[You fill me when i'm empty]

So many of our students here on project love worshiping the Lord with music.

Here are a couple of them singing Bethany Dillon's "All I Need."

It's such a beautiful song and hearing them sing it to the Lord just brings tears to my eyes.

[this is where we live]

"Ill-prepared.  I feel ill-prepared.

I feel like I came here with the wrong mindset.

I came here expecting to gain a lot;

I didn't come here expecting to serve."

That's what *Trent shared tonight during Family Time (aka Team Time) when the students were asked to share how they felt.  He was referring to biting the bullet and bunking it up sardine-style in the Christian Frat House with the rest of the guys on our team while the girls reside more comfortably in a fully-furnished house closer to the UC Berkeley campus.  

Ironically enough, I felt like what he shared kind of resonated with me.  During a lot of this internship year I've felt ill-prepared; even now that I'm staffing the Epic San Francisco Project, I still feel insecure in my ability to lead at times.  The only difference between me and *Trent is that I did come here expecting to serve.  I applied for this internship knowing full-well that I would serve-- and I was excited about it.  I am excited about it.  (I love my job :).  But I've also come to realize that it's tough work, that there are growing pains that come with choosing to put yourself in a position to be used and challenged by God.  And sometimes you question why you chose to do this in the first place because it's not at all like what you expected.  This past year of raising support, moving to a brand new city, choosing to invest in girls I'd never met, saying goodbye to those students I'd come to love in order to serve in LA next year-- all of that was so much more difficult that I'd ever imagined it could be.  But at the same time... I wouldn't take back this year even if I had the chance.  Throwing yourself into the gust of God's wind can be uncomfortable, but so worth it.  

So when *Trent gave that spiel about being 'ill-prepared,' I couldn't help but smile a little to myself, because I knew that he wasn't complaining for the sake of complaining or even just because he's a brat.  (He's not).  I know that God will use him despite the fact that he feels ill-prepared.  I know that he'll gain a lot by humbly learning to be the servant he didn't intend to be when he signed up for Summer Project.  Because even if he didn't know it the moment that he said it, I knew that there was an implied 'but' at the end of that sentence.  

"I came here to gain a lot;

I didn't come here to serve...

BUT here I am.  And I am willing

to let God grow me and stretch me.

I know He can use me despite myself."

And I, for one, am so eager to see that unfold even more-- in Trent's life, in my life, the other students on campus, and the lives of the students they meet.  :)  

[this just got real]

Hellooooooo!  :)  It's Jeanine here, writing to you from the awesome and hip-hopping... COSTA MESA!  haha.  Nope, not quite in San Francisco yet.   I'm currently at Summer Project Briefing with students from all over the country-- all eager to be sent out unto the nations this summer to tell the world about Christ, how He's changed their lives, and why His gospel of reconciliation is such good news.  So I'll be using this blog to keep you up to date on the whole Summer Project experience as it occurs.  Feel free to stalk me (aka find out how you can be praying for me and my team :0)

[Just in case you need a little reminder of what Summer Project is...]

Summer Projects are missions trips backed by Campus Crusade for Christ that send college students out into the world to share the gospel so that everyone will know someone who truly follows Jesus and have the opportunity to have a relationship with Him.  These projects offer great evangelism training and ministry experience.  They also allow you to experience authentic community with other believers-- students from all over the country who also desire to grow in their walk with the Lord, be challenged, share Jesus with the lost, and take ownership of their faith.  

I've been blessed by the opportunity to go on Summer Project three times as a student-- to Brazil, East Asia, and Hawai'i.  Each project challenged me so much in my walk with the Lord and rocked my world for the better.  In Brazil, I realized that the Lord could use even me, an angsty teenager who didn't have a clear grip on her own identity, for His glory.  In East Asia, I was struck by the realization that God created me to be exactly who I was for a purpose-- that as an Asian-American I could go places and reach people with this gospel that is neither a culturally Western nor Eastern belief, but a universal gift for God's creation to reach out an accept.  In Hawai'i, I learned that God could handle my brokenness and the mess of emotions that is my life; I learned that He neither shied away from it, nor did He want me to cover it up with a "good Christian"-facade.  I learned that I could come to Him, no matter what state I'm in.  

All to say, the Lord changed my life through Summer Projects.  And I am so excited to be going to Berkeley/San Francisco this summer, now staffing a project, pointing these 15 students-- now in the shoes I used to fill-- towards our Lord who is better and best.