Jesus in the book of John, the staff women at UNC put together a study that looks at:
How Jesus is the Great I AM (Exodus 3:14-15 and John 8:58) How Jesus fulfills the prophecies of the Old Testament, How Jesus relates to women, Jesus as our source of life, Jesus as the light in the darkness, Jesus as the way to heaven, Jesus' relationship with His Father, and Jesus as the Gospel that we respond to.
-Every day they study a different verse or passage
-Every week they read two chapters of the book of John
-We are also leading them through a book called the Master Plan of Evangelism so they are better equipped to reach their fellow students
-They are held to memorizing 2-3 verses each week
-We go with them into the dorms and to meet their friends, modeling before them what ministry looks like!

8. Next weekend we are hoping to have 100 students go with us from NC State, Duke, and UNC-Chapel Hill to Asheville, NC for a Campus Outreach Ski Retreat!

9. When I'm not on campus, I am probably doing one of the following:
-meeting with someone on staff about what's going on in the Women's Movement on campus
-studying the book of Hosea in my personal time with God
-reading C.S. Lewis' Out of the Silent Planet (I love it! It's the first book in his space trilogy) or the Lost Women of the Bible by Carolyn Curtis James (this is what my women's accountability group is reading) and I am also reading Gordon MacDonald's Ordering your Private World (I really suck at time management and end up busier than I need to be!)
-planning for things on campus
-organizing stuff for retreat, campus meetings, meals for students, helping the other staff women with what's going on in their ministries.

10. I joined a church that I L-O-V-E! It's called The Summit and it's really passionate about reaching the city of Raleigh for Christ! Their mission is Love God. Love People. Love the World. They even have a pastor for Church Planting and their vision is to plant 1,000 churches around the world starting in the Research Triangle (Chapel Hill, Durham, and Raleigh). Woo hoo! Here's their web-site-- www.summitchurch.cc

What exactly is going on in Chapel Hill?!

2008-11-14T12:30:00.008-06:00

Okay so there is the thing that happens in life where we get really proud of how busy we are. It kinda goes like this...
"How are you doing?" Jack asks Jill
(Jill sighs dramatically and shakes her head) "I am writing a term paper for every class I've ever taken. Then I am playing on 7 intramural teams, each of which I am the captain. In between running for class president, I am running for president of the whole college. I have also decided to take up tap dancing and will be choreographing my own recital.... just another crazy week."
Then Jack starts nodding empathetically and tells Jill that he is doing all those things too but also trying to stop world hunger. He will probably beat her in the campaign for class president. Because of this, Jill gets mad and leaves.

So, the point is... we are busy Jack's and Jill's. I am not the busiest person on the planet, or even in my house. But there are some cool things that I get to do every day. They require a couple of cups of coffee in the morning, and usually one in the afternoon. I thought it'd be fun for you to hear about a typical week in the life of Ally, Campus Outreach staff woman here at UNC... (and included a couple of pic's of the students I meet with)

Sunday, November 9th- met a student at Panera for breakfast. Talked about her walk with God and ways I can help her grow. Drove to a park nearby, sat in the car listening to music, praying, and reading Scripture. Then we had a leaders meeting for the student leaders at my house. Ate at Whole Foods with another student Margaret on our way to church (we go to the pm service at the Summit www.summitchurch.cc). Worked in the nursery at church and tamed crazy 2-year-olds with Hannah Love, UNC sophomore. Drove home and sang Happy Birthday to my roommate Tiffany and ate cake. Did laundry. Brushed teeth, bed time.

Monday, November 10th- staff meeting at Cafe Carolina. Shared how we're doing and talked about recruiting students to Atlanta Conference. Afterwards, met with my campus director Bowe and talked about how my time was visiting my grandma. He told me I might need counseling for all my personal issues! This is kind of a joke, and kind of not. We then talked more about what's going on in the women's ministry. Spent time with Jesus, studied Proverbs 1:1-7. Went to my Summit Life group (Bible Study from the church) it is amazing, we talked about how we carry around a lot of guilt to try to pay for our sins when in reality, Christ did all the work for us on the cross... we are called to "confess our sin and have no further uneasiness about it" -Brother Lawrence. Drove to Raleigh and printed out my newsletters (Woohoo!) This took a very long time and many cusswords ran through my head as I tried to print the newsletters and failed many times before it came out right. Showered and went to bed at 3 am (eww).

Tuesday, November 11th- Got up early and went to Starbucks with Betsy. We talked about why we care so much about how we look and how stupid that is. We prayed that God would use us here and teach us how to love Him. Then from 9-1 we had a regional staff meeting (this includes the UNC and NC State staff). Drove home and planned for my Bible Study that night. Next I went to pick up acrylic paint and a big white sheet. The girls in my d-group and I painted a huge banner to welcome students to our weekly meeting (Wednesday nights at 9 pm). It was great except I spelled the word FABULOUS-- FABULOS. Big boo-boo, thankfully we had white paint. Then we had our weekly Bible Study together at 8 pm. We talked about and prayed for our friends on campus and studied the book of Galatians together. Love them, love it. The guys next door had a cookout and watched football with students they're ministering to, at 11 pm Jim brought me over a really good piece of bbq chicken. My roommates and I prayed and worked on our powderpuff football tournament.

Wednesday, November 12th- woke up and did my day of prayer (a 5 hour eval/scripture reading time that we do once a month) Then at 1pm, I got to meet with my friend Erin Coomer who is on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ. So great, she told me about a talk that she's giving in December at their big campus meeting and we shared stuff about our lives, realizing we have a ton in common. Love Erin, she refreshes me a lot! Then I went to the Starbucks on campus and met my friend Kayleigh who is a sophomore. She is thinking about studying abroad in Australia and wanted my advice about it. We talked and prayed together, so great. Next I hung out with Molly, a girl that is in my Bible Study, in her dorm room. We mostly talked about boys, and giggled a lot. After that is the highlight of the week---- our campus meeting! We call it 104 because we meet in Howell, 104 a room on campus. There were about 40 people there. We played Pictionary and the winner got a 50$ gift certificate for the Atlanta Conference. Daniel, the CO Regional Director at UNC, gave a talk on 6 reasons why people don't like Christians. So great, and at the end of it, he explained that real Christianity transforms your life and comes from understanding you are a sinner and that the only solution to mend your major eternal flaw is to enter into a relationship with Jesus. Afterwards we have food and talk to the students, I always look for new faces and try to make them feel welcome. Erik gave me a ride home and we talked about what we were gonna wear to DT and Kellie's wedding this weekend.

