toilet bowl tour!

So I figured I should write about this, even though I don't have pics up. Tonight we did a toilet tour in one of the dorms on campus. I am a part of the community service team(with American students), and we have been thinking of ways that students can do some community service, and so when I was a student at MSU, one of the things our bible study would do once a semester is a toilet tour. you get supplies, and each group of three or four goes around and cleans the bathrooms for people that have their doors open. While two people clean the toilet, sink and mirror and take out the trash, one person explains that we are doing this to practically show God's love to them in a tangible way!

It was so good tonight! a couple students were able to share their faith for the first time, and many of the students that went with us came back and said they had expected this to be awkward going out, but it really wasn't, and it was easy to talk to people about Jesus when you were doing something that is their least favorite chore!

So hopefully this will help get the word out about our group on campus and more people will come to the weekly meeting the American students have. this week and the next two weeks we are doing a big outreach about hard questions people ask. This week is "did Jesus really rise form the dead?" next week is "how can Christians claim Jesus is the only way" and the week after is "is the bible really trustworthy?

so be praying that many new students will come to the meetings and get their hard questions answered!

:-)

conversation partners

so I think I have mentioned my Libyan friends before. Well last Thursday I was meeting with some students for a planning Bridges International events and I saw one of the friends I had met before. He told me my other friend (who is a girl - that I know better than the rest) was there! So I started talking to her and we all ended up grabbing a bite to eat in the cafe together. There ended up being 4 of us eating together. as we were talking, I told them about my time in Chicago, and about sharing the love of God with others, and they whispered in Arabic among themselves, and suddenly my friend turned to me and said "do you like pork?" I mentioned it's ok, and I eat it, and I asked if they eat it(knowing as muslims they don't) and my friend said "we don't like it" and I tried to clarify that they don't like the taste or choose not to eat it, and they said it was the latter. but my suspicions are that they were talking in Arabic about possibly converting me to Islam ;-) little do they know, I had the idea about talking to them first. Not that I am just friends with them to convert them. I don't really like that word, but more, I want them to know the freedom they could have in knowing Christ, and experiencing the love of having a relationship with him, rather than just practicing a religion.

anyway, they are all really nice, and sweet and asked if I would be their conversation partner. So our first lessons was the pronunciation of "cool." The way they said it, it sounded more like "coal" but I really enjoying helping them with their language, and also slipping in little tidbits about how marvelous Jesus is. :-)

Please be praying that I would be bold in telling them about Jesus, and that God would open their hearts and provide a good opportunity for me to speak with them.

Nutritional Science coming in handy!!!

So you may or may not know that my major in college was Nutritional Science. I really loved studying this, and I miss talking about it and using it, because it was really interesting to me

well, during spring break, we had an opportunity to go to the salvation army's "freedom center" in downtown chicago, that can house 198 men who are trying to recover from drugs and alcohol and be rehabilitated back in to society.

While we were there we served food, made meals for homeless people, helped plan an event for them to social more and learn about team work, and also did an activity to help them learn about an employer's perspective.

anyway, while we were there, finishing up one activity, one of our girls looked really tired and then sort of fell on the floor. she didn't pass out, but she just sort of crumpled. I thought at first it might have been just because the room was really warm, but as we moved into another area, she didn't seem much better. She said she had low blood sugar, and so that was why she collapsed. Immediately I thought "she needs some juice!!!!" but when I suggested it, she said juice wasn't good. so I got her some water, and as she was munching on some snacks, she still didn't look good, so I got her some juice, and within 5 minutes she looked 100% better!

A few days later, I overheard some girls say she collapsed again! so I went to check on her, and one girl was holding her head up by her hair. they said she was fine, eating snacks and whatnot, but she didn't look fine, she was very very pale, and I was worried she was going to pass out. again she refused juice. but when I came by 10 min later, and she didn't look any better, I insisted, and within 10 min of her drinking the juice she could hold her head up herself.

I had called a friend who is a nurse just to make sure juice was the right thing. I was worried because she kept refusing juice, but it helped her so much the first time, and I feel like it was drilled into my head that that was the right thing to do.

anyway, when I got home, I looked it up, and sure enough it said juice was the best remedy (less than 4 oz, just to get the system running) Later as I was processing why I knew juice would help, I remembered a situation I came across when I was studying spanish. Some friends would ask me to help them to make sure their grammer was correct, and I would help them out, and they would ask why they needed to change something and I would respond "it just sounds right" It was the same with this situation, it just sounded right. I think when something gets drilled in your head so many times, we don't know where were learned it, we just know it's right, like 2+2=4 we just know it, we don't have to think about.

so I was very pleased that I was able to help in this situation, because no one else had any clue what to do!!! I'm so thankful that God had equipped me for this situation. It's funny how almost every other week, I come across someone with some health issue or nutrition question, like a fellow staff member recently found out he has really high cholesterol, and I am so eager to help others to know more about how they can address these issues, but I feel like no one really pays much attention. I think most people forget I studied nutrition. oh well, at least I can help in some situations!

alone

this weekend I have the house to myself, for about a total of 24hours anyway. It's nice. I love having some time that I can just spread out and not infringe on someone else's space. My house is a little small, so you can hear everything, and I hate to inconvenience others around me, and so I often am just in my room a lot, or I go to a coffee shop.

