ice skating and Christmas tree raising

A college community is a very transient community. It can be lonely certain times of year if you are the only one who doesn't have somewhere else to be. The Christmas holiday left our teaming campus almost deserted with the exception of international students and a few others who stuck around for various reasons. Having no where to go ourselves, we found ourselves poking around to see who was left. We thought it would be fun to have a little party and make an event out of putting up our little tree since that is often a family event in many homes.

David said he wanted to go ice skating. I wasn't sure I wanted to be slipping around on ice while balancing on thin metal blades at eight months pregnant so we sent out an email to see how many daredevils would be willing to accompany him and got a few responses. The date was set for the morning of December 16 and we scheduled our Christmas party for that afternoon and evening. On the day of the event two friends showed up and one brought another friend along with him. The four ventured onto the ice while I held the camera and documented their various slips and spills.

After laughing at one another for awhile, we repaired our friendship over lunch and then went back to our apartment to mix up the ghiradelli's brownies and put the chestnuts in the oven. When a few more friends arrived David sat up the tree and we sat around peeling chestnuts and talking. The evening ended with some Christmas carols around the keyboard.
We love our Columbus family. They made our Christmas very special.

Bowling Night

ACF joined together with Kettering SDA Freshbread for a bowling event. There were 50 young adults there from Kettering College of Medical Arts, Kettering SDA, and ACF Wright State! :) There were so many people and it was tons of fun to bring the students and the church together!

Visiting Ethan Temple

One of our ACF members is part of Ethan Temple. I went to a couple of their Vesper's and it is so great to meet such a wonderful group!

A Busy Month!

Athens ACF has found ourselves busy this month with various activities! We've had a game night, a movie night, and last Wednesday, some brave souls braced the cold and brought some Christmas cheer to various neighborhoods with caroling.

We also held our first Saturday afternoon fellowship last Saturday and participated in a great sing-a-long and some testimony time. Christmas is around the corner and our students, if not already, are preparing to head home for the holidays. This week we'll have an opportunity for ice skating and we're looking forward to Collegiate Sabbath this coming Saturday.

After that, we'll be home for the holidays but we're looking forward to resuming ACF next quarter :)

ACF OSU Bible study thoughts

Some thoughts from this last Bible study. | www.acf.etowns.org

Entertaining strangers

God is laughing tonight. He pulled off a great joke. For a few weeks now I have been receiving texts from an unknown number inviting us to Wednesday evening meals. We were unable to attend the first one because of a schedule conflict but when we received an invitation on this Tuesday for a pizza party we had nothing else planned and decided to go. We were quite embarrassed that we weren't sure who was inviting us and didn't recognize the number but since we meet so many people every week at various churches we were sure they knew who we were. I responded that we would come and asked for an address. When we arrived we were surprised at how few cars there were. We were expecting a party. The woman who answered the door looked quite surprised to see us as well. I told her we had been invited to a pizza party so she invited us in but seemed to know nothing about campus ministries. Then she started to put things together. Her brother had recently changed his cell number and she had been texting the old number which is now our number. We were complete strangers, but, since we were there, we might as well have some pizza. We laughed a lot about the mix-up and had a great time meeting the family, all young first time parents. Good one God!

Narnia Night

November 24 was movie night at the Helbley apartment. Since several students had never seen or read the classic story of "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" by C.S. Lewis we decided that we absolutely had to set a date to watch Disney's "Narnia." And it would also be a good time to slaughter the pumpkin we had been saving and enjoy some fresh pie.

The movie led us very naturally into a discussion of the purpose of allegory and the nature of faith, personal sacrifice, and forgiveness. We pondered the mystery of a God who is both incredibly gentle and fearfully powerful "He's not a tame lion you know." We also ate plenty of pie and enjoyed being together.

ACF Social :)

ACF members got together at the church Tuesday night to have dinner, play games and watch a movie together. :) We even played some Disney Scene It with girls against boys. It was fun to finally see everyone out of school. A lot of people had other engagements with the Holiday's but it was a fun group and a new friend Robin joined us!

Weekend Success!

This past weekend Athens ACF held their very first ACF Thanksgiving Friday night and had their 2nd collegiate Sabbath the following day. Thanks to the many volunteers, both students and church members, our Thanksgiving dinner was a success! We had more than forty people present, including Sabrina and some of her students from Wright State University. We enjoyed good food, good fellowship, and took some time to reflect the many blessings from the past year.