Thursday- went to Wendy's house (her husband is Daniel, our regional director) with Katie (also on staff) we drank coffee and shared what we've been learning. Then At 11, I met Kristi, a junior at UNC. She is trying to grow in her walk with God but doesn't know how. We're going to start studying the book of Romans together. Then I met with Morgan (another girl in my Bible Study) we talked and prayed for the students she is reaching out to (even though Morgan is only a sophomore, she knows a lot of students that don't know about God). Last night, I had 3 students spend the night- Margaret, Anne, and Sandra. It was a blast. We sang and jumped on my little trampoline. Then we went to bed, kind of. We mostly laughed and talked.

Friday (aka TODAY)- woke up early with my slumber party friends went to Bob Evan's for breakfast. Sandra and I stayed longest and talked about God for a while. She is in an early Judaism class. We talked about Jacob and how he was kind of a jerk. We decided we are really glad that God uses failed people like us to accomplish His purposes. So glad He doesn't ask us to be perfect, or even good. I think this is a new concept for Sandra. Came home and met with Nicole- shared with her Campus Outreach's definition of discipleship. Nicole got so excited! She is ready to reach out to women on this campus, that is an answered prayer. NOW... I am packing, listening to the Supremes sing "You can't hurry love" and getting ready to go to Myrtle Beach for my friends Kellie and DT's wedding!

If you are still reading this post, I am shocked. These are 5 days out of my week. Thanks for taking time to keep up with me and for your ongoing encouragement and support. Please keep me in your prayers :) Ally

Insomnia

2008-11-12T00:12:00.005-06:00

Okay so I am a pro at sleeping. It typically takes me 3 alarms to wake up in the morning... I have this really, exceptional roommate who is a human alarm as well. She touches my leg everyone 20 minutes, tells me to wake up in the sweetest voice, and sets hot coffee on my night stand... which makes me think that it's gonna be hard for me to find a husband who will measure up to her.

But falling asleep, sheesh, that is another story.

So I can't sleep tonight and thought that I could fill you in on this week. Well, not all of it, so I'll pick one part. And maybe by typing some things out they will leave my head and I will have less going on in my brain. It's like a circus in there.

So tonight I led this Bible Study that we actually call a discipleship group (every Tuesday night it starts at 7:30 pm and goes until someone complains and reminds me that they are college students and have work to do)

The girls in the group are Molly, Morgan, Margaret, and Nicole. We try to be nice to Nicole even though her name doesn't start with an "m" and she's from Honduras. These girls are amazing. They love serving this ministry, but even more so they love serving the kingdom of God

We have this map of the campus- each dorm that we know people in mapped out with multi-colored sharpies and every week we write down the girls we've met this semester and where they live. If any of these girls saw it, they would think we were majorly weird and stalking them. But really, we pray for them. We ask God to take these girls lives and transform them into women that love Him in a really radical way.

A lot of times, doing this gets the girls in my group talking... they tell me about meals they had this past week with girls on the chart. Or ways that they are seeing God move that girl closer to knowing Him. To us, each name is someone who God has made in His image and really, passionately loves. He has a plan for each of these girls and we are really hoping that He'll let us be part of that plan.

"Come, follow me," Jesus said. "And I will make you fishers of men..."

New Pictures...

2008-10-29T11:34:00.008-06:00

This is Stephen and I (in the front row) with our team of students at the Summer Project. There were 4 teams total this summer. In this picture, we just had our field day competition (relay races, team cheers, games) and we won... of course.

Here is a picture of me with the other team leader girls. We lived in a room together this summer and helped run/organize the project. On this night, we dressed up for an event we put on called the "Nursing Home Boogie" all the students dressed up like old people (wore depends diapers, walked around stopped over, put baby-powder in their hair) and we had a dance, an applesauce eating contest, and bingo...

One of the students, Katie a senior at Coastal Carolina University, worked at Liberty Inn in Epcot. This is her in the hotel room one day after work showing off her fancy uniform!

This picture is back in Chapel Hill one Sunday after church- Susie, Anne, Sandra, and Katherine are sophomores at UNC that I met last year and continue to get to know and spend time with!

Two of my favorite students took me out to dinner for my birthday and got me flowers!

Better late...very, very, very late... than never!

2008-10-29T11:10:00.003-06:00

Hello friends and family! I am sick today. And after browsing BBC and Nordstroms.com, and responding to old, old e-mails, it popped into my mind to update my blog! Here is what has been going on via a month-by-month update...

1. May 2008- said good-bye to most of the students for the summer, took a course at Wheaton College towards a Masters degreed called: Spiritual Formation and Witness. Had the joy of studying and experiencing God with students from Uganda, Rwanda, Brazil, and Boston, MA! We spent 5 days dialogging over prayer, how not to always be so busy, American materialism, and how to engage with what God is always doing around us. After that I took a vacation with my dad and my best friend Betsy to Nevada! Dad played poker and Betsy and I enjoyed all the lights, swimming pools, good food and a Cirque de Soleil show that Vegas had to offer.

2. June 1st 2008- drove to Orlando, FL for Campus Outreach's Summer Project. Here we had 150 students (31 from UNC and NC STATE!) come to learn about God and work at Disney World for 2 months! Students live in a hotel and we get them a job working 40 hours a week at Disney. In the evenings, they attended meetings where they learned how to grow in their relationship with Christ. There were also a ton of social activities for them.
I was there with the students for 2 months! I was a team-leader. My friend Stephen and I led a team of 35 students. We helped the different rooms on our team get to know each other, grow in their faith by meeting with them one-on-one-- often showing them how to study the Bible, and sought to develop in their planning and leadership skills by putting together a big weekly meeting! (the big weekly meeting includes skits, worship music, and a talk... the students learn how to do these over the summer then they do them on their different campuses throughout the school year!)

3. August 1st 2008- left Orlando (Very, very sad after all the new friendships I made) and drove to Chapel Hill! Two of my roommates from last year got engaged and I had to find a new living arrangement. God is so faithful. The house I live in this year is even closer to campus and bigger. I rent a room in this house along with 4 other girls. 2 are also on staff with campus outreach and the other 2 are graduate students at UNC.

4. August 22nd- 1st day of class! We helped students move into the dorms and showed our sophomore student leaders (those who want to learn how to minister to their peers here at UNC) how to reach out and build friendships with those around them. We asked many of them to go to the dorms with us and meet freshman. We have been following up with the new people we've met ever since... cooking meals for them, inviting them and their friends to tailgate with us, bringing them to our campus meetings, we held a retreat for the students, visited them in the dorms, eat with them in the cafeterias, asking them to our awesome church (www.summitchurch.cc) , but overall building friendships with them and asking God to give us boldness and creativity as we point these students to the purpose life they can find in a relationship with Jesus.

