Good Morning! - The First Days of the Apprenticeship


In the morning, LORD, you hear my voice; 

in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly.

Psalm 5:3

Establish the work of our hands for us- yes, establish the work of our hands.

Psalm 90:17b


Hello, my friends and team!

    Thank you so much for being right by my side as I begin full-time ministry with FOCUS. I couldn't do it without your support (Yes, you, reading this!). I want to give y'all an update as we move into the year! Enjoy!


    These are this year's apprentices! It's the biggest class of apprentices yet! There are 19 of us being sent to different colleges in the DFW area. This picture was taken August 1st, the day we were licensed and officially made our commitments to the community. Among the commitments we made, I wanted to repeat this one to you: "Do you promise not to preach yourselves but Jesus Christ, crucified, risen, and Lord of all? - We do, and we ask God to help us." 




    These three photos were taken at this year's staff retreat! The purpose of staff retreat was to recenter on God before the school year started and to connect with fellow Focus staff. What a success! We meditated on Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." I don't expect this year to be painless. May God help me die to myself!
    I believe God used staff retreat this year to help me be free of the worry of whether I will fit in or not with the other staff. It has been an invasive thought the last few months, "Will I fit in? Will they like me?", and over the course of staff retreat, God taught me otherwise. God did not show me that I "fit in". He showed me that it doesn't matter whether I fit in or not. We all have been crucified with Christ, and Christ lives in us! 


    Our apprenticeship classes have begun! The purpose of the classes is to develop us and shape us as ministers, and to draw nearer to God. We just started, and I'm already seeing things in Genesis that I've never seen before! Thank you so much for investing in me, so that I am able to receive this training! 

    I also want to share good news about an elderly friend that God has blessed me with! What a sweet blessing it has been to have a 91 year old sister in Christ! We met last fall while I was still working at Walmart, where she asked if we could exchange emails. Over the months, we emailed each other Bible verses, stories about our lives, and prayers for one another. We finally got to reunite in person again this summer, and I asked if she would support me in my apprenticeship. She has since chosen to attend my church, the Wylie Northeast Church. She has been a great blessing to our younger demographic with her friendship (she goes out to lunch every Sunday after church with 10 or 20 college-aged students!). She hand-drew this cross artwork (which has Isaiah 40:28-31 beside the cross) for me, and she has made cookies for our homeless ministry, which I'm sure I'll share more about in future updates. Above all, she has been a great friend to me. Praise God!

Prayer Requests:

    SICM (Student Institute of Campus Ministry) starts this Sunday (8/8) and goes through Friday (8/13). We're bringing somewhere around 150 students to be trained and equipped to be small-group leaders, evangelists, ministers and disciple-makers in the Fall and for the rest of their lives. I went about 3 years ago, and I'm super excited for these young men and women to have a similar life-changing experience as I did! Pray that God would fill the students of DFW with his Spirit, and that he would prepare ahead of time the work that these students will be doing this coming year.
    I recently learned that I have the blessing to help be a part of a Focus "plant" at the Wylie Collin College campus! I will be leading a coed small group (which we call "Core"). Please pray for the Wylie students to be open to Christ-centered friendships and to the gospel.

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