Hello again from Ocean City! It’s been 2 weeks since my last
post and there is much to catch you up on! Hopefully these posts will become
more frequent now as I am falling into a fairly regular work schedule.
Last week was labeled “Killing the Giants Week.” It was all
about trusting God to help us through our “faith-sharing giants,” or things
that we are maybe too afraid to do in regard to sharing our faith. My personal
giants were to transition from the Quest survey to the Knowing God Personally
(KGP) booklet and going through the whole booklet by myself, which I had never
done before.
For those of you who are not familiar, the Quest survey and
the KGP are resources that Cru has available to use when sharing with people.
The Quest survey includes 5 questions:
1) What are three words you would use to describe your life?
2) What is want thing you want to make absolutely sure you
do during your lifetime if at all possible?
3) What happens after death?
4) You best friend comes to you and says, “I want to become
a Christian and I don’t know how.” What would you tell your friend?
5) On a scale of 1 to 10, rate your desire to know God.
These questions are meant to get a spiritual conversation
started, to hear where people are at in regard to spiritual things, and to get
their opinion on Christianity. We are not sharing just to force our faith on
others, but to really go out in the power of the Holy Spirit, having spiritual
conversations with others and leaving the results to God. Through this survey
alone I have had some great conversations with people from all types of
spiritual background—from Jewish to Muslim to Atheist to Catholic.
After the survey ends there are often opportunities to
transition to the KGP which is a presentation of the Gospel in 4 main points. At
the end of the KGP there is an opportunity for someone to pray to receive
Christ as the Lord of their life if that is what their heart desires. Although
I sometimes think that these booklet things are a little cheesy, I have really
come to love the KGP. It holds a powerful message and is so effective. The four
main points are as follows:
1) God’s Love. God loves you and created you to know him
personally. He has a wonderful plan for your life.
2) Our Condition. People are sinful and separated from God,
so we cannot know Him personally or experience His love and plan.
3) God’s Response. Jesus Christ is God’s only provision for
our sin. Through Him alone we can know God personally and experience God’s love
and plan.
4) Our Response. We must individually receive Jesus Christ
as Savior and Lord; then we can know God personally and experience His love and
plan.
And those are just the headliners. For each point there are
examples, Scripture back-up and questions to ask and answer. It’s great just to
get people’s opinions and it also carries a life-changing message. I feel like
after going through the KGP multiple times I have a fuller understanding of the
power that the Gospel has in people’s lives. If you are interested, here is a
link to the content of the booklet online:
If you have any questions or opinions you would like to
share I would love to hear them!
So that was just a taste of what we did everyday on the
boardwalk last week. To my surprise, I transitioned and went through the entire
KGP with 2 girls on the very first day of the week! Through these resources we as
a group were able to have over 5,000 spiritual conversations and just under 100
people indicated that they want to receive Christ as their Lord and Savior. So
exciting! It was definitely the hardest week for me so far, as talking to
people I don’t know is not my most favorite thing to do, but the results were
great and God was definitely faithful in helping us kill our giants.
After Killing the Giants week, we transitioned into “All for
One Week” which was all about building community. Trying to even succinctly
summarize all the information that I’ve heard this week would be impossible,
but I will give the highlights of some things that I particularly enjoyed.
-At our Monday meeting there was a talk about what the Bible
says about community. They used a passage from Ephesians 4 that highlighted
humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another in love and an
eagerness to maintain unity as characteristics of a Christ-centered community.
I’m really excited to take this talk back to campus, because I think it could
be really beneficial to our Cru movement there, but I am specifically excited
to share what I learned with my future roommates for next year. Can’t wait to
go deep into a Christ-centered community of women!
-Tuesday I had the day off work and did laundry at a
laundromat for the first time. Hooray for clean sheets!
-Wednesday evening we had Action Group on the beach and it
was really fun. We started out the night by splitting into partners and finding
5 passages from the Bible that illustrate how the Gospel effects our lives as
believers. Although the exercise was short and simple, it just made me really
excited about getting into the Word more often and made me realize how much God
really has done in and through my life. Thinking about how the gospel applies
to my life specifically was rejuvenating. I realized in a new and fresh way
that because I have put my faith in Christ I am now blameless before God
because Jesus’ sacrifice took away all my penalties that I had for all my sin.
And when God looks at me, he does not see my brokenness and sinful nature, but he
sees Christ. That is so cool.
-Thursday was another exciting night: Women’s Conference!
All the ladies on project got dressed up and we headed to the church where
there was a beautifully decorated room waiting for us and a meal prepared from
scratch by the staff women. It was such a fun time to get all fancy and learn
what it mean to be a woman of God. After 4 talks on different topics and a
delicious dessert we all stood up and had a dance party! It was so fun to just
let loose and sing silly songs at the top of our lungs. So fun.
-This whole week of community-building activities culminated
into a Staff vs. Student softball game on Saturday night. All 100+ students had
to bat, so you can imagine how long the game took! Students ended up losing by
7 runs, but it was still so fun and I actually hit the ball and made it to
second base! I had a lot of fun encouraging people and just enjoying a nice
summer night of softball.
In other news, work is going well at the South Seas Shop.
I’m getting more of a feel for the prices for everything and how to work the
cash register. I’m also having great conversations with my coworkers (including
two girls from Russia!) and it’s been really fun getting to know them better
and learning a few useful Russian phrases.
Basically, I am having a great time here in Ocean City! I am
learning so much and have met some amazing people. Can’t wait to learn even
more and go deeper in community here. Thank you for you continual support through
prayer and encouragement. I’m so excited to keep pressing on and seeing more of
what God has in store for me! Some exciting things happening here in Ocean
City! Keep following for more updates!
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