Admin 'Appenings

I went to see Wicked for the first time!! I love musicals and Wicked was the first musical I listened to and I finally got to watch it when it came to Dallas. It was so ah-mazing!! I can't wait for Hadestown to come in January! It was Stephanie's birthday on the 3rd so we had a little celebration with some friends. I think I celebrated her birthday 3 separate times with different sets of people. What a blessing it has been to know her and be married to her the past few months. :-) I finally had some people over at the apartment. We've been avoiding it because it's a bit messy and we still don't have a couch (as you can see, people are sitting on lawn chairs, an office chair, and some bar stools). But you know I had to have people come over to play Guitar Hero! UTD's Friday Night Fellowship. Peter was preaching about terrorizing me as a child. Or at least that's what I remember from the sermon. What else is new? 💁 I made some pizza one night and one came out...

And just like that, August flew by... thank you for your prayers and well wishes as we started the new school year! I truly appreciate each of you for being who you are and for your support in ministry. The night we arrived at SICM (after a long 6 hour drive), we had dinner and our first session. It was a surreal moment for me as I had been planning this for the past 6 months. I remember calling the different camps about their availability for SICM during the big freeze! But here we are, getting ready to learn about how to become better friends and ministers on our campuses, about 200 of us in all! This was the view right outside the cabin. What a beautiful place to be and learn! These are two of my good friends, Zoë and Andrea! They have both been such a blessing to me in my time in Texas and FOCUS. I'm so excited to see what God can do through them as they partner with what He is doing at UTD! About midway through SICM, we took the morning off to be able to sleep in a little long...

 Sometimes I find myself needing to write a paragraph or two regarding my month. Please bear with me! July went as fast as it came! In my head, I wanted July to last as long as possible. There were a lot of projects that were going to come to a head at the beginning of August: onboarding the new apprentices (19 of them!), getting the campuses ready for the new school year, and most notably, SICM. But as August is already here, please pray for me and our team as we run into the new school year with hopeful eyes for the students that have never experienced any student life on their campus. Please also pray for our student leadership training conference on Aug 8-13, that we can remain safe and still have a good time teaching our students how to purposefully minister to the students on their campuses. You may or may not have known, but I actually got married in July! It was a small ceremony and celebration with only a handful of participants. Afterwards, I was able to video chat with m...

As we approach August, it's hard not to reflect on what's ahead. When August comes, we'll bring on 19 new apprentices and pioneer 5 new campuses that FOCUS plans to be on in the coming years. We're also hosting our own SICM (Student Institute of Campus Ministry) conference in August — a weeklong training conference to build up student leaders in our ministry. Normally we bring our students up to Washington state in May for this conference that's hosted by a different organization, but due to COVID, they've given us permission to host our own version this year. This year is still bringing twists and turns that we need to adapt to, but please pray with me as we try to navigate this new school year! I didn't do a great job taking pictures this past month, but here is a picture of me and some of my roommates and close friends playing Jackbox! Can you tell I'm lounging with my feet up? 😂 This is Karlo. I can't quite remember if I've introduced him on...

I want to take a moment to thank you all for supporting me through a year with FOCUS! It has truly been a weird and unexpected year, but I'm so excited to stay on and see what else God has in store for me! As campuses are geared to open back up next year, I'm amped up in anticipation to see how He can use FOCUS in new ways. The pandemic was a soft reset and gave us time to evaluate what we do and how we do it and I think we're prepared to hit the ground running once they let us back on campus! Thank you, thank you, thank you for your partnership in all of this! What a beautiful month it was! Though, it was one of the busiest for me as we wrapped up the end of the year. I took this picture out my bedroom window. The beauty of nature is rarely fully captured on camera, but it helps to remind me that despite the chaos and the busyness of life, that God is good! For our New Testament class, we had a Zoom Q&A with former Regent College professor, Rikk Watts. His insight into...