It is finished!

Tonight was the graduation for School of Ministry. So my first year of school is officially over. However, before getting into what happened tonight, I'll back up to to Friday. I had volunteered myself to help out at a formal dinner hosted by a family at church for all the second-year women. So Friday at 10 am I showed up to learn what would be going on that night and to help set up for it. The hosts are absolutely awesome. Apparently they do stuff like this all the time. It just amazes me. I ended up rolling into school a minute or two late because of it though and had a seat way in the back. I mean like so far back that there was no row until people started putting chairs there. We had worship, which by the way, we have been blessed with some super musicians all year that are better than almost any worship team at any church, and they are just our band for school. Thanks God. Then we heard from Pastor Bill and Pastor Kris. After them they announced the winners of the M. Earl Johnson Award. That award was named after Bill's dad, who went to heaven a few years ago, with the intent on being given to the person who most signifies a revivalist. The problem is, it is way too hard for them to pick people. Seriously. I wouldn't want the job at all. Since earlier in the year I had people telling me I would win it. Not knowing what it was, they did nothing more than confuse me and make me wonder why I should win some award. Honestly, that would have been the single greatest honor that I have ever received considering who I'm up against and the integrity of the people choosing it (it isn't some popularity contest like in high school). Anyway, I didn't win it, but when they announced who won it, I was so happy because of knowing the sacrifice this man has made. Yeah. It is incredible. He is a great guy as well. Someone who I can proudly say that I would endorse to anyone. He has been a constant encouragement to me from the beginning of the year and is always telling me that he believes in me. Great guy. I'm so happy for him. (They had a male and female from 1st, 2nd and 3rd year that were picked for the award, so six total, and they all shared briefly at graduation as well as getting free rides for their next year of school, except that the 3rd years don't have a next year, so I don't know what they get.)

Then they had this ceremony of the award winners praying for the students as they did a prophetic act of walking through a door into their destiny to then go and be knighted by Pastor Bill and Pastor Kris who both had long swords. Then we got went through a fire tunnel. I was wearing a new shirt that one of the interns made that shows a guy in a wheelchair getting healed. I'll have to put up a picture sometime. Anyway, so the first year winner, Chris, is praying for me as I go through and he says in his New Zealand accent, "That is you! You are going to be pulling people out of wheelchairs the rest of your life! Feel free to start with my daughter!" It was something like that. Actually, a little bit longer, but man was it powerful. Then as I went through the fire tunnel, I heard, "That is you!" or "That is perfect for you!" several times as people hit me on the chest pointing to the man praying for the guy in the wheelchair. Knowing that I just got impartation from a whole lot of people, I lay down for about 15 minutes to just soak it in. I would have stayed a lot longer, but they were needing me back at the party, so as most of my class had yet to go through this process, I was leaving my last day of first year. Kinda sad to be honest. It was a great year.

Oh boy. The party. Incredible. Tough again in that I had to have had people offer me food at least 20 or 30 times. Makes me want to go hide just so that people can't ask me. It was a six course meal with all the bells and whistles. We were to treat them as princesses and make everything perfect. I got there around 5 and the guests started to arrive at maybe 6:30 for (I'm not even gonna try to spell it, but it sounds like...)"or derves". :) Haha. I know it starts hors, but I forget all the other stuff. Yeah, then the appetizer, then the salad, then sorbet, then the main course, and finally desert. It was an incredible time and I got to spend time with a lot of really great people who I will surely be spending more time with this summer. I left a little while after 11 pm and headed over to the prayer chapel to prayer through the night, after soaking for a while I realized I would be dead tired if I stayed up all night, so I went home and went straight to bed. Time, approxiamately 1 am.

The next morning I woke up at 5:30 or so and went straight to the prayer house. I figured if I have made it to the 40th day of a fast I might as well go out with a bang and pray it up. So I went and prayed in tongues for 4 hours. Then I went and hung out with one of the more recent friends I have made, Derek, for coffee, except neither of us got anything. After that I went back and spent a little time soaking and then more time praying. After having gone over 4 hours again I was starting to feel like I should stop and leave. However, since I had wanted to stay for 6 hours I was trying to get to that. However, the urge won out when I realized I didn't feel into it any more. So I left after 4.5 hours. Finding a note from another friend that I had made it to the end of the faston the sign in sheet, I called her to see what was up, and ended up going with a group to see Shrek 3. Eh, ok. It wasn't my favorite, but it wasn't bad. I was happy that there wasn't the random, unnecessary bad language. After that we went out to eat and I came to the official end of my fast! Woohoo!

