Unsure where to begin, Unwilling to leave anything out…

My dear friends, whom I consider family,
I believe that with all the goings-on of late an update on my part is altogether needed. Please forgive me if it seems detached and vague at times and unbearably detailed at others. I am not altogether certain where I want to begin…

First let me say that it is not possible in the least to describe how much I miss each and every one of you from the bottom of my heart. I love you all so very much.

So, about a week ago we flew down to California, checked into a hotel and spent a few days getting all the small things needed for school before moving in to the dorm on Monday. It took just a couple of hours to get my room set up, at least my own side as my roommate was not here. Since then I have been sleeping in this room here at APU, attending the International Student Orientation where I met a lot of cool people from all over the world…and learned how to use an American ATM machine…right, because Canada lives in the stone age. Ha, it was funny; the orientation was aimed more to help those who came from overseas but it was fun to be part of it.

Now, with the international orientation part of things over, the new student orientation with all the incoming American students has begun and let me just say things are getting crazy around here and much more crowded. It was nice to be here when things were calm at first and to be able to now transition into all this mayhem. I have put myself in my room to stay out of the way of all the families here trying to move there students in all over the place. Later we will get together as Dorms and have games and get to know you sessions which should be a lot of fun…although I do not think there will be anything nearly so satisfying as whipping total strangers with nylons full of pudding. We will see.

Our Dorm building has a theme this year and that theme comes from Matthew 5, in the Beatitudes where it says Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled. Our theme is “Hunger and Thirst” I pray that every person living on each floor of this four story building would take that to heart and seek to treat people with love and mercy and grace and righteousness. I pray also that we would all learn how it is that God wants us to live it out as individuals wherever we may go, whatever our majors may be, and whomever we may interact with on any day.

One thing that I wanted to let you all know, and this is really cool…at least I thought it was, we have to attend three chapel sessions every week and they are usually in the late morning or early afternoon; there is also one on Wednesday nights. I tend to feel a certain draw to go to this session many times over the coming years. If you want to know why, I will tell you…the Wednesday night session is called…any guesses?? Yeah, that’s right, it is called Kaleo. BOOM! I know. Crazy, right? I did the whole double take thing when I heard that, I was like “Wait, what did you just say??” So, just thought I would let you all know that I will be doing Kaleo on Wednesday nights here in California…and basically you should all come. Ha-ha.

Ok so on a bit of a deeper level as to how I have been, I would have to simply say that God is Good. Since coming here I have felt nothing but welcome and at home as much as I did when getting started with Kaleo (the Vancouver Island one) :P maybe even more so because of all the God showed me last year, I know so much better who I am and have become so much more comfortable in showing that to people. Also that might be because I have a year up on most of the people who live in the same building as me. Who knows. In any case, it has been going really well. I know that there will be people who are more challenging to get to know and to connect with, I ask for prayer that I would live up to my name here, that I would keep reaching, that I would stretch out my arm again and then let God take hold of it and pull it even further out…that sounds painful, maybe it will be at times, but stretching feels great.

Classes have not begun yet, they do not start up for another week or so, (this school loves to flourish the freshmen with all kinds of welcomes and events and random stuff like that.) I am looking forward to getting back into some books and learning more about what God wants for my life. If you could pray also that I would be comfortable in each class and that I would apply myself to what it is that needs to be done for each class. That I would have the sense to get work done first and have the time afterwards to go and enjoy the things that are around for us to take part in as fun.

Oh, and Ben lives close by where I am going to school so we might get to hang out a few times over the year! That will be fun! Pray that we could continue to challenge each other and grow more and more, and praise God that he saw fit to give us someone who knows us better than anyone else here who can be close enough to really challenge each other!

And on a final and totally different note, I do not know if many or any of you know that I have signed up to run a half marathon in Long Beach on October 11th but I have. And I desperately need to pick up training again, I got a good solid week in before coming to California, but I have not been able to do any more since being here which has been a week now. Please pray that I receive a renewed dedication to getting fit, not only to run in a race but to simply live well, that I might be ready to follow God wherever He leads me in the near and distant future. Also please pray I do not die of heat stroke! Ha-ha, but seriously.

Other than that, hello from me here in Sunny Southern California to all of you wherever you may be! Love you all very much! Know that I take you with me wherever I go. Happy studying to all you in school and happy working to those finding jobs!