A Roller Coaster Ride

Well, as the title implies, these past few weeks have had a lot of ups and downs!

Oxford Amazing Grace week was great! I loved getting to know students better and to even hear of a couple of students decide to give their lives to Jesus! I had dinner with one student who just recently became a Christian, and it was amazing to see and hear how God has transformed his life! He told us of even how his dreams have changed. He use to have a re-occurring dream of searching for the star that only had 5points, but everywhere he looked (and they were literally everywhere around him) he could only find stars with 6points. And there were millions to look through. It sounded like that was an exhausting dream...however, since he accepted Jesus into his life, he has never had that dream and has had peaceful nights! That was really exciting to chat with him and see God working in his life. Also, he brilliantly gave his story (testimony) at one of the big Amazing Grace talks! God is good :o)

My team here in Oxford has also been going through some team dynamic transition. Due to some issues one of my teammates is no longer able to be on my team. The news came to me as bit of a shock, so it was kinda hard to swallow for a bit...but God is good and is in control. I may not fully understand all of the circumstances, but I do know that His hand is in it, even if it's not easy to see. Prayers for all of us would be appreciated.

Last week we had an event for one of the colleges within Oxford University. It was a time for the gals to hangout and hear the gospel. It was really awesome! The room was packed with gals! We did face masks, decorated ginger bread people, and ate loads of yummy sweets! There was so much food, afterwards we called in the boys to finish the food... And since then it sounds like a lot of the students have had great follow-ups with their friends! It is a blessing to see students being purposeful with their friends in telling them about God's love! (And then last weekend we had another similar/great event--a gals brunch with Oxford Brookes!)

And this week has been really hard for me specifically. I found out on Tuesday morning/Monday night a friend of mine from High School, Daniel, died. I still can't believe it's true. I've gone through feeling shocked, confused, sad, numb, crushed. However, like I said earlier, I know that God is in control and he is Sovereign. I've found it a big challenge for me to go through the grieving process alone and not with a community. But praise the Lord for skype! I have been able to call friends back home and chat with them about things. I feel like this week I've been such an emotional basket-case! I pray that God will glorify His name through this time.

And yet this week has been Hope week for Oxford Brookes (like the Amazing Grace week). It has been awesome seeing students who love the Lord and love their friends. I pray that they will continue to follow-up after this week with their friends who attended events and ppl they met through surveys.

So yeah, the life of Nemo has really reflected that of a roller coaster for the month of February. But the one thing I do know is that though I may feel like such a basket-case, God is and always will be the one and only constant in my life. Thank you God for being my firm foundation!

OH! And just another story to go along with last time...
I was trying to be a good Bible Study leader and make a really yummy baked potato soup that my Bible Study leader made when I was at uni. Everything seemed to be going well, you know, following the recipe right in front of me, until I began to stir the soup more and noticed that instead of being soupy...it was becoming more like dough!!! Yes, that's right I made some weird bread rather than soup!! I had mixed up the lines on the recipe and instead of 2/3 cups of flour, I put 6 cups of flour!! It needed 6 cups of milk,not flour!! Yep, felt like an idiot when I had to ring one of the students and ask her to bring more flour b/c I had used all of the flour!! But in the end we had yummy soup and some strange bread! haha... oh dear...

Amazing Grace

This week's theme for Oxford Uni is Amazing Grace and it's been really awesome thus far! There have been lunch time talks (with lunch provided), a jazz banquet on Saturday night, and evening talks so far. I haven't made it to everything, but I've heard amazing things about all of the events so far. After the jazz banquet, I heard of one student who decided to give his life to Jesus! It has been amazing seeing students tell their friends about God's gift of grace, and seeing students realize that it is by grace that we are saved!

Yesterday I went to one of the lunchtime talks. It was really nice, if only I wasn't such a klutz! One would think it wouldn't be that hard to balance a paper plate and a drink when I was sitting down right?! Well, after knocking my orange to the ground and it rolling away, making somewhat of a distraction... I decide to get my drink, squash or Kool-Aid, and quench my thirst. But instead of actually making it to my mouth, somehow I decided to dump 1/2 of my drink on my lap! And of course this was at the beginning of the talk... so instead of making a commotion/distraction, I decided not to move until after the talk was through. Afterwards I was still soaked and it looked like I'd seriously peed my pants!! It was uncomfortable until a student/friend let me come to her room and use her hair dryer to dry my jeans! Anywho, just thought I'd share my random story...

Tonight I'm off to London to check out an open house at Birkbeck University. I'm gonna look at grad school programs to see if that is something that I would like to do in the nearish future... Please pray for me and my future decisions. I'm really clueless as to what I should be doing this next year and beyond. But I'm also really excited to see what God is gonna take me!