Its only been a week??

Well the first week is under the belt. Not quite what I was expecting but it was kind of an intermediate time at Grace. The school year just ended and the summer hadn't quite kicked off yet for the all the students. So this first week was spent getting an office space set up (it makes me laugh how official that sounds for no reason), figuring out a little bit what the summer was going to look like, and just meeting a whole lot of new people! It's been a good experience so far hanging out with students and getting moved in. Today I was sitting in Sunday School with the students during worship and it sort of hit me, yep, still like hanging out with high schoolers. It was just a good reminder that even if things get slow during the day, it's worth it to have the opportunity to be a part of any of these students' lives.

So here's a few short things I've been mulling over and learning while out here so far...
Today I was thinking about teaching this summer and I realized that I don't really know these students so how can I present them with something useful? Then I was thinking this, God is the same in Indiana, Illinois and Colorado. Geography doesn't change Truth. God stays the same and his message to His people doesn't change either.
Something else I've been rolling around in my brain is the importance of being proactive in this life. I've been thinking about this for awhile but I recently started reading the book “Crazy Love” and there's an image in there that the author uses that I really like. He talks about how life is like being in a river that has a strong current and the Christian life is like swimming upstream. When we stop swimming upstream the current automatically drags us back. When we stop living on purpose, when we stop attacking this life, when we stop working out our Salvation, then we automatically become more like this world. I've heard images like this before but they never sunk in till now. Another way I've heard it put is that the Christian life is like a car, there's drive and reverse, no neutral. The images aren't that hard to come up with but the truth of them is finally sinking in. And when you live life on purpose for God there's no room for fear really. So how do we get rid of the fear? The fear of the unknown, the fear we have nothing to offer, the fear of not pleasing people or being liked, the fear of new things, the fear of being alone, the fear of.....you name it. “Perfect love casts out all fear”