Best Night Of My Life...

The other night was the one of the best nights of my life. I had a chance to meet my most FAVORITE band. Me and a couple of my friends went to go see Underoath, Norma Jean, and Innerpartysystem. We ended up sitting next to one of the members of Underoath who happened to remember us from the last time they played in Vancouver (awesome!). Caitlyn wanted him to record her voicemail again because It got lost. Their set was completely amazing. Its an interesting feeling worshipping surrounded by non-believers. The Lord was definitely there. They played a lot of old songs, so there were a lot of people screaming the lyrics, and moshing (definitely fun). After their set was over we made it to the alley in the back of the theatre and waited for them to come out... they were all freezing cold because they just finished a tour in Australia... but now theyre in the blistering Canadian weather. ANYWAYS.. We ended up talking to all of them and telling them that the Lord was definitely there. We got a chance to pray for Chris, and to pray for Underoath and their tour that there would be fruit and that they would be humble...After we talked to Chris and the other members of the band, we got pictures and all that fun stuff...He invited us out for pizza...so we met up at the pizza place and Josh ended up talking to Aaron about their tour, and Caitlyn mentioned that their music helped her through a lot of things in her life, and they were very authentic.

It's cool because usually when you meet "famous" people, they want nothing to do with you. It's cool to see a humble group of guys that are into following Christ and making him known to the world! Keep on truckin'!

UNDERØATH Experience

"Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves" Romans 12

So there is a really great story behind meeting underøath and praying for them and going for pizza. SO good in fact that it caused a rel. div. about who gets to blog it. And as excited as I would to tell the tale. I will humble myself and let Carlye blog about it tomorrow. Stay tuned. 

The spirit is working!

Tonight at recre8 2 very significant things happened. 2 things that bring great hope into my life!

1. My friend came in and told me she was moving out because her common law partner is in Jail for the 2nd time that I know of for abuse against her. So, she's looking to move out before he gets out of Jail. So i took her up to grace mansions to do the whole application thing, and we're going to try to find a temporary place until she hears from them.

2. Then, Our friend leighanne came in and she was like and told me she needed to talk to me. She had tears in her eyes. So we went into the classroom and talked and she just started crying so much! And she told us that she felt alone because she didn't have God in her life and she didn't want that to be the case. She doesn't want the devil to have victory in her. She wants to be clean again! Praise the Lord! She's so beautiful, I love her with my whole heart! I want her to be clean so badly! She's coming to camp with us in May...and she got really excited.

The Lord is working in the DTES! Its amazing!!!

War College Photography

I've been taking some photos around the Downtown Eastside lately, and I thought I would share a couple with you....

Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me

I'm reading the book "Kissing the leper" by Brad Jersak right now for reading week. It's been a totally amazing read. It's been really encouraging! It's pretty much about Matthew 25:31-46. Which is "whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me". If you walk past someone on the street acting as if they don't exist, your essentially acting as if the Lord doesn't exist. If you take the time to talk and see how their day is doing, you're doing that for the Lord. I love it! I always feel excited after I finish reading a portion of it! It's extremely encouraging!

Shepherd

You hem me in!

Called me to yourself!

Held me fast as I strayed

and shepherded me all my days.

What is it I truly desire? 

What is it that I choose to stray again and again?

I.

Shall.

Not.

Be.

In. 

Want!

On love.

I scrawled this sentance in my journal in November, and I thought it fitting for a reflection of Christ's work in my life during my War College year (both phase one and two).

When I was young(er), I believed in the impact of words like grace and love, now I am impacted BY such words; wrestled to the floor where I must face the small honesty that in order to define love, one must be destroyed by it.

The War College on Global News

A lot of our footage didn't make this newscast but we're quite happy with how we were reflected. One point I would say is that 'our religion is to be good neighbours.' Watch and you'll see what I mean.

Global News: War College Style

About 2 weeks ago, a news reporter from Global BC news followed me and Sally around for a night while we were doing street combat. So I figured I would post the link on the blog so other people could enjoy it too!

http://www.globaltv.com/globaltv/bc/microsites/phoenix/index.html

It's the clip called "Project Lockstep"

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted

This is something I've been thinking about a lot lately. We've been talking about the beattitudes for the last 3 weeks in consistent life ethics with Lane Walker. It's been really good! I've been thinking about the recent loss of my grandfather and how I'm still mourning and grieving that loss. But I've also been thinking about the other things you can mourn the loss of. The loss of hope, or trust, or knowledge or anything. I think of mourning and I think of a funeral, but God has really been speaking to me about the different times and reasons to mourn and its crazy.

Well, thats whats been on my mind lately.
Courtney