The Supreme Court and you

As you probably have noticed, there has been a lot of talk about the recent Supreme Court decision and I wanted to throw my two cents into the ring. I think the best way to describe my view on the Supreme Court decision is to look at what the book of Ephesians says in chapter 2 verses 1 through 10.

¹And you were dead in the trespasses and sins ² in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— ³ among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. ⁴ But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵ even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, ⁷ so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. ⁸ For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, ⁹ not a result of works, so that no one may boast. ¹⁰ For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

I would like to look at this in two parts to formulate my opinion.  First off, let me start by saying that I believe what the Bible says to be inherently true. How the Bible describes the life of Christ and what He did in both life and death is how I want to model my life. That’s what it means to be a Christian after all-attempting to mimic the life of Christ to the best of your ability. So, when the Bible makes a claim, I believe it to be true.

Now, to break this passage up a little bit, I want to start by looking at verses 1-3 with a special emphasis on verse 3. I don’t want to spend a ton of time here because I think the more relevant matter of this passage is the latter portion but there are some definite truths here that need to be addressed. The first is that, “you were dead in the trespasses and sins.” Paul is talking to a Christian audience here; he is talking to people who are trying to follow Christ. He says, “you”. He doesn’t say people around you- he says you. He is directly addressing his Christian audience with the truth that they were sinful just like the rest of the world (they still are sinful, but we will get to that in a bit). He then goes on to address the fact that everyone has lived in sin. Everyone. There is not a man or woman or child spared in his address here. Paul emphasizes this next point, so I believe it is important to emphasize as well. He says, “among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh… like the rest of mankind.” We all lived in sin. That’s all there is to it. Paul, a spiritual giant so to speak, asserted that he was among the worst of sinners.

Why is this important? it gives no man, woman, or child-regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, size, shape, or any other platform or potential difference-ground to stand on when they try and condemn people outside of Christ for their actions. (Within the body of Christ there is a little bit of a different dynamic, but that is a topic for a different time). As a Christian, you have no right to point fingers at other people’s sin because without Christ, you would be just as lost as the next person. You have done nothing to deserve to sit upon the throne of judgement. That is the position of God the father and God the father alone. Now, this is where the beauty of it all comes into play. “But God,…” These may be one of the most wonderful set of two words in the entire Bible. I say this because it often indicates a shift in tone in the passage. Often times, a scene of total depravity or despair is displayed right before these words and then these words appear and God brings restoration or redemption. 

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,  even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” God loved and cared for us enough to reach down and save us from the sin within us. He loves having relationship with us and wants that for everyone. He loved us enough to die so that our sin, that repulsive, disgusting, soul killing sin within us, would no longer be a barrier to Him. (The aforementioned sin is in reference to sin of every kind and is not directed at any sin in particular). As Paul goes on to say, there is nothing we have done, no amount of good deeds, charity, love, kindness, selflessness, spirituality, or anything else- that could have caused any one of us to deserve this gift of grace and forgiveness. God’s mercy (not giving us something that we deserve which, in this case, is separation from Him) is the only thing that Christians have to boast about. They cannot boast in anything from the aforementioned list of good things because apart from Christ, none of those things would have come to be. They would still be a part of the sinfulness of the world. 

Tying these points together, there is a very evident inability for Christians to justly persecute, condemn, or otherwise criticize people for their sin, whatever it may be. Ultimately, without Christ, Christians are in the same place as the rest of the world, broken with sin and separated from God. Now, I don’t say this to put Christians on some sort of pedestal saying that they are above everyone else or better than everyone else or more valuable than anyone else. That is simply not true because of what Paul said earlier about Christ giving us a gift that we did not deserve. This gift is offered to everyone and anyone may accept it. That’s the catch however, people have to accept it. This gift is readily available to anyone who would have it! You have to recognize the sin that is in you (and in everyone else in the world) and call on Christ, through prayer, to forgive you of your sin. He wants to do this! He wants nothing more than for you to turn to Him so that the relationship can be restored.  