April Rewind...

2008-04-29T16:58:00.011-06:00

Strange places that I slept this month.

In a box...

An organization at UNC hosted a night called "Box Out" it was an opportunity for students to experience homelessness in a small way by giving up the comforts of home for a night. Two of my favorite friends I've made this year- Anne and Sandra- asked me to be a part of their box community so of course I said yes, good opportunity to sleep outside. Our box was in the shape of a castle, amazing! I really enjoyed this night, met some great students who really cared about empathizing with people in the community who were less fortunate than them.

On the beach...
One night at the cafeteria freshmen Lizzy and Katherine were saying how much they wanted to go on a road trip to the beach but couldn't find a ride. So I said that I would take them! We drove 3 hours to Wilmington and slept on the beach. The next morning we watched the sunrise and drove back to Chapel Hill so they could get to class in time! The girls and I had a blast bonding in the car- we talked a lot about relationships and how to build a relationship that is focused on honoring God. On the way home we listened to an awesome sermon about how lots of people think that Christians are really narrow-minded, it started a great discussion.

On this deflated airmatress...
This airmatress just stays in my car, I don't even bother putting it back in the house! For the last 3 weekends I have gone on a road trip to Charleston, SC for planning/leadership training for this summer! I have been asked to be a team leader at our Summer Orlando Project-- it's a cool role where I will work about 15 hours at Disney, play a part in organizing the Project meals and socials, and lead a team of 40 students along with my team leader partner Stephen. To lead this team, I get to spend a lot of time with Sarah, Adria, Felicia, and Alex- four girls that are going to be room leaders. They get to experience discipleship first hand for the first time. The girls in their rooms this summer will have the joy of having a woman who walks with God pour into their lives- teaching them how to study the Word, pray, reach out to their co-workers at Disney World, and learn how to tend to their heart and character to walk with Jesus for a life-time! I love it, it is an honor to help lead and develop these women.

This picture is of me and Zach-- Zach is on staff with Campus Outreach at NC State and will also be a team leader this summer in Orlando.

Love is in the air...

2008-03-26T08:12:00.005-06:00

Two of my favorite people are engaged!

Katie, my roommate and fellow Campus Outreach worker, is marrying her boyfriend Landon, a CO staff guy at NC State, this October! Woo hoo, I will miss her so much but am gaining an awesome new staff worker since Landon is gonna move to our campus and help us reach more men! Katie and I have lived together the last 3 years and I've learned so much about God from her

Katie, my SISTER, is marrying her boyfriend Drew! She came to visit me last week and Saturday when she flew back to Chicago Drew popped the question. When I tell people about the two of them I tell them about how I don't know how two people could be better matched up. If I could handpick a guy for my sister, it would be Drew. The joy I feel about a guy like him joining our family is inexplainable. He brings so much laughter and depth to our relationships, particularly how he loves my sister and is a big brother to Steven. I see God reign in their relationship and they are so in love and selfless towards one another. This is such good news.

Memorial Service

2008-03-26T07:56:00.004-06:00

As I said in my last post, I went with some students to a memorial service about Eve Carson last week. There were over 10,000 students, faculty, family, and friends of Eve in the Dean Dome and the service was so beautiful. Eve's friends said the most wonderful words about her, they described her as one of those rare people that you meet that longs to change the world and is actually doing something about it. Here is a little of what the student body president just before Eve, Seth Dearmin, said about her:

"Eve was certainly more than a laundry list of superlatives [...] Let us today shed our last moments of silence for Eve. For though she led her life fully, she was not able to lead a full life. From this point forward, we must speak loudly and act boldly. Eve's mantle has been passed to us."

Eve was a prestigious Morehead-Cain scholar and a North Carolina Fellow who studied abroad in Cuba and spent summers volunteering in Ecuador, Egypt and Ghana as part of a school program. She was a political science and biology major. She was one of the top students in the class and was valedictorian of her high school. People just adored her, she was always dancing and making people laugh. Her best friend Anna said that Eve genuinely loved getting to know people and validated them when ever she could.

Walking up the bleachers I started thinking to myself how rare a life like Eve's is because there aren't many people out there who believe they can make a difference in this world. I thought to myself- although I likely don't have the courage to do so-that I would like to trade my life for Eve's, so that she might go on living and impacting people. Then it dawned on me in a way that's what I'm doing here at Chapel Hill. I will likely never travel like she did and achieve academically but perhaps I can lay down my life in order that students here at UNC will know Christ in a deeper way. Knowing God through relationship with Jesus is the only thing we can do with our lives that will truly bring transformation. And that will last forever.

And you don't have to be a full-time campus minister to do so, you can trade your life for other people's just by spending some of your time praying for them, offering a listening ear even when you need to be doing something else, and by sharing what God has given you.

Eve Carson

2008-03-17T17:09:00.004-06:00

The Thursday before I left Carolina for Spring Break there was a lot of commotion in the Student Union. I was meeting with a student and we asked the editors of the Daily Tar Heel (the school newspaper) what was going on- they told us that the unidentified student shot the morning before was actually student body president Eve Carson.

School police made an announcement a few moments later and as some of her friends found out for the first time that Eve was lost to them, a lot of emotion and anger came out. It was so sad to see these students grieve.
Having lost a few friends myself, I can kind of relate even though all of our sufferings are so different.
Last week they found out that the men that shot Eve were in a gang in nearby Durham, they had also shot a student from Duke University in January.
Please pray for the students right now, not just here at UNC but all over the country. And pray for the people who have known nothing but violence and find their lives wasted away by the influence of gangs.
There is a memorial at the Dean Smith center tomorrow for Eve and I am going with a few freshman girls, I pray that we can somehow find Christ together in the midst of so much hurt.
I was stunned to realize the impact Eve's short life made on this world- look at this web-site to learn more about her and the ways her one life has changed things:

http://universityrelations.unc.edu/alert/carson/

Prayer Request

2008-02-28T12:00:00.003-06:00

Okay so lately there have been some really good things happening here in Chapel Hill. Last weekend at our first retreat in Asheville, NC, a girl named Nicole- from Honduras- a freshman at UNC gave her life to Christ and it has been amazing to see how her life has changed and her heart has truly been revived by Jesus. Another girl- Margaret, also a freshman here at UNC, realized that she gave her life to Christ for the first time at our Christmas Conference and she is so eager to share this with her friends that are trying to find joy in partying and relationships. I was able to share the gospel with one of these girls- her name is Mimi- last week and am having her over for dinner tonight to follow that up and ask her if she has given any more thought to surrendering her life!