We were also blessed to have Pastor Loren Seibold and his wife, Carmen, at our collegiate Sabbath. Pastor Seibold preached and also blessed us with some harmonica playing. We thank all our students and our wonderful church community for making these events successful and memorable. We look forward to more memories to come!

ACF and Intervarsity volunteer at a soup kitchen :)

<-----Intervarsity President

I got a last minute call from the Inter-varsity president to go to a soup kitchen, so me and one other ACF drove out there. :) It is such a blessing to serve others!

<----Stephanie (ACF member)

Ohio State and Wright State Come Together!

A car full of ACF students drove down to Athens this last Friday to join Beamy and Darrin for their Thanksgiving feast. :) They want to say thank you to you both again and they really enjoyed it!! It was such a blessing to be with such amazing people!

2nd ACF Meeting

As an ACF group we try to get together once a month to discuss issues and programs and goals. :) It was exciting for most of our core group to make it!

Bible Study

Had a wonderful student led Bible Study in the Student Union. :)

Cooking Up a Feast!

Athens ACF has been busy preparing our very first ACF Thanksgiving Dinner scheduled for this Friday, Nov. 19. If you think the Thanksgiving menu in itself is a feast, try doubling and tripling the amount! Thankfully, we have some wonderful volunteers from our church family and student group who are making the preparations a lot less overwhelming! (I am exceptionally grateful because the thought of preparing two very large turkeys was a daunting task, especially since my previous experience was, well, let's just say we all had A LOT of gravy with the turkey!)

Continue to keep us in our prayers and if you are in the Athens area, do stop by!

At the Well

Glumly sitting in my newly decorated living room, I recalled my first official week at Athens, OH with discouragement. I had such great aspirations for this ministry, yet, my first week proved, to me, disappointing. In my mind I had envisioned meeting and connecting with student after student. My cozy new home would be filled with lively discussions from young, intelligent, impressionable, and passionate minds. Instead, there was only me (And Darrin in the background commenting how the sandwich he was creating would be epic).

I sifted through the past week’s memories, hoping to find some reassurance that my first week at Ohio University (OU) was not as disappointing as I was making it out to be. Instead I was mockingly greeted by nothing - no student encounters, which then equated to no expansion of our ACF group.

Truthfully, I had not done much the past week to reach out to the OU students. And, for some reason, I had subconsciously expected students to sort of appear at our weekly Bible Study and Saturday church service, eager to be ministered to. Embarrassed at this thought, I new I had to reevaluate my expectations and approach to this ministry.

My thoughts turned to our ACF meeting last Friday night. We had discussed the story in John of the Samaritan woman at the well. A powerful discussion had ensued of Jesus ministering to this shunned woman - Jesus meeting the woman at the well, fulfilling her needs, and subsequently ministering to the whole town through this woman’s testimony. I recalled someone pointing out John 4:4, “Now he (Jesus) HAD to go through Samaria” (NIV). This individual reminded me of the fact that, in reality, Jews actually mapped out a specific route from Judea to Galilee that ensured no passage, whatsoever, through Samaria. What a powerful picture of Jesus insisting he had to pass through Samaria and stop at that very well. Jesus knew He had an appointment that day. That’s why He HAD to go to Samaria.

As I reflected more on this, I realized, for the first time, that I had already been provided with my very first lesson in campus ministry! Doing campus ministry at Ohio University did not mean sitting around and waiting for students to show up. It means meeting students at their wells: meeting them in the cafeteria, the Baker’s Center, dorm room, gym, and wherever else students roam about! It means maybe stepping out of my comfort zone and not waiting for students to initiate relationship building. It means not being concerned about numbers, but instead, being concerned about hearts.

With the Samaritan woman in mind, I resolved to change my approach with our ministry. No more waiting around or tallying up numbers. You see, Jesus has an appointment with OU students and their wells. He HAS to go through OU and I’m not going to get in His way.

Good food, Good friends, Good questions

Last night around ten hungry Adventist college students descended upon our house demanding food and a place to talk about race relations, Christian media choices, and the true meaning of gospel. Actually the conversation moved so quickly it's hard to say what we talked about but there was a whole lot of laughter. Somewhere in all of the confusion and noise two large veggie pizzas and a good deal of peanut M&M's disappeared. We all had a wonderful time together and were delighted to learn that our president, Robert Okyere, had arranged for our club to be featured in the UWeekly, an independent student paper. The U Weekly is no low budget, corner publication. It has a weekly circulation of 20,000 copies. His answers to their interview questions will be featured on the front page next week. In addition to questions about our club goals and activities, one of the compelling interview questions which he brought to us for group discussion was "Is it possible for a non-believer, or an athiest, to live an ethical and morally outstanding life?" Sometimes it is the really good questions we encounter in life that shape and grow us the most. How would you answer that one???

