Spiritual Formation

Well I have now begun real Bible College (haha). This past week we started our first course here called Spiritual Formation by prof Marv Penner former prof at Briercrest. It was a great course and unlike the rest of the courses that we will be doing this year. We didn't have a final exam but most of the courses grading was based on our participation and some papers that will be due in November. The prof was very interesting and was willing to share his own experiences with us and was able to cheer us on as a generation giving us advice for when we are going to be leaders in the church. He also evoked a lot of thought, I was really challenged this past week in a lot of areas. Every day he would usually send us out to our "sanctuary"-a spot to call our own to either journal, pray, or read the Bible. The first day he gave us some questions and we were to go find that spot so we could go reflect on them. The first question was a graph chart where you had to map out your spiritual walk with God since 2003. I realized that my highest point was when I was in Australia so I tried to figure out why it had lowered since 2007. I found that I was free of worry in Australia about what others thought of me because we were in this tight knit group where I never feared what I sounded like when I would speak but rather there was freedom in the things I said. Sometimes I find myself worrying about what I'm praying or saying in case it doesn't sound good or if someone would pick a part my prayer and find a fault because my lack of right words. So that hit me, but then at the end of the week the prof gave us 2 hours to spend in solitude and I found also in the past few months after camp finished my chart went down a bit. I couldn't understand how that was possible because it happened so suddenly but after reflecting on it I realized how at camp and the year before I had to rely on God fully for everything I did. I was working as a youth leader and so I had to rely on Him for helping me out in the group talks then at camp I had to rely on God for when I was speaking or just interacting with the campers. When I got back from camp I stopped and felt exhausted and relied on my own strength to get me by where in fact God wants to be the centre of my life everyday not just when I feel like I can't do it on my own. So I found that very interesting for me. The class material covered the different kind of Spiritual Disciplines like prayer, intercession, fasting, mediation, celebration, confession etc. So those were some of the things I learnt this past week. Besides class this week was quite normal, after school we usually get a group to play beach volleyball which has been very sweet. Last night we started to play soccer in the indoor gym called Qtown. Also last night was the first night of youth. It was great, there was about 20 kids and we had a pizza party and did some games afterwards for the kickoff. It was such a diverse group but they got along with eachother which was awesome. The one girl who I mentioned before also showed up there for youth and it sounds like she'll continue to come. It's awesome to see how she has been able to come and feel comfortable being there, it's AWESOME! Some prayer requests for me would be for wisdom as I have a few papers that I'll be working on which require a lot of prayerful consideration and that God would reveal himself more to me through the subject matter. Also please continue to pray for our youth group and us leaders Jayme, Leila, Michelle, Sherri, Jonathan, and myself as we plan out this next year together. This next week we are headed to Tofino for a 3 day surfing trip then we'll be coming back for a Camp Ministry course and then thanksgiving. Thanks once again for your prayers, hope you all have a happy Thanksgiving!