Dare2Share

This weekend's conference started and ended with a bang. Leeland began worship for Friday evening, and we were.. just a little late. The seven students and two interns (I'm included in that--no, not as a student, thank you!) were blessed with sweet suite tickets. A family of the church has a box in the Pepsi Center, and graciously gave us the seats for free!All that to say, we didn't have to scurry for seats, but had our own place all to ourselves! The view was all right, but the message was better. While I have had the chance to go a couple of times, things have always fallen through. Boy was I glad to go this time! Greg Stier, Zane Black and Derwin Gray were the main speakers. There was a play, multiple skits, various faith challenges, and the band Fee also performed. The central message concerned what it looks like to put on the full armor of God.

I couldn't possibly share everything with you, so here is what I shall call a buffet of information. Take your pick, and if you care to eat more, just let me know!

--music. Leeland was very good. I appreciated when the lead singer said that worship is not just singing, but it is something we do with all of our lives. I feel like students don't, well, and I don't, hear that enough. Fee's lead singer was also fantastic, and at points, things that he said, I wish I could have recorded for you, because they were so encouraging and true. Oh, and he often shouted, "Bad singers unite!" to encourage those of us who aren't that great of singers to just sing for joy to our Savior.

--speakers. Zane very much reminded me of the youth pastor I worked with at EBF this past year, Aaron Nebrija. Same mannerisms, craziness, and I feel like a similar conversion story. Greg had a gift of speaking clearly, and had a lot of encouraging evangelism stories that reminded me of some experiences I've had in my lifetime so far. And of course, Derwin was my favorite. I loved his enthusiasm and knowledge of the scripture. Something that most caught my attention was when he talked about playing in the NFL. He talked about how they would study their opponents for at least 30 hours a week, in addition to practicing as a team. "How much more, then, should we know the schemes of the evil one?" he had asked.

--silly moments. Let's see. There's when Alyssa and I were making funny faces at each other when she just stopped and said, "whoa! You're eyes are really blue!" haha. Or what about Bowman talking about how he tries to worship God all the time--even when he's pooping?! I'll admit, that one went too far, but we were all rolling! Singing at the top of our lungs (me and Janelle), "I AM FREEEEEEE TO DANCE!!!!" Oh yes, dancing was involved too.

--challenges. There was the challenge to talk about Jesus with our friends within the next 48 hours. Many of the students also had texted their friends to come to church the next day (awesome!).

--random. Another church group stayed overnight (Fri-Sat) at 4Cs with us. They had 80 students!! We ate dinner on Saturday at the Ross' and had AMAZING conversation about what it means to trust God and to share our stories with our friends. We played spoons! We watched Northwestern beat Michigan in the suite! I loved the interspersing of movie clips throughout the talks (from Ironman to Batman to Veggietales to Blood Diamond to the Spiderwick Chronicles to the Hulk to the Fantastic 4)--they were used effectively to illustrate the points.

There it is. And in the end, I was quite sleepy! But so worth it.