As Christians, Christ wants us to show his love for the world. We are called to love the world and why wouldn’t we? We were once a part of the brokenness of the world. Why would we not want the rest of the world to see the beauty of God’s grace, mercy, forgiveness, and love when all of those have had such an impact on our lives? We should be responding to sin in people of the world with the same attitude that Christ had; a loving acceptance of the person. What did Christ do when the Pharisees brought him the adulteress? He told them to let the one who is without sin to cast the first stone. (John 8:1-11) What did Christ do when the Samaritan ran into him at the well even though she was full of sin? He told her to come to Him for living water (eternal life). (John 4:1-45) He didn’t tell the Pharisees to kill the obvious sinner in front of them. He didn’t send Samaritan away because she was too sinful. He showed them love which is exactly what we should do as Christians.  

Now, do I think that homosexuality is a sin? Yes, look at the intent of marriage mentioned in Ephesians 5. Romans 1 also address homosexuality as one of the many sins of the Romans. A lot of people say that homosexuality is not mentioned in the Bible, more specifically the New Testament, but that is not true. Am I going to condemn, mock, ridicule, or otherwise humiliate someone who practices homosexuality?  Absolutely not! That is not my place in the slightest. The only thing I can do is love that person as Christ loved them. Christ loved them to the point of death. Christ loved me to the point of death. Christ loved you to the point of death. I have no room for judgement for these people, or anyone else.  

This ties into my view of the Supreme Court decision because I don’t think it is my place to tell people how to live. Do I agree with the lifestyle? No, but I’m not going to let a law/decision get in the way of my ability to show you love.  To quote Paul again: 

1 Corinthians 9:20-23: “To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings."

Going along with what I had mentioned earlier, it is not my place to condemn people for their sin. I am responsible for my sin, not the sin of others, especially not those outside the point people towards the only true hope that we have in this world and that church. As Christians we are called to show love as Christ loved us and to would be Jesus Christ.

In regards to the Supreme Court’s power to make such a decision, I think that they may have overstepped their bounds a bit. The Supreme Court displayed a very large amount of power with that decision. The consequences of such a display of power may be of power between the Judicial, Legislative, and Executive branches of the seen in the future but only time will tell. It is my opinion that the balance government has been shifted towards the Judicial branch with this decision. The to extrapolate it to include marriage. It seems as though they almost revised Constitution does not address the issue of marriage, nor should it in my opinion, yet the Supreme Court, an office of 9 unelected officials, has decided the Constitution without the other branches which is where the overstep of power comes in. I believe that they should have left this a matter for the states.

Content with Contentment

Unfortunately, I have not kept up with this blog very well as I have been very busy and a bit distracted. I still like to blog when I get a chance though and now is one of those chances. Today I wanted to talk about contentment. To start, let my just define contentment. Contentment, as defined by Webster's, means the state of being happy and satisfied. So when God calls us to be content with our finances, situations, or selves, He wants us to be happy with what He has given us and not focus on what He hasn't. Striving for more is not inherently a bad thing, it becomes a bad thing when we idolize that dream or goal. If we make x amount of dollars a week, then we should be happy with that and not greedily desire more or complain about not making more. That was just one example but hopefully that illustrated the point that contentment is a good quality to possess. Take a look at a few of these verses to see some Biblical references to contentment and how it is a good thing. 1 Timothy 6:6-7, Philippians 4:11-12, and Hebrews 13:5 are just a few of the many verses that talk about contentment. I would encourage you to take a look at them and consider how they apply to your own life. Now, I am going to talk about a different type of contentment that is not what we should strive for and what I have been struggling with this past week.

Contentment when it comes to our relationships with both God and people can be problematic. This may be a bit hard to explain so bear with me as I do my best. Contentment in relationships is good but it should not cause you to not try and improve those relationships. I titled this post "Content with Contentment" because that's what I feel like describes that kind of contentment. If we are so content with our relationship with God, for example, that it causes us not to get into the Word or pray or grow closer to him, we are becoming content with our contentment. We are becoming happy and satisfied with where we are at, so much so that we stop trying to grow. We should not let our contentment with the relationships bar our desire to further those relationships.