I honestly didn't think I'd finish it, but I got the burger that I love at the restaurant and ended up finishing my whole meal! LOL. I ate much more slowly than I ever would normally. Man was it good! Haha. Boy did I miss eating. The rolls were great, the fries were even better, and the burger, magnificent. Even the water was so refreshing (I fasted everything that day). After another person joined us and ate, all 6 of us went to the Sacramento River Trail to go for a walk. I had never been before so it was a new experience for me. I was full, like I would be any time that I eat out , and so I was walking slower than I normally would be able to. Not to mention I was still really sore from playing softball on Thursday. Then after a little while Derek joined us too. After that ended I went home to relax after a long day.

Today, I woke up on my own, before my alarm was to go off at 5 am. Haha. People think I'm crazy, but I just love spending time with God early in the morning. I got much more dressed up then is normal hear, wearing dress pants and a dress shirt tucked in. I ate breakfast for the first time in what seems like forever! Haha, 40 days serriously makes you forget what it is like to eat! I got to the chapel around 6 and started praying, and then later began to soak. Well, as I was soaking I became super aware of His presence and my hands were getting super hot. Wow. I honestly can't remember exactly what I was asking, but it was something to do with what I need to do to walk in the breakthrough, and then I heard a small inner voice say "faith." It was so tiny that I could have missed it completely, but it hit me like a ton of bricks. Faith is the key. I immediatly started thinking about Smith Wigglesworth and how he seemed to have faith for anything and everything. I truly believe that small voice was from God. I think faith is the key. It is all we need. We need mountain moving faith, but sometimes it seems like we don't even have faith that the grass will grow even though it still needs to be mowed every week. The great thing is that we can learn all about faith in the bible and don't need some book or something else to help us get it.

Anyway, this is huge for me. I just need to walk in the realization of faith. Anyway, between services I prayed for a man with diabetes. God touched him so much that even though the guy had just gotten there for the second service, he was tempted to go home so he could test himself to see whether or not he got healed. This guy had faith! I believe his faith healed him, and hopefully he will report back to me in a week that Jesus healed him completely. Amen! After church I went immediatley to Costco to pick up some FOOD! Woohoo! I have never spent that much money on things that weren't a bunch of clothes or some big ticket items. Granted it included protein powder that will last me several months as well as other things that will last me a month or at least several weeks. Got home and enjoyed eating. It was great. Again. Thank you Jesus! After spending some time cleaning up, I watched a movie with Jeremy and we enjoyed some vanilla ice cream with hot fudge, well it tasted cold, but it was still good! Then it was off to the civic auditorium for graduation. I made myself a sandwich with some lunch meats I bought! So proud of myself for eating something that isn't what I would normally eat! Lots of people were really dressed up as were Jeremy and myself. It was fun. We all went outside for a group shot which hopefully turned out OK as we were all looking into the sun and who knows how we fit into it as it was a mess. Anyway, back in for worship. I felt the presence roll in so I ended up sitting down after pressing in for a few more minutes. Fire on the hands! After that the graduation began with the third years, then the second years, and finally the first years. The M. Earl Johnson award winners all spoke and probably my favorite line of the night was from the female second year receipient who was diagnosed with cancer and then a few weeks later found out she was pregnant (the doctors have told her to abort the baby, but she has refused) said that we must remove the word impossible from our vocabulary. That is faith. Come on! My camera batteries, which I had charged on Wednesday didn't work at all, not even to turn on my camera, so I was only able to take some of the pictures that I would have liked to. Hopefully I still got some good ones.

I was talking with a friend afterwards about how they at times feel like even in this environment that they aren't challenged. This person is passionate about revival and wants to be trained up to become a revivalist that will change the course of history, but feels like they are being held up by people who are less passionate. They talked about wishing that the people who are going after "the stuff" as Pastor Bill would say could be hanging out and building with each other and really start to grow. I mentioned how there had been some people that would just meet together and do that kind of stuff. Unfortunately, I don't know how you grow in leading a crusade unless you are being trained by someone who has lead a crusade. You can't give what you don't have. Anyway, I feel like I need it as well, so I think we are going to try to get something like that started. This is going to be for crazy people that want to be radical evangelists (I would say revivalists, but in this culture that is too general and inculdes everyone). If you are interested let me know. Jeremy and I headed over to In-n-Out where probably 100 other students had gone as well and boy did I enjoy it. Grilled onions are definitely much better than the regular and vanilla milkshakes are the best. Ok, glass of water and I am going to bed! Even though I have no school tomorrow, I do not want to start going to bed at 2:15 in the morning! Heck, I could call my sister in Hungary right now and it would be after 11 in the morning for them! Good morning to those on the east coast! Good night to everyone in Redding who is probably still up after their graduation parties! Congrats and thanks for a great year! :)

