Personally, I like swinging

Life on the road has been a lot of fun. We've been blessed with great host homes, as always, and wonderful worship experiences. So far we've traveled to Miller, Hartford, and Chamberlain South Dakota. Today we head to Faulkton and tomorrow onto Pierre for a few days. Each year YE sends somebody known as "on the road support staff" with the teams usually within the first week or so of life on the road so that we are better acclimated and our program is adjusted to work out the kinks. Our friend Danielle has been with us this week and has been a blessing. Danielle was on Kindred to South America last year and so she has experienced life on the road and God has really given her a gift in the ability to support and encourage and a great listening ear (or two). Sadly, Danielle heads back home today so we'll be praying for her as she is waiting to hear back about a job and continuing on with what God has planned for her.

The other day while waiting for team devotions to start I found the swing set. We all have things that we just simply enjoy in life and one of those things for me is swinging. It seems like such a simple thing, but that's what makes it so great. I don't normally have to go to great lengths to find a swing of some sort. I hopped up on the swing, it was a little tall for my short legs, and began the kickoff. As always it started a little slow and gradually started going higher and faster as the push and pull of my legs and the chains worked together. I only took Physics in high school so that I could go to Disney World so I really don't understand the logistics of it nor do I try. I enjoy the wind rushing around me and knowing that I'm powering the swing.

I soon realized that I wasn't powering the swing by myself. God's hand was guiding me and encouraging me through the wind and the sunshine and cool fall morning atmosphere. It was fairly quiet where I was as well so that helped me to focus more on what was around. As I kept swinging I realized that the back and forth motion can be slightly nauseating. I felt like this was like our daily walks with God. Ahead of you there is a goal and behind you is what you have learned from, whether good or bad, to keep you going forward. You keep going forward, but to go forward you must go backward as well. Why in life to we always retreat? The nauseating part comes in when you take your eyes off the goal, the goal being God. When you lean back in the swing and stare at the sky or the trees rushing by. Our lives are so busy with outside sources, but the God is always there.

I don't know if it's human nature to retreat, but it's easy to do. In the book of Hebrews it says, "Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works" (10:24 NLT). So let us do just that. Encourage each other in every day life and motivate one another to step outside of our comfort boxes. God will be there even if our eyes our in the clouds.

Get your New Dawn

ONE

The YE theme verse for the year is just that! It comes from Ephesians 4:4-6.

Team life has been a great adventure as always. We're in our last week of training at Luther Point in WI. The International Teams have a separate training week to learn about cross cultural living and such, so the National Teams are still at Luther Dell. It's sad to not be with everybody, but it's also a good time to really focus on what God's called us to as well as learn to only be around a few people. On Saturday we all head out on the road and it will only be us & our teammates.

My teammates are wonderful people. We all come from different religious backgrounds which is fascinating to me because I know we can learn so much from each other. We've all had lots of different experiences in ministry as well so that adds to the team dynamics. We're still praying for another guy so if yall know anybody 21+ wanting to serve the Lord send them my way. We're doing great as the 5 of us though so no worries there.

We had our rally day booking this past weekend and had a really relaxed setting which was a total blessing for our first performance. We got to work with 2 separate churches that use the same building. One was a LCMC (Luther Congregation in Mission for Christ) and the other was a Filipino American Church. We get to work with these churches a couple more times throughout the year which is very nice.

We've had some silly times of course learning music and getting to know each other. The photo day was our first funny time and sharing our call stories/life stories. It's also great that our one guy, Jon, is 6'7", just over 2 meters, & all of us girls are 5'4" & under. We all mesh well together & just enjoy getting to continue learning about God working in and around each one of us. Tonight we have our first program so that'll be fun, it's just for YE people so that's nice too.

I feel as if this is a very scattered post, but none the less GOD IS GOOD!