I like the quiet and the space. I am often around people all day long everyday, so a little time with no people, no one to have to interact with is a little refreshing. recently I have had a lot of work piling up. With the end of the semester coming, I feel rushed to finish some of the little things, and meet with people before the semester wraps up. So my day off I don't think will end up being a day off afterall.

For me rest is time that is unplanned, and I like to accomplish things, as well as hang out with people that KNOW me. Sometimes building relationships with new people isn't as refreshing as simply spending time with people that you don't have to explain yourself to.

So today since I don't have anyone nearby that really knows me, I am just not planning out what things I need to accomplish today and catching up on some T.V. shows in the meanwhile.

I hardly ever have time to just watch T.V. anymore, I might catch something here or there, but rarely do I have time to just veg. So today I am vegging and accomplishing a few unfinished tasks. Like looking for a place to live! My one roommate just got engaged, and the other is moving out, so I need to find either two new people to move in with me, or a new place to move to. so if you know anyone that is in the Lansing/East Lansing area that might be interested in either, let me know!

Interesting firsts

So for the MSU spring break I ended up being the leader of a trip into inner city Chicago. There are lots of things to tell, some of which I will tell in my prayer letter I am sending out in a couple days, but what I did not put in there was I had the experience to have someone throw up in my car! It was like a movie, but usually they don't show the actual stuff coming out of someone's mouth, but I got a front row seat!

not that I wanted it, but I was driving, and she had told me previously that she got queasy if she didn't have something in her stomach, and I should have figured it out when she opened the window, but I didn't quite get until it was happening, and by then it was too late! anyway long story short, most of it was contained to the floor mat, and she was able to put it in a plastic bag and clean it up in the bathroom, and then someone at the place we were at gave me a whole roll of paper towels and a container of clorox wipes, so I was able to clean it up before the sun baked my car. then when I got home later, I used a spot carpet cleaner to go over it all again, just to make sure.

Another interesting thing that happened was while we were driving in the city, I had a car full of students, and just before we were getting off at our exit we were going through a little tunnel part and a car decided to cross three lanes of traffic, and I guess didn't see us, and I screamed! It takes a lot to actually get me to scream, and because we were in a tunnel there wasn't much of a place to go, but God definitly had his hand on us and even though the car seemed more than halfway in our lane, I swerved a bit, but we didn't hit the van or the wall of the tunnel. But I don't think I will ever forget the look of that van inches away from my car, and all I could think about is, "oh no! there's other people in my car besides me! they are going to get hurt!!!!" I think I am so secure in knowing what will happen to me when I die, but I was worried about what would happen to the others in my car. I knew they were all younger than me(not by much) and had lives to live, and I just remember a flash of "no not them!" but we were all safe, so that's good.

but yeah, so those were my close calls/gross stories. I also got to have an interesting conversation with a South Korean women, who has lived in Chicago for almost 35 years. She told me a lot of her life woes, but the highlight of the story was this bird/animal thing that has eight eyes and lives in the himilayas, and that is how she knows a God must exist if he can create things like that! I tried to look up what she was talking about, but couldn't find anything... oh well, it was still an interesting conversation for being on the subway!

Libyan friends

I've recently met a large group of students from Libya. They are all studying political science, and always go around in large groups, so it makes it easy to meet a lot of them at a time! But their English isn't so good yet, so it takes a while to really have a full conversation. But they are so excited to have an American friend! Last satuday before I went to Chicago for the week they invited me to eat some Libyan food with them, but it was the last free day before I left. So after I had already told them I could come, I had to cancel. It ended up being a good thing, because I had so many things to do that day, but I am hoping to have more opportunities to get into their lives and get to know them and share God's love with them!

aagggghhh...

So I know I have been very bad at keeping this updated, so I am going to try to not be so detailed about what I put in here, because I feel like I need to catch up so many things, so I will just put a little at a time.

for example, yesterday we had our life options bi-weekly meeting for Bridges. Well I was in charge and usually we do like a short film and have some discussion questions afterwards to spark some good conversations, give students a chance to get to know each other and practice their english.

Last night, since i was leading, we had had an idea to do many different things besides just short films, but it has been the easiest thus far because it is already set up with questions, so you really don't have to prepare anything. Well at the beginning of the semester I decided I would do something on Shakespeare. Well as I was last-minute putting something together, I was overwhelmed by what to do, I originally thought about doing his poem "all the world's a stage" from the play as you like it, but as I was starting to prepare it, the english is really difficult to understand, and I thought the students would have a really hard time with it. As I was overwhelmed I looked at other options, but I didn't even know what I was looking for, so I decided to just go with it, and see how it goes.

It ended up being a hit! There were a lot of really good conversations about if people thought they were acting/playing a part for people in their lives, and putting on masks, and just getting into some very interesting conversations. I think the American students maybe appreciated it more than the international students (because it was different and they could understand it easier) but I think, based on my group, it still was a good topic.

I really enjoy getting to meet the students at our weekly meeting, but it has been hard to feel very connected with them, because we only get to talk for short periods of time, and I only get to see people every other week, but it does provide a good opportunity for us to follow up with the students that come, and feel out who might be open to further discussion about God.