so i realize that it has been almost 2 months since i have written...likely, at least in part, a commentary on the crazy busyness of the beginning of the school year. with that long of a pause, it would take a pretty big deal to get me back writing, and last night was one of those nights...
one of our students, vickie arnett, had come to me a few weeks ago and said that she wanted to get baptized at our fall retreat, which was this past weekend. we had planned to do the baptism at the retreat in an outdoor pool, however, it poured rain the entire weekend and so we decided that instead of standing out in the rain it would be best to just wait and do it after dig on wednesday, and i am convinced that was God's plan all along...
so last night, immediately following dig we invited all the students to go with us to northside christian church to share in the baptism and to pray and celebrate with vickie. and right before we were going to leave one of our students (totally unplanned) got up and passionately from the heart talked about how exciting it was that Vickie was going to be baptized and about how being a community of believers was all about this and what better could any of us have then to celebrate with her!
it was awesome...and it could not have been more powerful...coming from a student...a peer was exactly what it needed to be. no question about it. i will admit, things like that are tough for me because it is unplanned and therefore i don't have control...but that is okay because God does and he did for sure last night.
and so i bet there were at least 40 students that went. we talked a little about baptism, vickie shared a little, we baptized her, sang Mighty To Save (the power of that group singing that chorus together was amazing!), prayed over her and for her, hugged her, cried with her, and then came back to campus house to have cake with her and to celebrate...it was a PARTY!
i do not think it can be underestimated how monumental of a night it was. it was monumental for vickie as she identified with Christ and opened claimed Him as Lord and Savior and Director of her life. but it was also monumental for our community. i believe that was a powerful time for our community to be together like that...something i don't think the students that were there will forget for a while. it was truly acts 2 type community...
a truly monumental night...
