We believe in the power of prayer.  So many times along this journey Kevin and I have been overwhelmed by the next step or even uncertain about what the next step should be.  Only when we stopped trying to figure things out on our own and started asking God for his input did peace come.  Not necessarily the answer we hoped for, or even an answer right away, but reassurance that someone greater than us was in control.  Someone greater than us is still in control.  Hallelujah!

It is also humbling for us to recognize our need for community. Thank you for praying with and for us.  We need you with us, asking God for direction and wisdom and courage. Encouraging us with your prayers.  It is a pleasure to be in community with you.  Please keep praying.

To download your copy of the Prayer Calendar, which can guide you daily through our most important prayer needs, use your supporter username and password (check your latest paper newsletter if you can’t remember) to log into the Prayer Calendar page. From there, just download the month you’re interested in. Easy!

Click here to log into the Prayer Calendar page.

This letter has been on my mind and heart for over a week now. Sadly, it seems that the first week of school every "spare moment" is consumed with lesson planning or preparing other items for the classroom. So, here I am, at the end of my first week with students. My mind and body are exhausted, but my heart is overflowing with the goodness of God. I'm still trying to digest all of the lessons from this week. Not lessons that I have taught, but lessons that God has been teaching me.

There is a country song (sorry all of you country haters) called I Saw God Today. The message of the song is really quite simple. The guy is talking about the birth of his child and how after that, everywhere he goes, he seems to be more keenly aware of God. The chorus of the song says:

I’ve been to church, I’ve read the book
I know He’s here but I don’t look
Near as often as I should … yeah I know I should
His fingerprints are everywhere
I just slowed down to stop and stare
Opened my eyes and man I swear
I saw God today.

As I was driving to work on the first day of “teacher work week,” I heard that song. On that day in particular, the line “I know He’s here but I don’t look near as often as I should…” really struck me. God began speaking to me about all of the way I tend to overlook Him on a daily basis, from the small things to the large things. With that notion in the back of my mind, I pulled into the parking lot at school.

Brand New School!

This year, God has blessed me by placing me at the brand new middle school that just opened up in Harrisonburg School division. It is a gorgeous school, full of a wonderful staff. So, all summer I was gearing up, wondering what it would be like to open a brand new school. What challenges await me? What adventures lie in the halls? Will I be able to adjust to the earlier school schedule?

Work week rolls around. The first day our new principal had scheduled a staff breakfast. We all gather together and he begins to make some announcements and goes through the formalities of thanking key people. After that, he asked the staff of 72 to join him in prayer, not just for the food but for a blessing over our new building. As he began praying over our school, I got chills.

I couldn’t help but stand amazed at the sight of 72 people, with their heads bowed, asking God to bless our school, our students, and our city. Later that day we had our building dedication. Many community members joined the staff and school board. Once again, a blessing was prayed over the building. I opened my eyes as the prayer was being said (gasp!) because I wanted to look around. What I saw, again, gave me chills…but this time it brought me to tears. I saw the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains with the sun shining down on them in the background. I saw a brand new school complex. But the most astounding sight was the crowd of a few hundred with their eyes closed (me excluded), heads bowed, and hands stretched toward the building as a local pastor prayed a blessing.

I have been in circles of many Christians, who claim prayer has been taken out of schools. I know as a teacher, I walk down the halls each morning praying for the kids. Prayer really hasn’t been completely taken out of schools! Too often I think people on the outside don’t know that these sorts of things are taking place on the inside. Public education has gotten a bad reputation, and that is somewhat understandable. However, take it from an insider…God is there. I’ve seen Him!

So, let me leave you with this, for it is another letter all together. What is it that you are doing in your daily life, in your work place, in your community, to help bring others to the place where they can say, “I saw God today?”

Luke Batchelor is a guest author on CONSTANTjourney and a future Canvas team member. We’re excited to get Luke here in Birmingham full-time and are always thrilled to watch his journey toward arriving here. Click here to learn more about Luke and the rest of the team, or take a look at Luke’s own website.

This is a story about love, about how campus ministry can change a life and a story of God’s power in this world. Enjoy these words from Luke’s blog.

The thing about Campus ministry, about ministry in general, about how God works through the whole world is this…no investment fails to yield returns. Allow me to illustrate.