But the further I get into friendships with different women here, the more I am becoming burdened and broken over the hurts in their lives. They have lost close friends in car accidents, had family members suddenly killed, seen their fathers leave their mothers, watched loved ones die of cancer... they wake up and are pushed to succeed academically and socially every day but in their hearts there are deep unanswered questions that lead them to struggle with anxiety and depression.

The blanket of emptiness I see these girls wrestling with makes me hurt. I am not a counselor nor a doctor yet I long to cure them of the pains they carry! There are about 15 girls I am reaching out to right now and each of them is struggling with the claims of Jesus in different ways. If he truly is the Son of God who has come to change our lives and bust our paradigms about religion, then it may cause a major life change for them. It is really challenging me to spend time in the Word, asking God to reveal to me who He is and how He would like me to share Him specifically with each of these women He has placed in my life.

Please join me in prayer as I ask Him to show me specific passages in Scripture to share with these women and for Him to minister to them in their pain in a way that only He can!

Praying that God will break up all unplowed ground like He promises in Hosea 10:12--
"Sow for yourselves righteousness,
reap the fruit of unfailing love,
and break up your unplowed ground;
for it is time to seek the LORD,
until he comes
and showers righteousness on you."

Some January News...

2008-01-23T08:43:00.000-06:00

"What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight; what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs" -Matthew 10:27
Hello! I hope you are having a wonderful week! Life in Chapel Hill has been very sweet this past week. God is doing amazing things in different areas of my life...

We have a women's accountability group (about 7 staff women) that has been meeting weekly since September. Sadly, until last week this time was relatively shallow. We would talk about our lives but never go much beyond the surface of our hearts. Last week we asked each other "What about this group makes you fearful?" and "What is something about you that you are afraid the women in this group won't give you grace for?" I said that I am often fearful that I will share something deep and personal and be met with blank stares. That the issues of my life aren't important to the people around me. I told the girls that I am afraid I won't get grace for being a messy person, a person with so many flaws that sometimes I fear that if people knew who I really was, not just who I seem to be on the outside, they wouldn't love me very much at all. God really showed up during this time and in our honesty brought each of us to a place of deeper trust in Him and in one another.
Bible studies! My staff partner Kellie and I are starting up a Bible study for 7 girls that are interested in walking deeper with God! Some of these girls may not have even surrendered their lives to Christ yet. Their names are Morgan, Sally, Elizabeth, Katherine, Lizzy, Freddie, and Margaret. Each of these girls are so full of life and personality. They each struggle in different ways to believe that God loves them. I can't wait to learn more about them and about Christ through leading this study.
We have started to meet in the mornings at 8 to get in the Word at a coffee shop near all of our homes. It is really changing me. I used to try to spend time alone with God at whatever point in the afternoons I had free time but having this set time in the morning helps me sit still and engage with God in a deeper way than I would on my own.
I am part of a party planning committee! Katie, Erik, Tony and I meet every Tuesday to plan events and then present them the following day to our staff team. We are working on planning a Superbowl party for the students. Last Saturday we had an all girls sleepover at our house! It was great, 13 girls spent the night! We played pranks on the boys down the street (the picture is of a few of us before we attacked their home!) and ate lots of pizza and watched Father of the Bride. The next morning many of these girls accompanied us to church, for some of them it was their first time attending church since arriving at college. This upcoming Saturday the boys are playing Flag Football and the girls are having a Miss America Party- we're asking girls to bring their high school prom dress (or providing them a dress via our abundant bridesmaid attire!) and watching the Miss America Pageant. Erik has agreed to come as our host and during the commercials we're going to have a fun pageant of our own complete with toilet paper sashes. These events help bring students and staff together, ultimately for the gospel to be shared, lives to be changed, and God to be glorified!

Atlanta Conference 2007

2008-01-14T11:13:00.000-06:00

We started praying for students to come with our staff team to the Atlanta Conference last October. Since students had never come with us on a retreat or to a campus meeting, we felt like only God could compel them to give up a portion of their Christmas break, spend the money it cost to go, and be around people they didn't know very well for 5 whole days. Our prayer was that 5 girls and 5 guys from UNC would decide to join us at the conference.... amazingly 6 girls and 4 boys from UNC came, 2 boys from Duke, and 19 students from NC State took a bus from Raleigh to Atlanta to go to the Campus Outreach Christmas Conference (ATL 2007). The picture above is of some UNC girls hanging out after an evening rally.

Many of our UNC staff were involved in planning the Conference. There were over 1,000 students from CO Gulf Coast, CO Charleston, CO Augusta, and the new region that I'm a part of... CO Raleigh! I work with these hilarious guys, Bowe and Tony and they spent weeks planning for their roles as the conference MC's, listed below are some of the videos that they made.
Here are some guys playing flag football on their free day:

The best part of the conference was seeing God show up in these students lives. The theme was "More than a Cliche..." and the various speakers delivered messages focused on God's love being more than a cliche. One speaker said that if you don't understand God's love for you, you miss out on an incredibly important aspect of having a relationship with Him. Over the course of the conference, many students decided to give their lives to following Jesus! These students will surely make an impact on their campus, in their families, and in the lives of so many they encounter as they grow in their relationship with God!

Here are some girls from UNC breakin' it down at our New Years' Eve Dance Party!

My friend Jim took some great pictures of the main conference room and then another here of students listening to a seminar:

End of semester update

2008-01-04T23:01:00.000-06:00

"Look at the nations and watch--

and be utterly amazed.
For I am going to do something in your days
that you would not believe, not even if you were told."
Habakkuk 1:5

Hello! It has been one of those nights where those of you that support and love this ministry I am a part of have been heavy on my heart and in my prayers.
Thank you for your role in making Christ known throughout this campus! Here are some of the events that students came to towards the end of the semester!

A holiday cookie party! We had over 40 girls at our home to drink hot chocolate and cider, decorate dozens of cookies, and watch the holiday favorite Elf. It was such a great chance for students to connect with one another and feel welcomed in our home. It was also a chance for us to tell students about the upcoming Christmas Conference.

Our first campus meeting! We invited students that we were connected to to come and hear about the Atlanta Conference Campus Outreach puts on every New Years. Nearly 30 students came to hear about why the conference is worth their time and travel (it's nearly 6 hours from Raleigh) and to hang out with one another!

I will post more about this later- but we had an amazing time at the conference! 31 students from Campus Outreach Raleigh (UNC and NC State) joined us at the conference (God exceeded our expectations, as a staff we prayed for a total of 20 students to come, that's 10 students to come from each campus). Some of these students made commitments to follow Christ for the first time in their life. Each was so thankful for the opportunity to learn how to grow in their faith and experience God's love on a deeper level.

