February 25, 2008 at 11:45 pm (Uncategorized)
Part of my everyday life in Rome is pairing up with one of my teammates, starting seemingly random conversations with students and seeing if they are interested in discussing spiritual things. At times it seems like we’re just picking completely random people to talk to, and other times it is so obvious that God had his hand in who we talked to you.
For instance, last week I experienced one of these not-so-random random conversations. Normally, when we begin such adventures of starting conversations, we spend some time in prayer… prayer for guidance and boldness in what to say, and prayer that the Lord would lead us to spiritually interested students. Sara & I were on campus together at this time, and were somewhat unmotivated, so we prayed… and we were still unmotivated, so then two of our teammates prayed with us… and then we went on our way. The first group we met weren’t interested in talking because they were getting ready to go back into the library to study. So we look over to two girls sitting on a bench near by, and think why not talk to them. We start out with the usual “parlate inglese?” (“yes”), and proceeded to say we work with a group called Agape Italia. Veronica, one of the girls said “I think I know this group… what type of group is it?” I said that we were a Christian group, and she said that she had heard of us because her grandfather had worked with Agape some, which sounded strange to me because I was wondering how this Italian’s grandfather would have worked with Agape. Agape Italia isn’t a huge organization like Campus Crusade in the States. What are the chances that this girl or her grandfather would have even know anything about Agape? Not very likely. Apparently, this girl’s grandfather had translated some of the Campus Crusade resources into Italian for Agape Italia. What??
At this point in the conversation, Sara had to leave to meet another student and I continued to talk with Veronica. She is a student in Rome, but she is currently spending a year in London to improve her english. She was only at that campus in Rome that day because she was spending time with a friend. Seriously?? After learning more about Veronica, she shared with me how her faith was so important to her, how her grandfather had been the backbone of her family until he passed away, and how she has been asking herself the same question that we have been asking ourselves as Agape staff… how do we show young Italians their need for Jesus? Seriously… it is so rare to meet students who truly know the Lord, and to meet one who’s grandfather contributed to Agape’s ministry… this was way too much of a coincidence for it to not be the work of God.
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February 10, 2008 at 10:57 pm (Uncategorized)
Since this is my first day of serious blogging, there is an overwhelming amount of stories that I could add to here from the year, and even more that God has been teaching me. For those of you who don’t know me very well (or don’t experience my obsessive emailing), I tend to play the question game with friends in order to continue the email conversation beyond the basic updates. One of my new dear friends from mid-year and I have started up the question game (aka asking questions and the other person answers), and the two questions she asked really hit me.
a.) What’s something God has taught you or grown you in through experiencing and living in a new culture?
b.) What has given you the most joy this year?
In response to question a, I honestly didn’t know what to say at first, and I think my initial reaction was a bit prideful. I initially thought I hadn’t learned anything new because I immediately thought, “well I’ve already experienced a new culture (or multiple new cultures) when I studied abroad, so being in Italy hasn’t been that big of a deal or cultural change. After thinking this through a little bit more, I realized how ridiculous I sounded in thinking that. One of the main things I have realized is how truly big God is. Living in a different culture reminds me how big the world is, and seeing Italians, Americans, (and other cultures) honor, worship, and serve the Lord is truly remarkable. While visiting a ministry in another country, I attended a prayer meeting, and I was amazed by the number and variety of cultures represented there. There were Americans, people from that country, and Koreans serving in that country. I was an American, serving in Italy, visiting that country. And they were discussing partnering with Holland to send people to Asia. All in the name of God Almighty. Absolutely amazing. God is incredible, and so much bigger than I can even imagine.
What
has given me the most joy this year? When I reflect on my STINT year so far, I realize how much I have been full of joy. I think my joy reflects how consistent my walk with the Lord has been over the last couple of months. I have relied on the Lord more in the last couple months than I probably have at any other point in my life. I was removed from my comforts, my over-achiever mindset, my stressed-out pre-med world, my home, and my housemates and closest friends, and placed in Rome working with Agape Italia (Campus Crusade.) I was surrounded by a completely new language, people who weren’t my close friends (yet), didn’t have studying or extra-curricular activities to occupy my time, and my job was to start conversations about God, Jesus, and spiritual things with students who didn’t speak the same language as me (which was/is scary at times!)… I had nothing to rely on except for the Lord. Through this reliance and new level of trust, I have been filled with immense joy.
Ok, so this post was semi-deep… next time I’ll try to be a little more light-hearted.
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February 10, 2008 at 9:48 pm (Uncategorized)
After months of saying I should blog about Rome and even having “blog” on my to-do lists, I am finally starting up a blog. Thanks to the inspiration of my teammates, whether they have recently revamped their blogs or are simply faithful bloggers, I may become a successful blogger. Or maybe not. Hopefully I will take the time to share more about ministry, life, and funny experiences in Rome than just uploading pictures and my prayer letters, but I guess only time will tell.
For now, I will upload previous prayer letters (see Prayer Updates to the right) in case anyone has missed out on them or wants to be reminded of where God has taken the ministry, and me, here in Rome.
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