Thursday night I had the chance to revisit the ministry that played a crucial role in my spiritual development, the ministry I committed a year of my life to, the place I fell in love with campus ministry. Out under the dusky sky of a surprisingly cool August evening, in the heart of Georgia Tech’s campus, I got the chance to remember what it is I’m working for. I watched (it never ceases to amaze nor encourage me) as nearly 300 people came, ate, talked, threw frisbees and footballs, laid in the grass, hugged, laughed, in one word fellowshipped under the Atlantan skyline. I observed friends who had spent a summer in different parts of the country or even the world reunited for the first time at their beloved campus home, CCF. I joked with the freshmen I worked with as an intern, in perfect paternal fashion, exaggerating my emotions as I commented on “how quick they grow up.” They’re leaders in the ministry now. They came in as wide-eyed freshmen searching for a place to belong, questioning their role in this swiftly changing world, and now have found a chance to make a difference as the movers and shakers of the living organism that is Georgia Tech CCF. I stand on the periphery of the crowd, mostly watching. It’s their ministry now, not mine. And how my ex-freshmen shone! Circles of conversation formed, involving strangers and friends alike as people introduced themselves and shared their stories. Some had brought others for their first encounter with CCF. More were making those first-timers feel welcome, and honestly, it brought me back. Back to my freshman year and my early days at CCF.

I was brought to CCF by one of my earliest friends at Georgia Tech, Stevie Hale. He invited me one Thursday night to drop my soccer game in the middle of the quad, clean up a little bit, and go encounter what would eventually become my home away from home. It began a friendship that would span my entire college career, and beyond. But that’s beside the point. There were others with me that fine Thursday evening, including one whose name was Jeff.

And it was Jeff who I was thinking of in the summer air six year later when I was reminded of the power of the body of Christ. Jeff lived on my hall freshman year. He played soccer on our hall intramural team, and when we weren’t playing real soccer, we were probably trying to best each other on the virtual pitch of our Playstation’s FIFA ‘03. He was a kind-hearted bear of a boy and we got along well. In the summer before his Junior year at Tech he met Michelle and fell deeply in love with her. In fact he fell so in love with her that he accelerated his graduation date, and did the unthinkable so that he could marry her sooner: he graduated in three years!! They were married shortly after in Mexico. He enthusiastically invited the entire ministry to his wedding, forgetting the impoverished status of most college students. They moved to Ohio to start their life together, but kept in touch with their friends back in Atlanta.

Its a rainy Monday morning in Rome when I get the news. Michelle, Jeff’s Michelle, had been involved in a car wreck and had gone home to see Jesus, leaving her beloved husband behind in this life. My heart broke for the tragedy of death, for another reminder in a long line of them, of our world’s falleness, and the death that ensues. It broke for my friend Jeff and for the separation of loved ones from each other by death, that great void between us and those that have gone ahead, between Creation and God after the fall. And I take a minute to thank God for the redemption of Jesus and the knowledge that Jeff and Michelle will see each other again in a world absent death. And I thank God for places like CCF that share that love with people who search for hope in a world that can seem dark and hopeless.

And that’s what I mean by no investment is wasted. It was probably offhand that whoever brought Jeff to CCF did so. A friendly but innocuous invitation to a living body of believers and seekers. It wasn’t offered with the the knowledge of its life-altering or life-saving consequences. For you see, when Michelle died, Jeff called his friend and old campus minister Rick. They talked, they cried, and amidst the stories of their love and the tears for lost futures, Jeff made one thing clear. If it weren’t for CCF, he said, “I don’t think I would make it through this.” God uses our offhanded invitations and words of encouragement. Tiny actions land on fertile soil and sprout yielding, blossoming fruits that reveal God’s love to our world, as it happened with my friend Jeff.

On Thursday, as I watched the students interact, I remembered my friend Jeff and I wondered, who of these students will have loved ones die, who will encounter tragedy that seemingly has no explanation and will turn to their brother and sisters in Christ for the love given by the Holy Spirit, that will carry them through the hard times and keep them in touch with a God who loves them deeply, and whose heart breaks along with theirs at the way things are right now. God uses us to reveal Him in this world. Campus Ministry is like that, a place to be shown that God is real and moving, and most of all that he loves us in our darkest moments. Thank God for that. My prayers go out to my friend as he longs for the time when he will be reunited with his wife, as well as his Lord and Savior and they will all dance for joy. Amen.