Great Song

2007-11-14T14:14:00.000-06:00

These days I am listening to Sara Groves, these are the lyrics to a wonderful song by her that I often listen to before going on campus!

Lord I have a heavy burden of all I've seen and know
It's more than I can handle
But your word is burning like a fire shut up in my bones
and I cannot let it go

And when I'm weary and overwrought
with so many battles left unfought

I think of Paul and Silas in the prison yard
I hear their song of freedom rising to the stars
And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them

Lord it's all that I can't carry and cannot leave behind
but your word has compelled me
when I think of all who've gone before me and lived the faithful life

And when I'm weary and overwrought
with so many battles left unfought

I think of Paul and Silas in the prison yard
I hear their song of freedom rising to the stars

I see the shepherd Moses in the Pharaoh's court
I hear his call of freedom for the people of the Lord

And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them
And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them

I see the long quiet walk along the Underground Railroad
I see the slave awakening to the value of her soul

I see the young missionary and the end of the spear
I see his family returning with no trace of fear

I see the long hard shadows of Calcutta nights
I see the sisters standing by the lepers side

I see the young girl huddled on the brothel floor
I see the man with a passion come and kicking down the door

I see the man of sorrows and his long troubled road
I see the world on his shoulders and my easy load

And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them
And when the Saints go marching in
I want to be one of them

November Update!

2007-11-12T13:10:00.000-06:00

Hello! Greetings from Chapel Hill :) Fall here is so beautiful

I am thankful to have internet today, our house is in and out...
Things are going good here! Sadly I have pneumonia so it is slowing down my energy and efforts on campus but God is teaching me a lot. Since I can't always do all the things I've wanted to the last week, I am forced to pray more and that has been a blessing
Here are some of the things going on!

-We are continuing to meet, meet, meet girls. I have gone by myself more and knock on doors in the dorms. When girls answer, I just tell them that I'm trying to get to know people in their building. We will talk for a while about where we're from, I ask them about their courses, their time so far at UNC, then I go on my way! I will go back a few days later and seek a deeper conversation. Then I will ask the girl if she'd want to get coffee or dinner in the cafeteria sometime. My hope is to build many friendships through which I can tell people about Jesus.

-At this point in the semester, many of these girls I have seen and connected with repeatedly are starting to be interested in what I'm about. Why I live my life the way I do and the reason for the joy that I have. Please pray that I will be bold and listen to the Holy Spirit's guidance in having these life changing conversations with women.

-Through prayer, I can tell that some of the girls I have met so far are very important to God. I can tell that He wants them to be part of His kingdom and that He wants them to influence other men and women at UNC. I love meeting so many amazing women and having a burden for their lives! So many of them are lost and looking for a reason and purpose by which to live their lives.

-We do not invite students to come to a weekly meeting and rarely ask them to be in a Bible Study. We do have two Bible studies running, one for a group of guys and one for a group of girls, but ideally we will continue meeting lots and lots of people and then start Bible Studies next semester. Why do we do this? Because we want to stay on their turf. We want these students to know that we're committed to their lives not just trying to recruit them to come to something.

-But... we do have a conference coming up! Hopefully after spending lots of time with these students, they'll be willing to come with us to a conference in Atlanta over New Years to see what we're all about. At that conference they'll get a big picture of how Campus Outreach works, the awesome community that we have, see thousands of students connected to CO across NC, SC, and Georgia, and hear the Gospel! I am pumped up. Please join me in prayer that many students from UNC will come to the conference and be changed by the love of Jesus :)

Thanks for reading this update! I love you! I am so thankful for your partnership and would love to hear from you: allyireneholm@gmail.com
Blessings and joy to you, Ally

October Pictures

2007-10-15T11:38:00.001-06:00

Kate, Karmen, and me before the UNC v. USC (University of South Carolina) game at our tailgate. It was the first time the Tarheels and Gamecocks had played each other in 16 years. There were so many people! Over 60,000 fans came to Chapel Hill to see the "Battle of the Carolinas" and, sadly, UNC lost 15-21.

Campus Outreach Tailgate, woop woop!

Landon and Erik (the Wolf-pack and the Rams!)

I love the tv show the Office and am thankful that UNC students love it too. Every Thursday at 9pm we pick up girls from the dorms to come to our cool house to watch our favorite characters sell paper at Dunder Mifflin Inc. It's a great time to laugh together and connect with students before the weekend (Here we have Kellie, Wendy, Claire, me, Sally, Karmen, Ashley, Megan, Whitney, Caitlin, Morgan, and Hannah)

Update Central

2007-10-15T11:24:00.000-06:00

Soooo I am sorry. I think about blogging everyday! I am just lame and don't make time to do it, but here I am! With lots of exciting things to say because they have been storing up in my head since Sept. 25th :)
Here are a few key points about life as a staff person with Campus Outreach...
*It never ends! I dream about the dorms
*I love it! I love meeting students and going to events and figuring out how much Carolina blue I can cover myself in at one time. I love figuring out how to reach this campus and what the world-view of these students is and how they spend their days. I love learning about them, what their insecurities are but also the magnitude of their dreams. I love seeing the way that God has His guiding hand on their lives and the way each of these students reflect Him in some way... whether it be through their love for one another, their humor, their excellence, their intelligence, their skills, or their experiences
*You eat a lot... we cook hot dogs on the big grill to tailgate for football, we bake lasagna and garlic bread for girls from the dorm, we scarf down international food in the cafeteria on cultural awareness night, cheese fries at the soccer games, and chex mix with M & M's when we watch The Office! At least I have a new area to relate to the freshmen- gaining those infamous, extra 15 lbs :)
*I am learning, learning, learning. A couple weeks ago I went to a forum on abortion and never knew so much about student's passion and knowledge over this issue. I am learning about politics and who students think I should vote for in the 2008 election. I am learning how to live with my roommates and not be so messy! I am learning how to budget my money to glorify God with my finances. But most wonderfully, I am learning about God and for the first time in my life realizing how real and purposeful He is! I just didn't see it all before.

I love to tailgate

2007-09-25T13:20:00.000-06:00

So I've learned a new term over the last two weeks. A tailgater is not someone that eats b-b-q in a parking lot before a football game, it is someone that lingers outside a dorm waiting for a student to use their id to open the door so that they can sneak in behind the student. This is illegal according to campus security and I am waiting to get in trouble!

I stand outside, sometimes pretending to be on my cellphone and scan the quad for students walking up to their dorms so I can sneakily follow them inside. I don't do this often because it is ideal to know students inside the dorm that will come down and let you in but we are at a place in our ministry where we are investigating the campus and being around the students on their turf is one of the best ways to find out what they love and how they spend their time.

