::Sojourn::
in chronological order, the following are some highlights from the past month:
- we [Sojourn staff] began serving with Starlight Ministries, an outreach to the city homeless. each Wednesday night, we spend a couple hours handing out food and clothes while engaging in conversation with the people of Boston Common. and when i say "conversation," it's mostly us listening and them talking. it's wonderful.
- our "steering committee" was here for a few days, which was really encouraging to us all. we had a big meeting with them, plus some New England ministers, plus some fellow Boston campus ministers. it was very good to share visionary things, and receive wisdom, prayer, and confidence.
- the Boston Partnership [the church-plant we are working with] had their first gathering, kicking off a monthly meeting time between now and September when they launch as a church!
- i started meeting with the "wives," a.k.a. the only other women remotely involved with Sojourn/Boston Partnership. we are hoping to evolve our time into a women's small group, so i'm stoked for that. they are three of the most amazing women ever, and even though our lives are vastly different [well, they are wives, and moms, with 2-4 kids each], i think i'll learn a lot from them and hopefully be an encouragement to them. heck, in our first meeting, i already learned explicit details of childbirth...oh boy!
- this week we have been hosting a spring break group from CMSU [Central Missouri State University, where Tim has been the lead campus minister at Campus House for eight-ish years; also Bobby and Nate's alma mater]. so yeah, it's been really good...serving the city, showing them our favorite places, sharing Sojourn things with them. really good. we will have another college group out here the end of this month as well, so March is pretty booked.
so a couple weeks ago, Nate and i decided to go backpacking and camping in the White Mountains. it was so incredibly beautiful...yet, somewhat cold. during the day temps were in the low 20s, which was great. it was the whole camping part of the trip that in hindsight maybe wasn't the best idea. we had zero-degree sleeping bags, so i was pretty toasty during the night. the problem came in the morning, when it was 14 degrees inside the tent, and roughly -5 outside. but the real problem came as we were packing up things, getting ready to trek through about 2 ft of snow back to the car...which was a good two-hour hike away. i'll spare details, but let's just say that Kim doesn't do well when she is mildly dehydrated and fighting the threat of frostbite. nature always brings me and God to some of our best times, but almost passing out multiple times in the middle of a national forest when we hadn't seen another human being for 15 hours had me praying a bit more...
it all turned out fine though, even with a touch of frostbite for Nate to brag about. here are some pictures [all Nate's], and you should read his blog too.
::girl friends::
i hung out with Kerry and Meg, two friends from work, last week. actually, the three of us hung out twice: once for Fat Tuesday, and then for Harpoon Fest on saturday [Harpoon is a fabulous Boston-brewed beer]. anyway, i can't tell you how great it was to hang out with girls!! [i love you boys, you know that :)] and Kerry and i talked about starting up a Bible study with us and some other girls from work...i am so stoked.
::Purdue::
i'm making a trip back to purdue at the end of the month to speak at campus house. i'm pretty excited for that, and for seeing rob and todd and a few others. speaking of purdue, i wore a purdue lacrosse shirt to work the other day, and a guy asked "did you go to purdue?" i nodded. he said he went to IU, to which i replied, "oh, i'm sorry." :)
::random::
i was walking to work the other day - just walking - when a lady [at least i think it was a lady] passed me on the sidewalk, threw a fist at my face [inches from making contact], and then continued walking past me, loudly proclaiming several things, some i didn't quite pick up, others involving me being a type of female dog.
what the crap? i just kept walking, kind of unfazed for a block or two, pondering every possible reason for her actions. was i squinting at the sun, making a weird face? did she think i was someone else? was she yelling those words to someone down the street? nah. i think it was all just a random act of urban living. and it makes for great stories.
i love this city.
