Weekend Trip to Oklahoma anyone???

Ok, once again, I've got a lot to post, so bear with me...

Last night was free dinner night at [radius] (the campus ministry). We've sort of decided to take a different tactic than what we originally thought we were going to. Obviously, like most other ministries, we planned on doing worship services, small groups, etc. The problem with those (or at least it's a problem for us) is that they require people--which we currently do not have. For the opening worship night, we only had three people show up. So we ended up just hanging out. And decided that's what we should do for a while--just eat and hang out. So our plan now is to simply have free dinner and fellowship no strings attached. We won't be doing a devotion or worship, no pressuring to come to worship, just fellowship. The hope is that as people come for food they will build relationships. From relationships will come things like small groups and worship. Or at least that's our goal.

So Sunday was Miami's freshman activities fair. We had a booth, gave out cookies, put ourselves out there, and touted our FREE DINNERS. We had 60 some people sign up for more information, and many more who just took fliers. Monday, Eric emailed everyone who wanted information.

We hoped maybe even a fourth of those people would show up for free dinner last night...they didn't. We again had 3. Don't get me wrong, we're thankful for those three people. But it was very hard for us to fight the discouragement last night. And I've seen it's effects on Eric today.

I think that may be one of the hardest parts about this process so far--keeping Eric encouraged. I'm doing the best that I can, but because he wants so badly for this ministry to be a success, he gets discouraged quite easily. I don't blame him. In fact I think one of the only things (besides the grace of God) that is keeping me from being discouraged is knowing that I need to keep him encouraged...but I just keep telling God how much I want this thing to take off. And seriously...free food? It doesn't get much better than that.

We'll keep praying for next week.

In happier news, as is eluded to in the title of the blog, Eric and I are making a weekend trip to Oklahoma City. Apparently, Paul (Eric's dad) is being ordained on Sunday. Today I got an email from my mother-in-law Judy that mentioned the ordination, which we felt like we should be there for. And shortly thereafter Judy and I plunged into the world of online airline tickets hoping for a good deal. We found something we could live with (although we probably could have done better had we planned ahead), so tomorrow at 7:30 we fly out of Louisville. It should be a lot of fun!!!