Big League Dreams

I'll admit that I was a bit skeptical when our leaders at school announced that the next to last day would be at a park in town called Big League Dreams. I had never been to it, but I know that it is one of the main attractions that is promoted by the city. In the morning I had to take care of my car, so as I started walking towards the church I called AAA. They gave me a time frame from 8 to 8:30. I looked at my watch and saw that it was already 8. Well, once I got to a bike trail near the freeway I started to run, knowing that he would probably be there soon. I had planned on needed to do this so I had stretched before I left. It actually wasn't too bad. They called on my way to let me know that he didn't see me, so I let them know that I was running and would be there in a few minutes. After he got my car jumped I headed over to get it checked out and found that I needed a new battery, so I got that taken care of and went home to get some more Gatorade. Luckily I took some with me thinking that I would need to run. I don't recommend running on the 38th day of a fast just in case you ever think of fasting for 38 days and then think you should go running. Anyway, I am doing fine.

I spent some time checking out some great links that my Tallahassee buddy Clayton put in his blog. After gathering my first base glove, bat, disc golf discs (that I never used!), and a gallon of gatorade that would have to sit in my car (no food or drinks allowed) I headed out to the park in my car (Yea, it works!). Well, I arrived about 11:30 got my sunscreen on and went to the batting cages. Thankfully everything was paid for so we could do it as much as we wanted. It had been away since I have swung a bat, so I started out in the slow pitch softball cage. Hah! I swung and missed on the first three pitches! After that I started to improve and got out so really good hits before moving onto the slowest of the baseball machines. After a few times in there I moved up again and then repeated that once more to get up to the fastest cage which had looked quite intimidating when I had first arrived. While I was far from amazing, I surprised myself a little bit and got off some really good hits.

Wanting to see what else was going on I walked around to find some people inside playing dodgeball and others playing basketball. Not wanting to kill myself I moved on to see what else there was. I found a game of softball going on, but having just spent a lot of time in the batting cages I went inside the clubhouse restaurant. I didn't eat, but it was sweet. Tons of seats and tons of TVs, almost all on sports. Ah, it has been a little over a year since I have enjoyed that kind of experience watching the first round of March Madness in Tallahassee with a bunch of friends and some great appetizers. Best of all, it had great views of the game, so I could watch, drink some water, and cool off for a little bit. After a few minutes I went out to get closer to the action and sat right near the dugout. Seeing that sitting nearby wasn't getting me in the game I entered the dugout and immediately got put on a team.

After getting to play first base a few innings I was finally gonna get to bat when they decided to start a new game and change teams. Several innings later I got my first chance to bat, 2 swings and I was out. Yes, they decided to make it just 2 strikes for that inning, which they later changed. No worries though, I got on base every at-bat after that and scored several times. One tiem I was on first with two outs and so I was running on every pitch (we couldn't steal if the ball wasn't hit, but we could still run) and for three straight pitches the hitter lined the ball foul, with me getting to third base each time. Finally he got the ball in play and I scored from first on his single! That's what I'm talking about!

After a few errors at first, I made some much better plays like the good ole days. A few hours had passed by now and we were still going strong, rotating in new players for those who wanted to do other things. In what ended up being my team's last time hitting I hit a sharp grounder towards short. I slipped and fell in the batter's box (which I had done once already and others had done many times as well) but got up and sprinted to first barely beating the throw that was a bit wide. So I decided to go for second, barely beating the tag (I knew I could make it...hah!). After an out I was looking to score. So with two outs (I think, lol, I think I batted 6 or 7 times and got only got out in my first at-bat) I ran on a grounder to short. Rounding third determined to make it home, I scored just a second after the first baseman dropped the ball! As I walked toward the dugout I could feel something was wrong. My left shoe was hurt bad and I lost yet another shock (Maybe these guys should make a Junky Shoes Club). Oh well, I scored from second on a ground ball!

It was so much fun. I forgot to mention that we were playing on a field that was replicated to the Chicago Cubs' Wrigley Field. There also was a replica of Yankee Stadium in New York and Fenway Park in Boston. How cool! The game got cut short as it was time to go when the visiting team was up. My run had been the go-ahead run, but they ended up scoring 3 or 4 runs before we had to stop the game. Oh well. Hopefully someone out there has understood my baseball lingo. I was explaining the rules to one student who is from Europe. They were having trouble understanding balls and strikes (hey, it was their first time!) and the other team had first baseman that would just stand on the bag, creating more than one collision. As I hit one ball that ended up being a double I was yelling, "Get off the base! Get off the base!" as I ran towards first. Haha. Big thanks to our leaders for making the big league dreams for many people come true.