new snowboarder
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me catching a little air off a 75ft. drop...i landed it.
this past weekend i took a 9 hour drive to durango and learned how to snowboard. i went with 80 other high school & college students from trinity church. my main reason to go was to talk about jesus in the evening gathering times. it was great to share the love, victory and life of jesus. my hope is that the spirit of god moved in the secret places of hearts. god is a great god and i hope this was understood in new & personal ways. if i could do it over i would certainly change some things i said and the way i shared. nevertheless, god is good and my prayer is that the supernatural happens through or in spite of the natural. i was reminded of the gift and privilege to speak for god & the responsability that goes with it.
the trip started with me literally being shoved between 3 other guys in the back seat of a 15 passenger van. it sucked! we were so uncomfortable. i can't beleive these guys didn't hate me for taking away their plushness & roominess in return for a straightjacket. but they are good guys and were totally cool about it. we listened to music, talked, tried watching a movie on my laptop (battery went dead in 10 min.) and started the consumption of a 5 pound gummy bear bag. oh the good ol days.
i spent the nights on a couch like most people but at least i could straighten my legs, shift my body and only smell my own body odor -all things striped away from me in the van. the food i ate was really good, the showers were ice cold, the games played in the evenings were fun, it snowed non-stop the whole time we were there and it was cold -really, really cold.
i had two goals: learn how to snowboard & don't die in the process. well i did learn how to snowboard and this blog shows my passing will have to wait for another day. by the third day i was totally carving down small hills and trying not to do unplanned back-flips down steeper hills. it was fun and the next time i go i will once again get a "board". my legs were killing me by the end and other than having my brain knocked around a few times hard and my left rib cage bruised, i'm totally fine.
an interesting thing happened on this trip. on the way home everyone was in the same seats. it's a classic rule on a trip like this. i'm sure you recall my seating situation. but after spending the ride together on the way their, hanging out during the weekend, boarding together, eating together etc. the ride back was nowhere near as uncomfortable as on the way there. i'm sure the van size didn't change and despite all our activity i'm sure our size didn't chage either. so here we are the same 4 guys, same van, same bench, but much more comfortable, roomier & enjoyable -though the smells & odors were the same! it reminds me of the incredible power of relationships and why this is one of our values. we truly spent the weekend journeying together & living out the practices of kindness, friendship, & fun. we spent the weekend as a journing & loving community & it had the power to change how we experienced things -even though the physical enviornment didn't change.
it really challenged me to be thinking about how we as a community are practicing journing together as a loving community. i know there a thousand different ways this happens and i see it happening all the time. i've seen it in some of us taking trips together, having dinner together, playing together and struggling together. i'm just reminded of how important and powerful this is. i'm reminded this is not just a value on a piece of paper but part of what it means to live life as god intended it to be. may we all be even more willing & courageous to enter into deeper & deeper relationships with each other.
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