April 08 Intern Newsletter

I haven't had time to write anything lately so here is one of my favorite newsletters I wrote as an intern at the LA Tech Wesley Foundation:

The summer after my freshman year, I woke up one morning in West Monroe and decided that I was going to go backpacking in Colorado. I left that night at midnight and the following evening found me sitting alone on a Rocky Mountain outcropping, eating Ramen noodles from an aluminum pot in my lap with the setting sun warming my back. Three days and many miles later I happened upon a new morning and was surprised to discover still another altogether unique landscape. This day was a gentle descent that testified to the elegance of the mountains’ lower slopes. I saw green and gold grasses and wild flowers in narrow folds of valleys. I crossed modest creeks with a single step, and walked beside strong, nobler ones flanked with the famed aspens. Finally my feet found the last miles to be startlingly open over the lowest of plains bold in their vast width beside the sharp height of the peaks and trees behind me. It was gold, it was quiet, and the thin line of the trail before me was beautiful. The day was altogether different from the days before and as I walked a little slower to savor it I remembered the spots of the trout I watched, the jagged slopes of fallen rocks, and the cool of being above the tree-line. I remembered all the days and moments before as individual pictures.

It’s April second, and I remember the days, months, and quarters of this school year as though they are books on a shelf that I’ve read. I have a thousand moments of a thousand shapes. I pick them up and turn them over in my hands and remark at their uniqueness. They are vivid as the present and yet they seem years passed. The days behind me have ended. Today is new and I am a different man.

The greatest change that has taken place in me since I began this internship is that I no longer live by fear. I used to live my life analyzing all the possible things that I could be doing wrong and constantly fearing that I was unknowingly bringing disaster upon myself. To believe positive things about myself or to hope for positive outcomes were things I was almost unable to do. In the book of Matthew Jesus makes some remarkable commandments regarding anxiety. He says not to have it…not to worry because it doesn’t accomplish anything. Somewhere in the midst of this school year I began to believe that worrying was not advantageous to me, and that I had a choice about whether or not I did it.

I believe it takes horrible courage to live our lives to the degree that they should be lived, and that safety is the greatest threat to God’s desire to use us fully. In talking with students I continue to see that fear and hopelessness keeps people from going after the things they care about the most. Last Wednesday Scott told me he would be out of town part of this week and he asked if I would like to teach The Well, our communal Bible study and worship gathering. Initially I said no, but I found myself structuring my week so that I could prepare to teach if I changed my mind. My wife told me I would regret it if I didn’t, and of course she was correct. More than almost anything I want to teach Scripture, and for that very reason I am tempted to avoid trying. But last night I taught The Well.

I am sad that my time with these students is limited. As an intern, I continue to remember the things I have learned before – especially that listening enables love. Today I am able to live with greater tenacity because I have begun to believe that my heavenly Father knows my needs. The threat of failure has lost its power because I know that I am not loved for my success but for my being. My own story, my own encounter with the healing of our living God is what I bring into my meetings with students. The change moves me and drives me on that others may know it in themselves.

May we not remain in the familiar for the uncertainty of the unfamiliar. May we go.

Thank you for your prayers and support.