April - End of Semester, New Relationships and Fundraisers!

Good Morning Friends, Family, and Internet Wanderers!

I hope everyone has had a meaningful Easter and is excited for the warming weather. In my apartment I have radiator heat, and so this time of year it is either way to hot, or way to cold depending on if the heater is going. That aside this month has been an amazing one for me! From finishing the semester strong, to plans going well, and a new relationship I am truly feeling blessed this month and as such I am going to combine my prayer requests with my thankfulness today. :)

Youth

I want to first and foremost thank everyone who continues to pray for me and for the things I post on this Blog. As I have shared for the past few months I am planning a youth trip to a conference. Along with all of the paperwork and e-mails involved with figuring out how to transport teenagers long distances, I also needed to plan a fundraiser. The fundraiser was held on Friday April 26th, and it was very different than I expected. The total cost for this event is being estimated around 1800, which is not huge for taking 7 people on a trip, but more than I have ever spent on a youth event. In addition to planning this fundraiser I had prayed and discerned and asked those who attend to reach the target of 1200,feeling like this was a stretch but hoping to reduce student costs by 2/3rds. The event itself went well with students engaging attendees and serving coffee/ desserts. That being said we did not have a ton of people show up. Yet the event went well for those who attended, and after the event when counting the funds I was made aware that other people had been contributing to this on Sunday morning as well, and we had actually raised almost 1500! We are so blessed by the generosity of the church, but also by the prayers of people like you.

Please continue to pray for this event, it is almost 2 weeks exactly until we leave and there are still some students who need to submit papers, and some final things to get sorted. Please pray for me as a leader that I will lead well, and get everything sorted. Please also pray for the students who still need to get things to me, I would really hate to have to leave a student behind because they could not get a few basic things in order.


New Relationship

Speaking of answers to prayers, this month I made another announcement which I assume most people here are already aware of, but on the off case you are not I have started a relationship with a beautiful young woman. Speaking truthfully we have actually been dating for almost 3 months, but both of us wanted to make sure that this was not going to be a fling, before sharing it publicly. It seems a little to early still to comment on the longevity of this relationship but we are both cautiously optimistic about this.

Please pray for both of us as we continue to spend time to learn about one another, that we would have the conversations we need to have, and that we would learn what we need to learn about each other.  Pray that God would guide us both and that our relationship would honour Him in all ways.


School

Finally, April marked the end of the semester! In many ways I was concerned about taking one less class this semester and the larger upcoming workload, but it has been great. I have been finding more and more that taking courses the traditional way (coming to the campus for an hour or two, 2-3 times a week) is increasingly difficult for me. More and more I am appreciating the ability to take a course all at once, by taking one week to do the whole class and then turning in the homework at my own pace over the next 2 months. This is what my upcoming semester is looking like and I am so thankful for it. Also with the reduced load of this past semester I am finding myself able to work ahead for both of my upcoming classes and by doing so I am finding the stress lessened.

Please pray for the upcoming semester and the two courses that I am doing. Right now everything is great, but I worry about the busyness of the end of the ministry year, combined with increased coursework might be a very heavy load. Pray that I will continue to manage my time well and that I might be able to finish early and take some vacation time this summer.



Thank you again for your continued support both prayerful and financial. I could not do this without such a strong support network behind me.