A New School Year

I can't believe the summer is already over and that next week I will be starting my second year in seminary. It has been a pretty laid back summer, I just worked a couple days a week, started helping out at my church and had a wonderful time back home in good ole San Diego for 3 weeks in July. Now I am bracing myself for a very full schedule which includes 6 classes, an internship at my church, serving on the Masters leadership team, being the RA (resident advisor) for my apartment, and working two days a week. Only by God's grace and strength will this be possible! As daunting as it appears, I am looking forward to it (you all will probably have to remind me that I said that as I get in the thick of things :)). I do, though, very much covet your prayers, after looking at the syllabi for each of my classes I realized all the more how impossible this seems! My classes are methods in Biblical Theology, Biblical Leadership, Homiletics, Greek II and Biblical Counseling with a lab. I am still in awe that I get to study all of this and that I have already done so for a year. God's Word continues to amaze me and His faithfulness continues to keep me in awe!

My roommate Ellen and I just moved from the downstairs apartment we have been in for the past year to an upstairs apartment..we love it! It is nice to have a little more privacy being on the second floor and it is great keeping the windows open at night! We found out that instead of getting one additional roommate that we would have two...that's right, four girls and only one bathroom. :) One of our roommates, Ashley, just moved in last night. She is very sweet. It will be close quarters, but I think we are going to get along well and pray that we will sharpen, encourage and edify one another.

I have been getting quite a few people asking me what I am going to do when I am done with school (which is still quite a ways down the road), or what I plan on doing with my degree...that I do not yet know for sure. I recently came across the following verse in Colossians, a verse I am sure I have read many times, but upon my most recent reading of it I realized how perfectly it desribes my desire as well. Paul said "my purpose is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Colossians 2:2-3). Everything comes down to knowing Him..truly knowing Him. To know Him and to play any part in helping others do the same, that is my hearts desire.

I love you all. Words can not express how much I love the people God has so graciously placed in my life. Again, I am going to echo Pauls heart in his prayer for the Ephesians; this is my prayer for all of you..for all of us. "I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through the Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God" (Ephesians 3:16-19). I pray we don't just stop at knowing the verse, but that we truly believe the truth of it.

In the light of an upcoming crazy season, God has been reminding me to take everything one thing at a time, one day at a time..as He said, "don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself, each day has enough trouble of its own" (Matthew 6:34). Immediately before that He reminds us to seek Him first and He will add unto us what He knows we need. God gives us our daily bread, we need to trust Him for that and constantly recall His past faithfulness. Praise Him all you saints...praise Him with thansgiving over-flowing from your hearts. He is good and His love endures FOREVER!!!

Because I love Him, because I love you
Cari