Going into the dorms to meet freshman is only a small part of my job. I am asked to be in one of the 28 dorms at least an hour a day. It is one of my favorite things to do. Students love having random visitors. I know I am usually being used as a new form of procrastination for these school-lovers but at least they talk to me!

Today was my first time eating in the cafeteria. Ashley and I sat down with a girl from Charlotte who was not very interested in getting to know us. Thankfully there was a table full of girls next to us. We started asking them about the food around campus and they gave us a ton of info! We laughed together and talked about their experience as freshman. They shared with us about walking the big hills to get to class, fears over deciding a major, the pressures they face in pledging sororities, and how they stay connected to one another during such a busy phase in life.
Tonight I'm going to do 3 different things to try to meet students!
1. Stopping by a Spike Lee movie and discussion called When the Levee's Broke, a documentary on hurricane Katrina
2. Checking out a meet and greet with TIME Magazine photographer Steve Liss for broadcast journalism majors
3. Going to a new dormitory to visit my new friend Lauren I met at lunch today. I won't have to be sketchy and sneak in :)
Everyday our amazing God reminds me of the ways that He is opening doors for the Gospel to be known at this campus even if it's in unexpected ways.

First Week in Chapel Hill

2007-09-12T09:50:00.000-06:00

Hello! I hope you are doing very, VERY well!
I am loving life these days. Living in NC has been very different, hard, yet a sweet time of life.

God is gentle and gracious in showing me Himself here.

Our house is wonderful! Last minute the home we expected fell through; however, we are now renting a home even closer to campus! We moved in on Monday and have been getting adjusted (i.e. I am attempting to hang things in my room and it is all crooked). I was SO blessed to have dear friends lend me their furniture so I did not have to buy any, I am quite the fan of not buying things with this new budget I am on!

Here are some of the things that happened this week...
1. We are allowed to go on campus! This is a big deal. When you start an organization particularly a ministry at a new school there is some red tape to get through. You are not allowed to simply walk on campus and start meeting students. You have to be approved by the Student Activities office and sometimes this can take many months. We are thankful that UNC is glad to have us here. In the next couple weeks we will get i.d. cards that will allow us to go to the dining hall and the gym, two places students go to a lot. The boys on our team are anxious to get out on the basketball court and start meeting guys that way.
2. On Sunday we went to the Church of the Good Shepherd. The first girl I went up to to talk to was from Naperville! She went to Waubonsie high school and lives near my parents. She is a freshman here at UNC and just pledged the sorority ADPi. We are having lunch tomorrow!
3. Our staff meetings have been wonderful. This morning we listened to a talk by pastor Tim Keller. It was about how the gospel is intended to consume our lives with love and worship for Jesus. He spoke about how the Bible is not about us and what we should do, it is not a self-help manual. Rather it is all about Jesus. Everything in the Bible points to Jesus, from Genesis to Revelation it is the story of His redeeming sacrifice. Sometimes we tend to hear teachings and decide we want to do things and attempt to change our selves. But apart from Christ, we can do no good thing. It is His grace and mercy alone that saves us! Talking about the gospel reminds me what I want to share with students. I do not want to teach them that they need to live a better life in order to walk with God but rather to receive the forgiveness and joy that Jesus extends.
4. We are spending a lot of time helping each other move in and not get lost so much! I get lost everywhere I go and still haven't found the grocery store which is a sad story for my roommates because I live off of their cereal (and the chocolate cake our friends brought us). Thankfully, our staff team lives within a mile of each other. Three married couples live in an apartment complex up the road and our studly single men live in a home down the road.
5. Last night Kellie, Megan, and I went into the dorms together to meet some girls. I was terrified. The dorms here are enormous and there are so many of them. It is hard not to be overwhelmed. Before we went I prayed that God would remind me that every one of the thousands of freshman in the dorms was created by Him and He loves each one of them and desires each of them to know Himself. We went and hung out in our friend Hannah's room. I am learning to dodge people's questions about why I am hanging out in the dorms if I have already graduated! I wear my back-pack everywhere and try to look like I am 18.

St. Francis of Assisi

2007-09-06T13:12:00.001-06:00

This is a favorite prayer of mine; I found it in a book about Mother Teresa. Her and the nuns of Missionaries of Charity would pray it every morning.

"Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen."
-St. Francis of Assisi, Prayer of Peace

Going to the Chapel...

2007-09-03T16:26:00.001-06:00

Hello! I hope that you had a wonderful labor day weekend. Chicago has been more beautiful than usual and I have loved being here the last few weeks.
Tomorrow I am moving to Chapel Hill! It is certainly time. Our ministry maintains a policy that staff cannot come to campus unless we are at our full financial support. God has been so faithful to provide for me so that I can give all of my time to helping students find their way to Him.
To be honest,I am nervous about moving, I do not know what this year holds for me. But I have hope in my heart that something wonderful will happen.

Here are some recent answers to prayers...

-The single staff guys (Erik, Will, and Jim) have found a great house to rent near campus

-Campus Outreach has been well received by the other campus ministries at UNC; they're excited to have us there and to partner with us in reaching out to students!

-2 couples on our staff team have returned from their honeymoons (Claire and Tony and Ashley and Bowe) and are getting settled in their new apartments and enjoying married life

-one student that is connected to our team shared the gospel with an exchange student from Australia and has been getting to know her better!

Commissioned

2007-08-27T09:38:00.000-06:00

What an amazing week! I am done with support raising, am currently in Columbia, SC, and am driving to Raleigh tomorrow! I will be getting the rest of my stuff from Chicago as well as wrapping up a few things and then start on campus next week.

Here are some pictures of this weekend. Our team met for the day and shared about our summers and what God is teaching us. We were commissioned by First Presbyterian Church of Augusta, they shared what we're doing with their church and laid hands over us and prayed. We ate a lot and talked and laughed of course. I can't wait to work beside these amazing people.

The whole Raleigh team:

University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill team:

North Carolina State team:

A Vision to Give Your Life To

2007-08-20T11:50:00.001-06:00

I have always been a pretty passionate person and when I find something I love, I give all my attention to it. When I find a song I enjoy, I listen to it non-stop. I learned how to cook one vegetable in college- green beans! People that I've cooked for throughout the years know to expect them as a never-fail-side-dish. The only t.v. show I watch is the Office (season premier is Sept. 21st), I can quote almost all the lines! And if I'm in the middle of a good book (i.e. the latest Harry Potter) I will most certainly ignore your phone call until I've finished every page.