This is sort of where I am at. I have found that I am generally happy with where my life is right now. I am home and enjoying the time with my family and friends and I'm in a pretty good spot with God, at least I was coming in. I've come to the point where I've lost the desire to expand the relationships with my family (my brothers more specifically), my friends and roommates, and most importantly, God. I came into this summer wanting to grow closer to my family, friends, and God but I have sort of hit a wall. With my brothers, I have just been really discouraged as whenever I suggest something, they turn me down (that statement was not meant to push blame as I can always do more than simply make a suggestion). I want to have more conversations with them beyond surface level stuff but I've lost motivation to do so and, frankly, don't really know how I would do that. With my friends, I feel like I am not putting in an effort to serve them in anyway I can and be there for them when I can. With God, I have not been in the Word much and my prayer life has even faltered a bit. I have just lacked a desire to further my relationship with God which has been really frustrating. Thankfully, however, through God's grace, I've noticed the problem early on and can take action in the right direction. 

I could probably talk more but I'm going to end there. I want to take this opportunity to challenge you to examine your own relationships, both with people and with God, and see if you have become content with contentment. Be happy with the relationships that you have but don't let that deter or demotivate you to further pour into those relationships. Moving forward in relationships can be a bit terrifying (one of the reasons I am hesitant to move forward in some relationships) but they can lead to tremendous growth. Don't let sin and the devil deceive you into thinking that the relationships that you have now are as good as their going to get because they can be so much more. Be intentional with yourself and those around you and continue to point one another towards Christ.

God Bless and Go Blue,

Tedd Sheets 

Bear One Another's Burdens

Hello everyone, today I am going to be speaking from Galatians and mostly from Galatians 6 more specifically. Here, Paul is wrapping up his letter to the Galatians and makes three really powerful things in just the first 10 verses. As I was writing about them in my journal, I kind of had a lot to say so I apologize in advance if this post is a bit longer than normal.

The first point that Paul makes is that when we notice a fellow Christian struggling in sin, we "should restore him in a spirit of gentleness." This point and the next one kind of go hand in hand but I have a bit to say on each so I split them up. This concept of revealing sin in another person's life is a delicate business I think. It is something that I want to learn how to do this year and my discipler, Kyle, is going to help me with that. But, for the time being, I thought for a while on the matter and came to the following conclusions. In order to be able to point out sin in another person's life, you have to examine your own first. Matthew 7:3 says "Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?" I think this is probably the most important aspect of this. You cannot go to another person and try to rebuke them for a sin when you have one blatantly sticking out in your life. I'm not saying you have to be perfect or sinless to approach a person about their sin. I think the point that is being made is that you have to examine your motives. Are you pointing out sin in another person's life to make yourself feel better about yourself or are you doing it to help the other person draw closer to Christ? This is a key point in pointing out sin. Another important side note, you need to know the person pretty well, in my opinion at least, to point out sin in their life otherwise they won't take you seriously or you don't know the extent of the sin.

Once you figure out your motives, the next step is to approach them about the matter. Approach them directly, not through another person. Matthew 18:15 "If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother." So, don't go tell Johnny that Jimmy is doing x y and z but go directly to Jimmy. When you approach the person, do so lovingly, making sure they understand your motives and that you both are broken people in desperate need of a savior. This experience will be different from person to person which is why it's important that you know the person you are talking to relatively well. Don't speak harshly to one another but with love. That's about all I have for advice in that matter. Remember though, my word is not perfect, I am broken as well and my advice should be taken with that in mind. Look into this yourself and determine how you think you should go about a situation like this.

Okay, this is going to be really long but bear with me because this stuff is good. The next point that Paul makes is to bear one another's burdens. This command stems from Jesus' command to love your neighbor as yourself. If we are executing that command to it's fullest, bearing one another's burdens should come naturally. We are to be Christ-like and bearing each other's burdens without a doubt part of that. Just look at Christ, he bore the ultimate burden, billions of people's sins. So, we should do the same and help people when they are in need. What does this look like? Simple, serve one another. Be there for one another. Be present in one another's lives. When someone comes to you for help, be quick to offer your hand in whatever way you can. I challenge you to think and answer this question at least once a day: "How can I serve [insert person's name] today?" Do that and see how your attitude changes. If you are feeling really ambitious, think that question for a person that you are not necessarily too fond of. I dare you. Do that. See what happens.

