This past Monday, I started my summer job in demolition. It was really cool! I got to tear down a couple walls. How awesome is that? The only thing about it is that the work right now is inconsistent because it depends on the number of jobs coming in. As of right now, I will only have two days worked this week. Not a lot, but things are supposed to pick up. Depending on how many hours it picks up to, I may be looking for another part time gig.

In other news, I journaled for the first time this week. We had a scheduled extended quiet time with God and it was pretty cool. I love doing those, but I've never really journaled during quiet time. I've never really been a person that's big on journaling and taking notes and things like that, but I decided to just write down what I was feeling and write out a prayer in response to the thoughts that I wrote down. Writing all that out really helped me to see a little more clearly where I was and what questions I had and then concentrate on turning those things over to God. Along that line, I've been really thinking more about the areas of my walk where I still struggle, including my interactions with others and the relationships I form. Let's just say that I have a lot of things that need to be turned over in prayer.

On another note, the campus ministries are making good progress. At both Malcolm X College and Illinois Institute of Technology, we will be doing spiritual interest and spiritual leadership surveys this week, which is pretty cool. We will also be starting an English Club for international students to practice their English while conversing with us about different things. I anticipate that going pretty well.

Before I sign off, I just want to ask everyone for their prayers. Please keep in mind the three things in this post (job, personal spiritual growth, and campus ministries) plus everything in the previous posts, specifically the people I have tried to reach out to so far. Your prayers are very much appreciated.

Thanks,

Ray

Updates for this week

I realize that I haven't kept this up as much as I would have liked. However, this week was pretty busy. Here's my attempt to break it up into major things that happened.

For those who don't know (which might be most people), I am playing the drumset for the worship band here on project. This has been the second week of playing together and so far, I like the chemistry of our group. We love to come together to worship the Lord, even to the point where we have had late night rehearsals when we are all dead tired. However, in the midst of being tired, we managed to have practice Monday night, Tuesday night, and Wednesday evening before Relate on Wednesday night.

This week, Erin (one of the girls on project) and I went to Malcolm X College during campus time. Our goal was to talk to a contact about setting up a time and place for surveying the summer students about starting an Impact movement in the fall. I could tell God was at work because we got there and had a long conversation with one of the faculty members about the survey and about the need for a Christian student group at Malcolm X College. I could tell that the way was being laid for us, and while there would be some challenges, starting this Impact movement is very likely to happen. I'm hopeful that God will pull enough students together to make this a reality. Pray that next week's surveys go well.

I got an email this week from Anne, another person I talked to at Millenium Park two Sundays ago. She was also interested in the conversation and she also wishes to continue talking about Christ and Christianity over the internet. Pray with me that what I share with her and with Doug will be from the Lord and that He will draw their hearts closer to Him so they may come to know salvation.

This past Wednesday, I also had some quality time with my discipler. Over lunch, we talked about the importance of being open and honest with fellow believers, especially here at CSP because we have such a short time together. This conversation was really great for me because it helped me to see that I still carry a lot of junk in my life that I try to hide, including issues with trusting people with my feelings. I know that there are definitely some people that it's not smart to open up with, but I'm now being challenged to trust God on a whole new level when it comes to deciding who to open up to. In the event that brothers in Christ are trying to get to know me in order to help me grow significantly in Christ (such as now), I need to trust in God to be my protection because when I don't let people know what's going on out of fear of being hurt, I make it hard for God to use them in my life. I also make it hard for God to use me in the lives of the other guys around me. This is gonna take some serious faith and heavenly discernment, so pray with me that God works in my heart and transforms me.

