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last hour, last week, last month...
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Saturday, March 24, 2007
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Saturday has officially become cleaning day. All week long, my "life piles up" (as we like to say), in the form of papers on my desk, books on the floor, and - depending on when laundry day falls - clothes spilling out of my closet (the verb most often used to describe the latter event is "explode"). Then, Saturday comes, and voila! Time to re-order the week's clutter. Sometimes it's more cathartic than I realize - and having a clean space to study in is GREAT (like Biology, for instance, which I SHOULD be studying right now... ah well. I'll get back to it).
 ANYWAY. Exciting news!! Aaaahhh!! :D A month or two ago, a group of Japanese students (in the U.S. for a 6 week English-learning exchange program) visited Chi Alpha's table at the events fair; they were excited by the fact that we did things like ice skating, snowboarding, bowling, etc., and they wanted to know if it was okay if they joined us, even though they "Didn't have any religion." (The answer, of course, was - OF COURSE!) They came bowling with us, and I got to share a lane with two of the girls, Mina and Mai - it was SO much fun! - a few of them came ice skating with us a week later, and people from XA kept on running into them. We were praying for them like crazy - family, friends, even the congregation at CIA church - but, at least for me, the fact that they were heading home during our spring break was kinda saddening... (O ye - me - of little faith...?) In spite of that, though... I flew back to Minnesota to GREAT news.... and I got to hear it twice that evening! :)
...through this strange sequence of connections, a few of the students had met a Japanese student from North Central, and she had 7 of them over for dinner at her mom's house, joined by our friend Stas. It sounds like they had a lot of fun; a conversation started about what they had enjoyed most here in the U.S., and a few of them mentioned how everyone they met had been connected (it WAS strange how that happened!) - but eventually the conversations began going deeper, and before all was said and done - six students dedicated their lives to Christ. And not only that, but God REALLY met them - one of the girls had a vision, heard God's voice... amazing. Amazing!! I don't write to boast - far from it! I had very little to do with what transpired. But that's how God works, sometimes - all we did, as a group, was pray and show them a Godly love by being ourselves, hanging out, having fun... but seeing what God did in them, for them, has been such a blessing and an encouragement for us (and a nudge towards a missions trip destination in the near future?? :) eh?). It was also very challenging for me, too; when it comes to "expectation," I now see just how little I expect of God - and what a sad thing! He can do ANYTHING... I want to learn to expect... well, more than I can expect or imagine, and to really trust him to show up.
Aw, nuts. My computer's dying, and I need to get back to reading my Biology textbook... but I just HAD to share. Pray that we would keep expecting, keep pressing in, keep praising God for everything - encouraging and challenginig, expected and unexpected.
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