I always hoped I would find a job that I love, a job that I couldn't wait to wake up to every day. As a religion and psychology major in college, I thought that I would go overseas after graduation and help women who were in despair, perhaps those emotionally crippled by the sex trade in Thailand or train missionaries to meet the needs of HIV sufferers in Africa.

But God called me to share Him with college students, often priviledged young people who have financial means and great possibility laid before their lives. God has reminded me that even if we have all of our physical needs met, without Him as our savior, all that can be counted as a "gain" in this world will be lost. And that great possibility does not always equal great hope, we can be physically rich but in our hearts, very poor.

A couple weeks ago, we had a staff meeting in which a leader said: "The vision of Campus Outreach is worth your life." That really stuck with me and I haven't been able to shake it out of my mind.

How often do we find something that is really worth giving our one life to? Maybe I'll be connected to this ministry for just a few years but it is definitely worth all of me. If it wasn't for the women that shared their faith with me, I would be navigating through this world without Jesus and I do not think that that would be a life worth giving to anything at all.

Charleston, SC

2007-08-07T11:46:00.000-06:00

Hello friends! I hope that you're doing wonderful! I have not written for a long time on this, exactly a month! I often wonder what events in my life merit a post that is worth your time to read and it's almost always... nothing! I hope you simply enjoy hearing about a very small part of what God is doing to redeem others back to Himself!
I am currently in Charleston, South Carolina sitting at my most favorite Starbucks, it earns this glorious title because of the giant tree that sits outside the large window I always choose to face. I have been here for many hours with my stationary box, taking note of my car and how its contents are melting in this 105 degree heat!

I had a wonderful drive to South Carolina last week, my first time making the 14 hour trek alone and had a successful trip which was definitely a result of many prayers! I guess people don't trust my driving very much and the idea of me making a cross-country trip alone prompted a great deal of concerned phone calls. But thanks to Harry Potter on cd and the beautiful scenery as I drove through the Blue Ridge Mountains, the day flew by.

This past weekend I had the honor of standing up in one of my dearest friend's weddings. Ashley played a BIG role in telling me the story of God's love for us. As a freshman at college I felt lost and did not know what my purpose in this big world was. She took me under her wing and shared her faith and life with me. A big part of this life was her adoration of a handsome football player- Bowe Butler. But a problem with Ashley's feelings for Bowe was that she lived with them for four
(the picture is of me and fellow bridesmaids and future roomies Kellie and Katie!) years, never knowing whether or not the affection was reciprocated. After 4 1/2 years and lots of prayer, Bowe felt like it was the right time to let Ashley know that he loved her. They began dating last October, were engaged in January, and married this past weekend. It was so amazing to watch these people that waited so long for God's timing to stand before Him and declare their promise to love each other forever... and ever! They are now on their honeymoon in Mexico. Both Ashley and Bowe will be serving the Lord along side of me at UNC this fall.

C.I.Y.

2007-07-08T13:29:00.000-06:00

This past week I was able to hang out with 80 awesome students and leaders from CCC church in Naperville. We went to a conference called CIY- Christ in Youth (www.ciy.com) held at Hope College in Michigan- so beautiful- it's where my sister goes. At the end of the trip my mom asked me if I got anything out of the week since I've been on so many conferences, retreats, etc. I told her that it was honestly one of the most wonderful times I've spent growing closer to the Lord! Here's some of the reasons why!
1. The Music- even though the worship leaders wore v-neck shirts that revealed their hairy man chests, I LOVED the music and had so much joy over singing beside the students. It was awesome to look around the auditorium and see 1,000+ people praising God, singing and dancing.
2. The other leaders- I was able to have awesome talks and see the giftedness of the leaders there. Alison H and I had a talk one night- she told me about how conversational her relationship with God is, how she often talks to Him aloud, sometimes getting so choked up by the fact that when she prays she is ushered into God's presence. What an awesome reminder of how near our Creator is.
3. My small group! I was able to lead a small group with Shawn Williams who is the youth group leader at CCC. He made me laugh so much and when students shared in our group I could hear in them their excitement about God and desire to follow Him with their lives. These kids are so different from one another but they are united for sure by their passion.
4. Plexiglass- so there were these plexi-glass walls put up all over the auditorium one night and during worship, the speaker told the students to go write on the walls a few words that described the painful issues in their lives. I walked around and looked at the hundreds of words and saw so many things that broke my heart- depression, rape, abuse, divorce... these students are living in a very broken world. There were so many times throughout the week I was moved to tears by the stories some of the high school girls shared with me. But there is hope. So many of them realized that healing can come from the love and connection we're all made for through Jesus. That night some staff of CIY prayed for 14 hours for every un-named individual that wrote on the plexi-glass and for their pain. Definitely an example of how God seeks to be a part of our every hurt and enter into it with us
5. Ones- The theme of the week was ONES- Here is the mission statement I found on the CIY website about the week (the picture below is some of our students holding hands and singing):

"In our differences, we are the same. We are a wide spectrum of people, with distinctive traits and talents, each reflecting a different characteristic of God. Each of us is playing a role in a saga so big that it can not be confined by time or space.
In our pockets of isolation, we search for significance and yearn for true community. So we come together, broken and injured, looking for a place to rest. Some come to support, some come to be healed, in coming together, are made whole.
They all come to be known, to matter. We are here as more than just a number or a statistic. We are here because we were created to bring value. We are here to make her laugh, to cause him to think, to convict them, and to grow. Here to be more than just ONE person, ONE failure, ONE sinner, or ONE saint. We are here as a part of the ONES. And we are here…

…Because we were never meant to be alone."

A real home... at the hill!

2007-07-03T13:04:00.000-06:00

Yahtzee! We (Me, Kellie, Katie, and Megan) have a wonderful house that is less than 1/2 mile from the UNC-Chapel Hill Campus, so I can totally walk/roller blade/ride my bike there every day. A supporter that we had in Raleigh decided that this would be a good investment so we are very excited. I am especially excited about the abundance of bookshelves and all the pretty trees.

Classes at Wheaton

2007-06-25T11:41:00.000-06:00

This past week I have had the privilege to take two classes at Wheaton College. In order to earn a semester's worth of credit in 3 days, I had to read an average of 7 books for each class, sit still and focus for 9 hours at a time, and write a whole notebook full of class notes! It was SO worth it though. I LOVED being at the school, sitting on the trees and eating lunch with new friends and being at a campus where so many amazing people learned to follow God.

The first class I took was called Planting and Reproducing Growing Churches and it was taught by the two wonderful, innovative founders of Community Christian Church in Naperville, IL- Dave and John Ferguson. These guys have helped thousands of people find their way back to God through their church structure and strategy to reach the Chicago area (www.newthing.org). I never knew anything about church planting before I started prepping for this class and now it is definitely on my radar as a BIG way that God is working in the world to let people know of His purpose and presence!