The final point that Paul makes in these first 10 verses that I want to highlight is that we reap what we sow. Yes, I'm aware that this a very common phrase and perhaps even over used but I think it has a lot of meaning in this context. Paul gives two contrasting examples of what you will reap depending on what you sow. The first is that of a man who sows his own flesh. This man will "reap corruption." Not exactly a very pleasant return on an investment if you ask me but hey, if you love corruption, sowing the flesh might be for you. But, if you're like me and would rather "reap eternal life", you should sow from the Spirit. While this sowing will be much harder than sowing from his flesh, the reward is infinitely more great. You should really read verses 6-10 because they are too good to summarize. If we are sowing from the Spirit, "let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap". What this is saying is to always sow with perseverance in our hearts. Do not give up because you will get your reward of eternal life. While we are waiting around for what we sow to become what we reap, do good. I can't put it much simpler than that. Don't be lazy and just wait but go out and do some good things with the time that you have. You have been blessed with time here on earth so use it to your advantage. Make the ground more fertile so we can rejoice when we get to heaven and see more faces there because we didn't waste our time here. Sorry for the length but I hope you enjoyed it!

God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.

The Heart Behind It

Hey everyone, I know it's been a long time since I've posted anything and I apologize for that if you like reading what I have to say. But, I realized I missed blogging and am going to try and post every or every other week while here at school. This post is going to be based off an article I read last night that made me think a lot and I really enjoyed it. It was from relevant magazine and I'll give you the link. Here you go: http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/why-don%E2%80%99t-we-evangelize-anymore. It's a great read and I would recommend it. While it has a great message I want to focus on a smaller part of it based on this quote:

"The thing is, God’s not after our efforts or initiatives. He’s not after the good words and the good deeds. He’s after our hearts. He wants our hearts to beat for the people who have never heard a word from the Bible. He wants our hearts to be filled with love and longing for the people we see on the street. He wants our hearts to break for the young adults that decide to leave the church they grew up in. Because that’s what His heart does. That’s where it all has to start."

While this article is focusing on evangelism, I wanted to go a bit broader with this concept. You see, God doesn't just want our heart in evangelism, He wants our hearts in everything we do. The actions don't matter as much as the heart because the heart is at the root of who you are, what you believe, and what you do. If you have the type of heart God desires, the actions will follow. James 2:18-26 relates to this very well saying things like "I will show you my faith by my works", "You see that faith was active along with works, and faith is completed by his works", and "so also faith apart from works is dead". So, have the heart and the actions will follow. If you have this heart, how could you do anything else than try and bring in God's kingdom?

On the flip side of that coin, we shouldn't be trying to justify ourselves through our actions. This is something I, and I'm sure many of you, can relate to. In Galatians, Paul is talking to people who have been saved but are now trying to "earn" their salvation through their works. Galatians 3:11 "Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law for The righteous shall live by faith." Your "job" as a Christian is not to do good things and avoid bad things, your "job" is to love and trust God with all your heart, soul, and mind. Doing this will lead to a transformation, either for the first time or for the tenth time, of your actions to honor God and bring in his kingdom. That's the end goal isn't it?

I'll give you a quick look into my life at the moment before I wrap this up. This topic is something that I have been faced with this summer through now and am still working through. I have realized that I don't really have God's heart for a lot of things, people being the most obvious one. My heart doesn't cry out for those that are lost usually but I've seen some change in that recently so that's good. When I do what I do, whether good or bad, I've had to examine my motives. I'm not sure if I do what I do because of a love of God, or if I do it for a more legalistic reason. I want to say it's because I love God but I can't say that that is the case all of the time. It's something I have been working through. If you want to know more, feel free to e-mail me or text me or whatever and I would be more than willing to talk further. For now, I challenge you to examine your heart and figure out if it is in line with God's. If not, pray about it. Not once, but daily until you see God transform that in you, that's what he's doing in me.

God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.

I'm Afraid

So, for this post, I'm going to let you into my life a little bit. I was having our date night with Jesus in the library and I was reading James 5:13-20 (can you tell I like James?). It's not a very long passage and it talks about prayer. I figured that it would be a good place to read considering our theme for this week is advancing on our knees. Basically a week dedicated to prayer and fasting; we are having a meats and sweets fast starting tonight (Wednesday) going through Saturday night. Anyway, James 5:13-20 talks about how we should always be in prayer. When we are sad, happy, or sick, we should always be in prayer. There is so much power in prayer, I can think of a handful of stories without even trying of how God has answered prayer. The example in James is Elijah. He prayed that it wouldn't rain for three and a half years and God answered his prayer. When he prayed for it to rain after that time, it did.

