A Fresh Perspective

Speaking of perspective......Trent was gone over the weekend to an event planned to give college students a little perspective.  The event was called:

They got away, indeed.  And they may have frozen a little bit (one student, who left his tootsies au naturale in an open-air cabin,  actually started experiencing frost bite symptoms -- we are thankful that all ten digits are still intact and attached).

For the most part, though, the students and campus ministry staff found the cool weather refreshing, and they enjoyed having their minds and hearts refreshed as well.   It always surprises me how much leaving your daily surroundings, even for a few hours, can impart valuable perspective.  

Like us, many of our students spend every day of the week in the concrete jungle.   And like it or not, the din of trucks, horns, and sirens is the soundtrack accompanying our daily lives. 

Add to this the reality that (in the city) we are constantly interacting with strangers, but we have little time to spend with people we actually know, and getting away to the country for two days with real friends becomes quite a treat.

The staff and students on Fall Getaway got to do this: 

and this (notice the green space): 

and this, and this and this: 

And of course, they were able to soak in hours of God's Word, brought to them by:

Justin.  

The fun connection with Justin is that he came to know the Lord when he was a student involved in our ministry (back in the 1900s :-)).   About 13 years have passed since then, and Justin, along with his wife and son, is now planting a church not too far from us.  What a privilege it is to see God change Justin's life and now change the lives of others through him!

But back to Fall Getaway.    The students gathered.  

   They listened, took notes, sang, prayed, and meditated.   Sorry -- no photo of those activities!

But I do have photos of these activities:  

Not sure what's going on here, but the guy at the mic is named Cecil.  The girl in the white hoodie seems amused, so I'm guessing that Cecil is saying something funny.  

And I don't know this guy's name, but I do know that those bags he's sporting don't even remotely qualify as "man bags."  Sorry, guy.  It looks like he's having fun, though.  Way to be a good sport, Guy Wearing Purses! 

As Trent was looking at the pictures on this post, he started telling story after story about these students....of lives changed, students praying for unbelieving parents, students sharing Christ in hard places.....of the Lord and His work.   

You can find some of those stories soon on his blog:  GTcrossroads.blogspot.com