After 3 days of interesting discussion and knowledge from the Fergusons I showed up for Jerry Root's class on C.S. Lewis. We spent two days talking about the Romantic publications and thoughts of Lewis (which doesn't just mean lovey dovey poetry but instead some real deal heart based theology) and then one day focusing on the Reason approach Lewis had to literature. One of the most interesting lectures Dr. Root presented to us was Lewis' journey from atheism to Christianity. As one of the most influential minds in this past century- thought to be true by those inside and outside the faith- Lewis' brilliant understanding of God can make a huge difference in the life of readers from all backgrounds! My favorite books by Lewis that I would recommend are...

Mere Christianity- Lewis leads the reader through his pilgrimage from doubt to faith with some awesome tips along the way
The Great Divorce- This piece of fiction provides a really interesting look at heaven and hell with characters that you can totally identify with. It's scary to see hell from this perspective but the hope of what heaven could be like is worth your time and thoughts.
Screwtape Letters- This fictional book describes the conversations between a senior devil and his nephew, also a scary view on what hell might be like as well as the ways that eternity influences how we live our lives in the present

Ones I can't wait to read based on my classmates' perspective...

The Silver Chair and Voyage of the Dawn Treader (both from the Chronicles of Narnia series)
Surprised by Joy (Lewis' autobiography on how he came to faith)
God in the Dock (a bunch of theological essays I probably won't understand!)

The Happiest Place on Earth

2007-06-20T16:35:00.000-06:00

Disney World!! It never gets old, I love it every time. One of the contacts we made at Disney said that Campus Outreach staff could have a day to play in the parks, under the guise that we were "inspecting the working conditions of our students." Ha! After stacking strollers in the arm-pit of the Magic Kingdom for two months I am sure that they're doing fine in comparison to what I did two years ago.

So first we went to the Animal Kingdom (where we went on the best safari ever!) then we headed to Epcot, ate in Mexico, and watched the fireworks at Magic Kingdom. We rode some of the best rides and just had a blast together. We were troopers and went from 10am - 11pm and decided that we had our Disney fix for at least another year, our wallets did too especially since we felt the urge to eat at every park!

Staff Training

2007-06-20T16:24:00.000-06:00

Last week we had our staff training in Orlando, FL at the Summer Orlando Project. We got to see 130 students from colleges in the Charleston area living together in a hotel, learning how to grow in their relationship with God, and working at Disney World. It has been an awesome privilege for me to be connected to some of these students over the past 4 years in Charleston. I attended 3 of these projects and they really changed my life! Needless to say, it was pretty entertaining and exciting. Water fights are the big thing this year, it is pretty fun to see twenty-year olds running around screaming like crazy people with water balloons in hand.

My best friends Betsy and Katie are helping to run the show this summer. Somehow I escaped to be in Naperville raising support and taking classes at Wheaton so I get to be grown up while they have all the fun. They were pretty excited to see the staff when we arrived last Sunday and the students were confused by the new faces on their turf.

One of the nights we were there the students had a home-made chili and pie cook off so of course we went to check it out and got all decked out in our country gear. Kellie caught us singing in the car and took a picture... I'm not sure why I have my back pack on?

Later in the evening the boys found a way to get everyone dirty and started a sliding contest in the mud, standard. Here is a picture of our new staff guy at the College of Charleston, Max, and James, setting a great example of how to be ridiculous at the project.

While the students were at work, the staff came together and learned some awesome stuff about the Lord to strengthen our vision. The first day we met together as a Raleigh team, Ben Elseroad shared with us some equipping information on how to talk to people about the validity of Jesus rising from the dead. It is pretty essential to the Christian faith and at UNC I am hoping to get into some good discussions with people where a question about the resurrection might come up. Lots of intellectuals discuss what might have happened to Jesus after the cross. Through valid documents, hundreds of testimonies, and the Holy Scriptures, it becomes clear that he appeared to many people 3 days after he died and several days after that. I was reminded that He is the Son of God, worth giving my life and heart to.

University of North Carolina

2007-06-06T10:30:00.000-06:00

Some facts about UNC Chapel Hill:

UNC anchors the famed research triangle (Raleigh, UNC Chapel Hill, Duke University) which plays a vital role in nurturing the economic development of the country.

It is one of the 75 most competitive universities to attend.

Ranked #1 out of the 100 best public universities.

In fall 2006, UNC had 27,500 students enrolled from 49 states and over 100 countries.

UNC fans tell me that the Tarheels are the best basketball team in the country!

What are college students at UNC saying about God? A video camera stopped a random sample of seven students and asked them what God means to them. Here are their responses:

"I guess for me, God is more of an abstract sort of thing, rather than a person or a figure. Just like the relationships between people, between nature and people, animals and people."
"I personally have a lot of questions about whether I think God actually exists. I think that if God does exists it's in a intangible way."
God to me is a force that connects all of us."
"To me... God is the questions unanswered by science. That's where I draw on faith."
"If there was a God, he gave up on us a long time ago. I think it's a life force and energy."
"I think of Jesus the same way I think of Martin Luther King Jr. or Gahndi, more of a political figure. I think he's a political, historical person."
"He [Jesus] is an amazing man there is no question about that. But I don't call him 'Christ' and I don't think about him as a god... but that's just my god. I think different people have different gods."

Famous Last Words

2007-06-06T10:14:00.001-06:00

One of the reasons I am making this blog is to let people know about a way that God has compelled me to serve Him.

So Jesus was this amazing guy. Many people think that he was a really great person, a moral teacher who set an example of how to love people. Then they stop there. But Jesus said that he was the Son of God... if he was just a teacher, that would make him a crazy one. I would definitely walk out of the classroom if my teachers said that.

So if we respect this man's character (which was perfect) and look at the reality of what he said (that He is God in the flesh) and what he did (the way he reasoned with perfection, loved the unloveable, did the miraculous) then we can truly answer his question that he asked the disciples: "But what about you... who do you say I am?" (Mark 8:29-30)

Peter followed Jesus for three years. He saw His life and the focus of His mission, and because of what he saw Jesus do and what Peter knew in his heart, he was able to respond: "You are The Christ."

He is the son of God, who came to change the world through a few ordinary men (Acts 4:13)

The last thing that Jesus wanted us to hear, before he went to heaven wasn't so much a statement as it was a command. He said: "Therefore, go, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, and of the son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I will be with you always, even to the very end of the age" (Matthew 28:19-20).

Famous last words... I think that Jesus really wanted us to listen to this. I have decided to be kinda crazy and take this literally. Therefore, I will be going.