Friday Night Meeting...

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After driving over 3,000 miles and bringing WAY too much stuff to my new home in Athens, I am finally a more tangible part of Campus Ministry in Ohio! Having to finish up my work contract in California, I've had to live vicariously through Darrin as he headed up Athens ACF.

Friday night marked my first Friday meeting with the ACF group at Ohio University. As usual, we met at the Baker's Center (our awesome student center at OU). In addition to GREAT company and delicious filipino food, we were blessed with a very powerful discussion of the Woman at the Well mentioned in John 4.

I'm so thankful that I am at Athens for good now and I can't wait for all the adventures we have to come :) Stay posted for our upcoming events including our Thanksgiving dinner on Nov. 19 and our monthly collegiate Sabbath on Nov. 20!

I love our group and the opportunity to get together. We had a great time fellowshipping together.

student led bible study and upcoming party

Tuesday my friend Lisa and I had a great time at the Columbus Zoo.


Thursday night we had our first student led Bible study. The turnout was excellent, starting with eight and ending with about twelve. We read about John the Baptist in John chapter 1 and had a lively discussion. Afterward I went to check out the intervarsity meeting on campus while David found the linux user's group and then joined another group of students to learn a new card game. The intervarsity students were very friendly and welcoming and I had a great opportunity after the meeting to chat with leaders from both the general undergrad group and the Asian group.

Because next Thursday is a holiday and off campus students have no other reason to be on campus, we have decided to have a fun night on Wednesday and take Thursday off. We're looking forward to the chance to chill together in a less structured and more informal setting.

1st ACF Social!!

SUCCESS!! God is good! We had our first social on campus and a good part of our core group showed and we played pool and ping pong and then went with a group out to Pizza. There was about 10 people that came and by the end of the night we had a group about 18. :) I just walked up to anyone and everyone that I saw and they were excited to join and hang out. Afterwards a group of 12 of us went out to eat, which half of them were people I met tonight. It is so amazing to be able to meet people and have such a wonderful night with new people. :) This is what this job is all about, building relationships and simply being there for people and being a positive group that they can spend time with. :)

The Calling

Why would someone become a public campus chaplain? Do you realize how difficult that job is? I have to admit - I didn't!

I (sometimes) think it is tough to be a minister in a church - an established congregation. Then I think what it would be like to start a group "from scratch" - which is essentially what we are asking these teams to do. More than that, however, they are building a community of young adults - people whom our society has declared as "dead" to religion. Add to that - their budget to do these monumental tasks is negligible.

What I have witnessed is the power of the Holy Spirit - because only God could be behind something as audacious as this! Already (just a few months in) I see college students excited to be part of this ministry.

I still see the challenges - but more than these I see the opportunity for more people to realize that we ALL are called to ministry. We all have chances to form friendships, to use our blessings for the good of someone else, and to share our relationship with Jesus through our actions. Please join me in praying for each of the teams - and in humbling asking God what crazy challenge He has for each of us!

No Fright Night @ Kettering Church

Our Church has this wonderful Halloween "No Fright Night" I participated in decorating a trunk for trick or trunk treating :) There were some ACF group members that attended and it was an awesome COLD time! :)

<---- Jessica B. and her friends and me with my princess trunk :)

<----Josh and Rachel

Filming!

So, the Wright State ACF group started it's first shooting for the short film we want to get out about Wright State. :) It's an intense camera and I took some time to learn a little about it and we interviewed about 5 people on Wednesday. We have so much to do and I'm teaching myself so it'll be awhile, but I can't wait to show you all!

Methodist Christian Group Meeting

Hey everyone,

I went to the Methodist Christian Group meeting this last week with some Intervarsity people and one of our ACF members. It was a great worship to meet some wonderful people. :) I also went out for a couple lunches with different people. Our group is doing great. We met three new people this last week. It's very exciting! It's been a great week :)

Some wonderful people from the Ignite worship ----->

Sabbath at Worthington Spanish Church

We made some new friends at the Worthington Spanish Church this Sabbath. There are several OSU students who attend there and we are praying about the possibility of a Spanish student group on campus. The afternoon was spent in the home of a professor who had invited students to share a meal with him and his family. We all had a wonderful time.