Maybe you noticed this new family pic at the top of the blog?
It was snapped by one of our college students this weekend at our Virginia RUF Fall Conference. Approx. 16 of our students joined another 200 RUF (Reformed University Fellowship) students from other campuses around the state.
(Excuse me, around the Commonwealth. I'm learning.)
The conference was in the Blue Ridge mountains, just about 45 minutes away from our house.
The way our schedule worked out this year, I was only able to come and bring the kids up for the day on Saturday (then Caroline enjoyed spending another night there with her Daddy while Jameson and I headed home).
When I got to the conference, I found our students together in a small group, discussing and applying what the speaker had just taught to the entire large group. Good stuff.
I was only able to stay for a little while that day, but even in those few hours, I had some great discussions with a few students that included:
- Does God choose who will be saved, or is it our choice?
- Is wanting to have your own biological children ultimately selfish when there are so many children in the world who need to be adopted?
- Why do many Christians baptize babies and many other Christians completely disagree? (this was brought on by talking about dispensational theology vs. covenant theology)
- What does the Bible say about speaking in tongues today?
- What is the purpose of worship music, and who is it really for anyways?
I'm confident that if those were the conversations I was having after only a couple of hours, there must have been all kinds of great discussions the entire weekend.
I love these two. They have a Caribbean bond-- she is Jamaican, he is Haitian. :)
Time to hike! Students piled in all parts of our cars to catch a ride to the trailhead. :)
I've only got pictures of the group from the bottom of the mountain this year since I'm currently not able to hike. (or go on walks or exercise, for that matter) I'm in the middle of a long, discouraging bout of physical therapy for injuring my hip/lower back from WALKING ON THE TREADMILL over the summer. (go figure, right?!? Why did I even bother??? Uggghhhh....)
Close to this time, I realized I was down to Jameson's last diaper. (because I was careful to pack everything else.....) Ummm, yeah. That'll cut your time short when you're in the middle of NOWHERE Mountain with a baby on its last diaper. So I high-tailed it outta there to race back into town, while Marc and Caroline enjoyed the rest of the conference with all the students.
(Turns out the conference speaker's children were there, ages 4 and 6, so Caroline was in heaven to play with kids her age. Her Daddy also played with her barefoot in the cold stream, too. Special times for a little gal!)
It was a really good, much needed weekend of rest, learning, discussing, and relationship-forming for our students.
It was a great few hours for us, too.
Maybe next year I'll remember the diapers.
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