You see, we need to pray for everything. We are called to pray and pray according to God's will. Just think of the Lord's prayer, "Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" Did you catch that? YOUR will be done, not ours, God's. For me, this is really hard to do. I want God's will to be done for sure, but I also want mine to be done and this is where I faced some frustrations when reading this passage. I want to live for God but I also want to make sure I'm secure in life. When it gets down to it, I just want to be comfortable and serve God, which is probably not how most of us are called to live our life.

How often do you chose comfortable topics to talk about when God could easily be incorporated? How many times have you sold your possessions and gave the proceeds to those less fortunate? How many times have you gone to an unreached nation to share the Gospel? How many times have you failed to share the Gospel in your own home, job, or school? I don't mean to pose these questions to judge or condemn you because that's not the point. My answer for each of these is definitely not where it should be. My point in asking these questions is to get you to think about your life and who's really on the throne of it. Are you truly living your life for God or is he just an aspect of your life? So, I challenge you to pray. Pray for God's will to be done, pray for opportunities to suffer for Christ, pray for an uncomfortable life, pray for a heart for God, pray, pray, pray. Along with this, don't be selfish in your prayers but pray for ways in which you can advance the kingdom of God.

Now, here's where I get a little vulnerable with you all and the part that relates to the title of this post. I'm just going to type what I wrote in my journal so here it goes. "Jesus calls us to pray and pray hard. Pray according to his word and will. This seems to be relatively obvious, especially with the theme of this week but why is it so hard to apply this to our lives? For me, I don't want to give up control I think. I'm afraid of what God may do in my life. I'm afraid of the friendships I may have to give up. I'm afraid of the close friendships I would make and then move away from. I'm afraid of not being financially secure and not having that be in my control. I'm afraid of not having a family. I'm afraid I'll never have a great friendship or relationship. I'm afraid of not being equipped to answer a tough question. I'm afraid of being hurt. I'm afraid of being inadequate. I'm afraid of feeling. I'm afraid of failing. I'm afraid of God. I'm afraid of what he might have me do. When it gets down to it, I'm just afraid. There's so much to do for God and I have so much potential for that. I'm on track to have a great career, life, and future by worldly standards but that's not my standard and most certainly not God's standard. I'm so frustrated with myself."

So yeah, that's how I'm feeling and what was going through my mind at the time. God really broke me down and I had a great time with him. I wanted to post that to just show all of you that I still struggle with sin and not giving up control of my life. I don't want you to see me as someone who has everything I post about figured out because I really don't. So, I would encourage you to pray as often as you can this week.

God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.

Confession

Hello everybody, the title of this post may be a bit misleading because this is not going to be a Catholic based post. Something that has been on my heart recently is the concept of confession and repentance. I spoke a little bit on this a while ago with my "All for One" post but I just wanted to expand on this a little bit. We are called to confess our sins, both to God and to other believers. 1 John 1:9 says this "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." James 5:16 says "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working." So, for this post I will just talk a bit on each of these verses.

1 John 1 talks a lot about walking in the light. It has 3 marks of a person who does "not practice the truth." I believe these are referring to someone who claims to know Christ but doesn't. The three marks of this person are as follows: someone who claims to have fellowship with God but walks in darkness, someone who says they have no sin, and someone who says we have not sinned. The first two are a bit different than the last. Dealing with the first two, the person deceives or lies to himself, however with the last one, the person makes God out to be a liar. What's the same throughout them however, is that the truth is not in the person. If you are experiencing any of these "symptoms" (be honest with yourself and really look at your life) there is always hope! This is where verse 7 and 9 come into play.

1 John 1:7 says "But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin." I think this and verse 9 are so great for two reasons; they either offer a way out of how we've been living or they encourage us in how we are living. We can have that fellowship I talked about in the "All for One" post if we walk in the light. Isn't that great? We can have awesome fellowship with other believers and with Jesus if we just "walk in the light" (yes, I do realize this is harder said than done). That was a little tangent from my main point for this post but a good one I think. Anyway, verse 9 mentions confession of sins. We are called to confess our sins to God and if we do this, he will forgive us. No questions asked. How great is that? That's the whole reason he sent his Son, to die for our sins as a perfect sacrifice so that he could forgive our sins. I can't fully wrap my mind around this to this day. So, my first challenge for you in this post is to not hold anything back from God. I mean, he already knows everything so what's the point? It is so relieving to do this.