This entire week has been nothing but exhausting, mostly because of the job hunt. Our staff has been taking great efforts to assist us in our job hunt, so we have been meeting at 8am every morning as a group to share some information and pray, then breaking up to go out. As a result of so many 8am mornings in combination with long days walking around the city looking for jobs and late nights loaded with activities, I have been physically exhausted of all my energy. And yet, I keep getting up and pressing on each day. I know that the energy that I feel when pressing on is given by God because if it were up to me, I would have stopped a long time ago. However, pressing on by faith has been rewarded! I was talking to one of the Chicago staff on Thursday after coming in for the day from the hunt, and he told me that he has a contact (who happens to be a Christian friend) that is looking for some guys to do some demolition work. He said that he wouldn't be able to guarantee consistent work for the entire summer, but jobs like that always come up, so it's likely that he will be able to have available work all summer. He also said that we'd be starting on Monday! So I said, "COOL! I'll take it!" My prayers had been answered. I remember praying specifically that day as I was looking for jobs, telling God that it's all in His hands because I have nothing and never really did. Even though it seems really bleak because not many people are hiring for just the summer, I was going to keep my faith in Him because I know that He provides and that He has a plan. And that day, I got His answer! The Lord is awesome.

So now you know why I haven't posted in a while. Yes, there were plenty of things to post about, but little time to do so. And now that I have, you guys can see just how awesome God has been this week.

What a beautiful day...

Today was really cool. My group went to River City Church for the first time, which is the church we are assigned to for the summer. The service was really interesting because it accomodates four different ethnic groups and worship is done in two different languages, which is pretty cool. The message was really good too. The pastor talked about the parable of the wheat and the weeds (tares). I'm really excited for what the rest of the summer will look like at that church. Later on, my action group met up for dinner at an authentic mexican restaurant, and despite our lack of Spanish skills and their lack of good English skills, everything was good. Then we played ultimate frisbee. Now I am preparing for another day of job searching. Keep praying for that and for God to just move me and the ministry dramatically this week.

Interesting day...

Today, I went on campus at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) to try to find some students to talk to. The goal was to try and scope out where students spent a lot of time, what kind of things and events are available, and just generally finding out good information that would be helpful in starting a new ministry targeted for the students at IIT. We didn't find many students, but I did have one conversation. The conversation didn't go very far, but it wasn't an unpleasant one.

For the rest of the afternoon, I spent time with my mentor/discipler. We got lunch and talked about some things one-on-one. The conversation we had was pretty cool. It was refreshing to be reminded about the essence of our heart as human, and how our sinful hearts need to be changed and refocused by God in order to affect change in our sinful behaviors. Just focusing on the fact that our hearts are the single root of our desires and actions really spoke to me during that conversation.

I got an email from Doug today. He replied saying that he enjoyed our conversation on Sunday, and that he is open to more conversation about the Gospel. I am praying that God really works in his heart and that he uses me to be able to share with Doug. Keep Doug and the condition of his heart in your prayers also.

Signing off...

Ray

Busy as a bee...

I've been pretty busy lately. I definitely haven't had much time to post stuff up between this past Friday and now, but I'm thinking that should clear up a little. Much of my time has been doing things to get acquainted with the city and finding a job. I've also had some opportunities to talk to some people about Christ this past Sunday at Millennium Park. (Three days in and already at it! I'm excited.)

Speaking of which, I talked to a guy from Brazil named Doug and his friend, also from Brazil, named Anne. They both have some basic knowledge about Christianity and they both seem very interested in the message of the Gospel, but a couple things seem to be getting in the way. Doug himself said he's still trying to see for himself if a works-based salvation is any different from a faith-based salvation, and which one is better. I'm looking forward to talking to him more in the near future. Keep him in your prayers. Tomorrow, I go into campus so pray that God opens up more hearts to the Gospel. (I found out that UIC is not the only campus we will be reaching, but actually one of several. Pray that God does awesome things and starts lasting movements at all of these locations.)

I'm also growing in my personal faith. Since I've been here, I've had time to see just how greatly God works in other people's lives as well as in my own. I've also been challenged to continue fighting daily the things that are/have been a struggle for me and hand them over to God because He is my strength and deliverer. I'm praying that I continue to grow and be challenged to walk in Him.

Signing off...

Ray

And it starts...

Man, I don't know how to really express this excitement right now. I don't know if that's because of a lack of a proper outlet to do so or if it's because the time is 5:38am and I had the equivalent of 4 hours of sleep on a couch. Either way, my stuff is packed and I'm ready to get this show on the road... literally. Roadtrip, anyone? ;-)

Ray