Sunday, July 01, 2007
Never a dull moment: fire etc.
1 I rejoiced with those who said to me,
“Let us go to the house of the LORD.”
2 Our feet are standing
in your gates, O Jerusalem.
3 Jerusalem is built like a city
that is closely compacted together.
4 That is where the tribes go up,
the tribes of the LORD,
to praise the name of the LORD
according to the statute given to Israel.
5 There the thrones for judgment stand,
the thrones of the house of David.
6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:
“May those who love you be secure.
7 May there be peace within your walls
and security within your citadels.”
8 For the sake of my brothers and friends,
I will say, “Peace be within you.”
9 For the sake of the house of the LORD our God,
I will seek your prosperity.
This was our verse for the week. And what a good reminder it is that peace may be within our walls in the midst of the fire, which was 1/2 a mile away from Blue Ridge (staff housing). After getting close to evacuating property the fire was controlled due to more favorable winds and cooler tempatures. As for our topic it was “How your story affects your leadership” given by Ron Nydam. His main focus was to look at our family tree and identify the trends within our family history. “God uses all of our gifts AND struggles”. To some degree we all have family struggles and it is good to embrace our reality to better ourselves for the future. And as usual here are some pictures from this past week:
The week brought about Jen Van Winkle’s 22nd birthday
The smoke from the 50 acre fire
The REI tent sale in Denver (AKA buying really cheap camping gear)!
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Power of Influence
This week we were very excited for our speaker John Britton to arrive. JB is the assiciate dean for student development at Calvin College. JB spoke on power of influence vs. the power of position. Everyone learned a lot about leadership from his talk. For example one thing we took away was “Leadership is dynamic, and the right to lead must be earned individually with each person you meet.” Along with a great speaker our small groups went very well. The bible study this week was mainly focused on God as our helper, our keeper, and our gaurdian. God knowing our plans for us better then we know it ourselves and God having a reason for everything (why we are here at SMR). The verse we focused on this week was Psalm 121:
1 I lift up my eyes to the hills—
where does my help come from?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;
4 indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;
6 the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;
8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.
For our Wednesday activity we headed to Grand Lake. We started off hiking up to the beautiful Adam’s Falls. Due to the hiking we needed to cool off so we then headed into town to grab some ice cream and hang out by the lake. Some photos from this past week:
Sunday, June 17, 2007
The beginning of the summer for 2007
Well it is year 8 of calvin College’s LCI at SMR. Things are off to a great start. This is the first entry for the summer of 2007! For those of you who do not know every Monday night we have a speaker from Calvin come and talk on leadership. For our first two weeks Mary Hulst (also our program director) was our speaker. Her first talk was called “Here we are! Now what do we do?!” and her second was “How to be a good follower.” Both were very good and everyone learned a lot.
Along with that second Monday night came a celebration of 21 years for Monica Lackman. Monica is one of three female small group leaders (the others being Sarah Baker and Molly Fuller). There are also two male small group leaders Tony Terpstra and Dan Riemersma. On these Monday nights these five leaders lead the other Calvin students in a Bible study, which Mary Hulst has put together. The Bible study is called “Standing on the Heights”. The first week we looked at our theme verse (one we all have memorized and will continue to go back to throughout the whole summer), which is Habakkuk 3:19: “The soverign Lord is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to stand upon the hieghts.” From there each small group talked about their goals for the summer (emotionally, spiritually, physically, relationally etc.) and how faith is about being people of God as much or maybe even more so than it is about being a person of God.
Also every week (on Wednesdays) we have a Calvin group outing. Our first week we went white water rafting on clear creek. Although two people fell out of the raft they got back in safely and everyone had a good time. For the second week we went to the Hot Sulfur Springs. They are nautral springs (24 of them) that range from 96-110 degrees. Even though it was a bit smelly everyone felt very relaxed and enjoyed themselves.
Here are some pictures from the past two weeks:
The group (well most of us)
For Calvin’s Kick-Off (Orientation) we started with “get to know each other games” and ended at night with a fire
The leadership team (Sarah Baker not pictured)
White water rafting on Clear Creek
Of coarse we have done some hiking to! Here are some views from over 14,000 ft. high ( AKA a 14er, there are 54 of them, which are the highest mountains in Colorado)!
This ones at sunrise!
Celebrating Monica’s birthday with some delicious cake after our LCI Monday night
Some of the ladies going out to go dancing in Beautiful Grand Lake, which is right by Rocky Mountain National Park
Hikes around SMR property