Now, on to the passage from James. Quick side note, James is my favorite book in the Bible and I would highly recommend that you read through it and meditate on it throughout this next week. Anyway, in James, we are called to confess our sins to other believers. Hopefully I didn't just scare you away by saying this because I know this is a scary, no, terrifying thing to do. There are so many things that are scary, shameful, or whatever other feeling crossed your mind, about this concept. But, I can tell you from personal experience, this is one of the best things you can do. This truly does lead to healing, I've experienced it. I struggled with a specific sin for quite some time (if you really want to know what, I will share with you, it's just not something I should be posting on the internet) and tried fighting it on my own many times and every single time, I failed. Then, after years of battling it, I began attacking it with confession and have since rid my life of that sin that gripped me for so many years. This is not to say I don't struggle with temptations or other sins, but, healing came in that area after I confessed and had people praying for me. Now, I'm not saying go to the pulpit next Sunday and share your sin with the entire body, but I am saying that you need to find a few people that you can go to to confess sin. I personally have 4 accountability partners that I plan to utilize when I go back home. (There are a lot of people on project that I can and have confessed to but that probably won't continue when I go back home). I don't say this to brag but to encourage you, to show you that it is possible and people aren't that scary. After you confess, pray together for strength and healing. You'll be amazed by what happens.

So, if there is a sin that was on your mind this entire post or part of it, confess. Confess to God and confess to other believers. What one is scarier to you? For me it's confessing to other believers and I feel like it's a pretty safe assumption to say that that is how a lot of you feel. Think about this for a second though, why is that true? Why is it easier to confess to a perfectly holy God than to confess to other sinners who do the same things? Seems silly when you put it that way doesn't it? If you can confess to God, you should be able to confess to other believers. I feel like I wrote a lot but I also feel like I have more to say, so, if you want to talk more on the matter or have questions, feel free to email me at tedds@umich.edu. Thanks for reading!

God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.

Goodbye Staff, Hello Project

Hello everyone, I apologize for my posts being so far apart but I am just so busy here! This being true, I'm seeing God do a lot of amazing things all over the place. I've had the chance to continue to get to know people here on a deeper level which has been sweet and I've seen Christ move and work in my life. As some of you may know, the staff leave halfway through the summer to go to their staff conference in Colorado. This is what I will be talking about for this post.

About 5 weeks into project, the staff leaves. While this was sad because we love them so much, I hear it is when project really takes off. So, before the staff leave, all of the students are given different jobs. We have  co-directors of the project, a leadership team, an outreach team, small group leaders, heritage team, and many others. The role that was assigned to me was the co-director of the community or Koinonia team. The job of this team is to encourage community within the project people through events. It's basically the most fun job because our job is to get people to have fun.

Now, I will share my initial reactions to this assignment and what I've learned from it. When I was first assigned this role, I was honestly pretty bummed. I was hoping to be in a "better" or "more spiritual" role. I thought that I was "more spiritual" than this team. However, this was the complete wrong attitude. That week we really focused on community and people's roles within the body of Christ. A key verse for me this week was 1 Corinthians 12:12-31, I would encourage you to read it. After hearing this passage, I realized how wrong my attitude was. We are all important to the body, whatever body we are a part of, whether that be a missions trip, a church, or just in general. God has given us all different strengths, weaknesses, and spiritual gifts to use to glorify His name.

We are all given certain strengths and weaknesses for a reason so we should make the best of what we have. Utilize our strengths and boast in our weakness because "[His] grace is sufficient for you, [His] power is made perfect in weakness." 2 Corinthians 12:9, part of it that is. Is there something holding you back from utilizing your strengths? What about boasting in weakness? Christ can use our weaknesses to be relatable to other believers or non-Christians. This can either build community or bring people to Christ. Again, what's holding you back from letting Christ use your weaknesses to advance his kindom? Anyway, that's all for now! There will be more to come in the future!

God Bless and Go Blue!
Tedd Sheets Jr.