Choir tour, oh you should here the students talk of choir tour. The inside jokes, funny host home stories, some things only explained by being in a van too long with your close friends. Everything about tour sounds like so much fun and yet at the same time such valuable ministry expedience. Freshmen year I was going to go and then I had to drop out. Junior year things didn't work out either to go. Finally though senior year I would at long last get to go. When I found out that the choir would go on tour without me it was a bitter pill. 2 years of anticipation and hopes dashed forever. There would be no other years to go on tour this year was to have been my last chance and it was not to be. To me it seemed silly to be sad over such a frivolously thing, yet finally I had to stop saying it was silly and admit I needed God's grace. I thought I could brush off the pain myself, but in reality I needed God's grace. When I finally gave in the pain left and I understood how God uses seemingly little things in our lives for a reason. To help us learn grace.
Senior year was not all pain and work though. Being a senior gives license to fun that others may not have. Under cover of darkness the senior class fled campus one cold January Thursday night. We only arrived back Sunday night after we had made sure that we had plenty of fun and made just as many memories. Our senior class managed to sneak without anyone knowing, except for of course the higher powers. Pats on the back for everyone :).
We hung out at camp in the snowy hills and of course made sure to make plenty of good use of all the snow. That is finding creative ways to dump it on each other. I managed to
The class pretty much went wild over the ever flowing hot chocolate and coffee pot. It was especially handy for 12:30 am games of Apples to Apples. As much as we would have liked we couldn't stay on sneak forever and eventually the fun ended and the homework begun again.
Once again for Spring break I road tripped across the country although this time the car was just a bit more reliable. Ahem.
The snowy peaks of the Utah mountains greeted us and so did the harsh reality of the oppression. Once again we saw the spiritual blindness everywhere. I don't think any of us left the same. I'm so grateful for the grace of God that has saved me and the same grace that uses me to serve others in ministry.
Banquet came around just like it always does every year. Just like all the other years homework was laid aside for fixing hair and painting nails. So out of obligation to tradition and some what for fun everyone got dressed up, dumped their life savings on flowers and journeyed through the hills to banquet. This banquet though wasn't like all the other banquets. It was for us the senior class. We sat at a special table, we went first in line, we spied, gawked and poked fun at the other guests just because we were seniors. Suddenly it was all so real that in a few weeks we as class would be graduating and going our separate ways. We were ready to be done, but we were ready for ministry? Never. We all were going to have to trust in God's grace for every step.
Probably the most momentous occasion of the year for me was sharing my senior testimony. The guys had already had the chance to share in chapel several times, but now us girls got a turn. Cramming 3 years worth of lessons into a 15 minute speech probably was more of the more challenging things I've ever done at school. Contradicting all of the things I wanted to share was the one word that summed up college years. Grace. Sharing that one word would have been too short, so opted for a concise 13 minute 40 second testimony. Mr. F. caught me in his office right before chapel stashing tissues in my Bible, but I escaped crying in front of the whole school. That's not to say that when I wrote my testimony I didn't cry, because really shouldn't every now then God's grace overwhelm us so much it moves us to humbling tears?
12 times over I had the privilege too of hearing my fellow classmates share their own stories of God's grace.
Chips and salsa plus Mountain Dew Chocolate fudge ice cream floats; we consumed that glorious food on the eve of our very last day of school. A little over 12 hours after our pre celebratory party ended school had forever ended for us too. Done. Over. Finished. Complete. All I could think of was "to the praise of His glory and grace"! Yes, we had completed 3 years of school, but only by the grace of God.
I just wrote a lot of
When it comes down to it I can describe this year in three words.
Pain
Giggles
Grace
It was the year where sometimes I felt the pain would stifle me. Then there were the times I laughed, so hard I could hardly breath. All through the year grace sheltered, healed, comforted, blessed, and covered me. Teaching me the pain was worth it and the laughter was a undeserved blessing just like grace was given to a poor undeserving person like myself.
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