Fast Week

I cannot believe how fast the weeks are flying by. I only have TWO weeks of school left! My finals start on May 1st, then I am free!!! Well, it doesn't go quite like that, but at least I'll be able to read the stack of books that I've been collecting from VFC.

The newest one, given to me at Vision Quest, is called the Gospel for Real Life by Jerry Bridges and is super wonderful. Bridges articulates the message of the Gospel so well. One thing he talked about in one of the chapters is not to catagorize the wickedness of our sin according to our standards, but to look and see the payment Jesus had to make for our sin. The fact that He had to die that terrible death and that God poured all of His wrath on His Son is evidence that our sin is disgusting and unacceptable to God. But because of His grace we can be acceptable through the righteousness of Jesus' blood that covered our sin. God is so kind, and I am so thankful that He has saved me from my sin. I could go on and on, but I won't...just read the book.

Last Saturday Reuben had a birthday party at my grandparents farm. It was a blast. Grandaddy had us doing a treasure hunt...which he made all of the clues for. Now my grandaddy, being the genius that he is, did not take into account that not all of his grandchildren got his genes. Some of his clues were really tough! All of us had a wonderful time teamin' up and running all over the farm. I learned one new thing about grandaddy, he will not let anything get into his way of creating an exciting treasure hunt for his grandchildren! He had us climbing on the side of silos and in the rafters of the shed...ha! Later we had a nice bonfire and enjoyed good conversation. There were about 25-30 of us.

Exciting news, I just got Luke, Dad, and I signed up for the New Attitude Conference in KY this May. I am very happy. I was starting to experience anxiety after one hotel told me that they were booked. My friends have been after me for weeks to get signed up. It will be a fun time for Dad and Luke in part because they will get to be with my VFC crowd and will finally get to put faces to names. I also anticipate hearing from the Lord! Can't wait, can't wait!

My brothers played paintball all day today. Samuel Joiner, a Marine that is on leave for a week, joined them and Luke got to be on his team (much to Luke's delight). I think Luke said their team won all but "maybe" one game. Samuel joined us for dinner one night this week and it was cool to hear about some of his experiences being in the Marines. He just got back from officer training in the California desert so he was full of stories. He leaves for Iraq in September for 7 months. My sociology class watched a news video about the military in Iraq recently and it made me appreciate what they are doing for our country. What a way to serve. Joe Obenschain, one of my friends from highschool, is going to Iraq in May. It puts a new light on things when the people you grew up with and went to school with are the people that are engaging in the war and not just the military you see in the news. The war is a lot more personal.

Well folks, thats all she wrote. Signing off, over and out!