a few more years shall roll

Now that classes are in full swing, and the campus is buzzing with activity, and chapel services are completely packed out, my job makes so much more sense. I realize that one of the challenges of being overseas for the summer is coming back to the quiet of August on a college campus. It’s not til the students show up that my work takes on its fuller significance, and it’s easy on a quiet day at the beginning of August to forget that. But I remember it when I am sitting on the steps outside Carter Hall talking to students and staff about what we’ve seen in other parts of the world, when two girls drop by my house for quick visit since they were in the neighborhood, when I shared a meal with a senior who’d just returned from India and we just realized we were dealing with some of the same challenges in returning home, when a student shares how God has changed her heart over the weekend and I can see the gospel shining in her face as her eyes well up with tears of joy.

Singer Adele sings my theme song of the summer (thanks to Matt for introducing me to the song, via this line) . . . The people I have met are the wonders of my world. Adele sings about London and you can view her singing it here. Adele Hometown Glory

When I look back the past few months, I am struck by the people that have crossed my path. Some photos here.

From speakers at the college where I work, to the group of freshmen I traveled with to Europe for two weeks, to the two shop workers in a large city in the middle east who grew up under Taliban rule and wanted to hear the story of the nativity, to friends from the middle east who speak in very different ways about the events in their country than anything I read in the headlines (but also want to hang out and watch The Half-Blood Prince with us!), to the students I grew with and loved this summer, to the people who shared their stories of coming to faith from backgrounds that many consider hopeless and too dark for redemption.

How did I get this privilege? Seriously. I could not have planned this life that I live. And, sometimes I forget to be thankful. I think of what I don’t have, of what I would like to add to my life, and then I am reminded that I have everything and yet I still receive more. I get hit in the face with how big our world is, how amazing the people in it are, and how God is working all over the place!