November!

Hey, friends!

November has come and gone. It seems like all the months are just zooming by. Here are all the fun things that happened this month. (Well maybe not all of them, but at least the highlights.)

Pizza Theology
This is one of my favorite events that we put on as a ministry. It is exactly what it sounds like: A lecture or theological perspective on a topic with some time for pizza and mingling! All of our FOCUS campuses meet together at UTD for this event. It is from 4-9 pm; 2 hours of lecture, an hour of pizza, and 2 more hours of lecture. We try to teach students about engaging God with their minds, and this is the perfect event for it. We had the privilege of having Mary Poplin come out and speak. She wrote the book, "Finding Calcutta" about her time with Mother Teresa! The topic was, "Is Reality Secular?" She went over a lot of different worldviews and compared them to the Christian worldview. It was fascinating to hear her views and stories, and was a great experience!

My view point from Pizza Theo. We filled the room!

Core News!

Not many other events happened this month, so I thought I would give an update on my sweet, sweet core. Just a reminder that we call our gender-specific small groups, "Cores". 

Over the course of seven weeks, we looked at an article on Spiritual Disciplines written by one of our pastors in our Northeast Family of Churches. Some of the disciplines included were Silence and Solitude, Thankfulness, Prayer, Fasting, etc. Emily (my Cofa, or co-facilitator) and I felt like our core could benefit from reading this article and seeing how disciplined we are in these areas, ourselves included. It was an amazing and eye-opening experience to go through this with them and practice some of them in the core setting! For example, at the end of the core on Silence and Solitude, we spent 10 minutes in silence. It showed all of us just how hard it is to quiet our minds and sit in God's presence, listening to hear anything that He wanted to share with us. If any of you would like that article, feel free to comment or contact me. I would be happy to send it to you and hear your thoughts!

We celebrated a couple birthdays in my Core by going bowling with a large group of us. We spent the time laughing and just enjoying each other's company. At the end of the night, we took some time to go around and honor the girls that we were celebrating by encouraging them. I have grown to really love this group of girls, and can't wait to see what God continues to do in this group! 

Sarah and Cathryn, the sweet sisters that we celebrated!

MY BABIES (and roommate Ashley.. she joined in on the fun)

Some More Fun 

Another fun and sweet thing that happened was that my longest friend William got engaged to his sweetheart! The Royal family has been very close to ours since William and I were born, so we grew up together. A few years ago he started dating Lindsey. I was nervous at first that this meant William and I could no longer be close due to his new relationship. However, Lindsey has really pursued me in friendship and has become such a close and dear friend. I love spending time with both of them and am so happy about their future together!!

ENGAGED

Sweet pal

Another sweet pal :)

Overall, November was a great month. I am thankful for all of you who continue to support me in this opportunity. I am having a blast and am learning so much. So thank you!