What God's been doing in my life...and how you can be a part of it.

Dear Friends and Family:

Hi! How are you? I hope that God is doing many wonderful things in your life as He is in mine. There are many exciting things going on in my life that I hope you will allow me to share with you.

First I will share a little background for those of you who might not be aware of what I have been up to. In the summer of 2008, I participated in my first unit of a Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) program. These programs are interfaith, professional education for ministry. This program provided classroom training with a supervisor and peers, as well as practicing skills through working in a pastoral setting and then being involved in personal reflection on my experience. That summer I had no idea what I was getting into going into the program, but it helped me to realize my own personal past needs for a chaplain as a child and helped me to continue discerning a call toward youth ministry that I have always felt, specifically chaplaincy in a children’s hospital or hospice.

During the classroom training part of my experience, I heard about Hartford Seminary from a number of past students and felt the push to apply there for the upcoming semester. About a year and a half before, I went to another school for a degree in pastoral counseling. I left that program and pursued my first CPE unit. In the midst of doing CPE, I applied to another school for a different degree, but I withdrew from there when I felt the call towards chaplaincy and applied to Hartford Seminary. I got in for the upcoming semester and started my journey toward a Master in Divinity degree.

As students cannot receive the whole Master in Divinity degree through Hartford Seminary, I started looking into schools to transfer to. I visited Gordon Conwell this year for their “Discover Gordon Conwell” experience, and know current students there whom I have spoken with about the program and my decision to apply. I previously visited one other school that I liked, but for many reasons, Gordon Conwell feels like the right place for me. After I visited, I applied and got accepted. I will start during the upcoming spring semester.

One of the opportunities I have at Gordon Conwell is The Partnership Program. This is a scholarship program that will enable me to have a community of prayer and/or financial support during my time in seminary. This scholarship provides me with continued opportunities to strengthen my relationships with my church, family and friends, even as I am away at school.

As a recipient of this scholarship, I will gain an education and experience in ministry and fund raising, as well as practical skills and experience in applying Biblical Stewardship values while participating in educational opportunities emphasizing the Biblical principles of calling, stewardship and discipleship.

The amount for this scholarship is $9,000. My goal is to raise $5540 of that amount per year. All financial support for this scholarship is given to a scholarship fund for the Partnership Program. Scholars do not receive financial support directly, enabling donors to give on a tax-deductible basis and allowing participants of the program to receive assistance in the form of an academic scholarship.

This scholarship also allows for the opportunity for people to pray with and for me about what's going on while I'm at school. The school will send out a newsletter to my prayer partners throughout the year written by me to let you know what I have been up to and how you can best be praying for me.

I would love for you to be a part of my seminary experience in this capacity. Would you consider partnering with me through prayer and/or financial support, supporting my vision for ministry, the scholarship fund and ultimately assisting me to pursue that vision? I would be honored and humbled to have your support and partnership.

Pledge form: http://www.gordonconwell.edu/sites/default/files/Part%20Pledge%20form%20for%20web.pdf

Electronic Fund Transfer form:
http://www.gordonconwell.edu/sites/default/files/Partnership%20EFT.pdf

Completed scanned forms can be emailed to: partnership@GCTS.edu

Or mailed to: Partnership Program, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, 130 Essex Street, South Hamilton, MA 01982

Checks can be written to “Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary”. I can be reached here or by email or on my cell phone at any time: EEP54@comcast.net or 860-416-6773 if you have questions.

If anyone wants hard a hard copy of this letter and/or the forms, I will be glad to send those to you.

Thank you for your prayerful consideration in partnering with me on this journey.

Love in Him always,

Emily

Hartford Seminary - Women's Leadership Institute

I AM OFFICIALLY A GRADUATE OF THE WOMEN'S LEADERSHIP INSTITUTE at Hartford Seminary!

I will write more about it at some point...if I don't, yell at me...but for now, I just had to say that!

Good night! :-)

Prayer

At church we've been going through Habakkuk, looking at his relationship with God and talking about/thinking about our own. At first I kept thinking back to undergrad...the time when my prayer life/time with God was intense and constant. When I'd wrestle with things in bathroom stalls or pray for people as they'd walk by. Prayer became something constant and automatic for me...something I could do as I went about other things during the day. Don't get me wrong, there were times that I consciously sat and journaled etc., too, but it was way more than that.

As we've gone through the series and talked through Habakkuk, one of my prayers has been that I would get that CONSTANT, deep relationship back. I'm not even sure I realized it, but it was something in my thoughts and in my heart constantly. And God answered. I realized that I have that connection back where even if I'm not journaling (which I have started again...not consistently, but started!) or I am doing other things and my mind may not even be focused on Christ, my HEART is and I can FEEL it. I'm not even sure it's even something that can be described for someone who hasn't felt that...but does ANYONE know what I'm talking about? SO AWESOME.

Boy, what have I not "dumped out" since my last entry?

I am not good at keeping this thing up! 4 classes this semester...planning for the "Day of Respect" on campus March 16 (also the day I was baptized, confirmed and took my first communion 12 years ago). I'm doing my presentation on physical access that day. Using the presentation I did for my worship class last semester with a couple minor changes.

Did I ever write about my thoughts on the Living Word after my friends and I from school went to synagogue? I don't think so. It was really cool to hear about and see in action beliefs about the Torah.

http://www.jewfaq.org/torah.htm This probably would explain way better than me
http://www.beliefnet.com/News/2005/10/Christian-Gives-Ruined-Torah-Scrolls-Jewish-Burial.aspx Cool related story

It made me think of my own conversations within Christian circles about our interpretation of the Word of God. Some believe you shouldn't write in your Bible because it's the Word of God. For someone like me, writing in it helps it "stick"...and it helps to go back and see thoughts I've had when I've read it or things I have been taught that I thought were important enough to write down and remember in relation to the passage. Some believe the Word is literal, some believe it is something up for interpretation...others believe it's both (I tend to be in the "both" camp). For me, I rarely look at it the same way when I open it. I see something new every time. That's what makes it LIVING for me. Some of it seems historical, and other things are like getting a peak into someone's diary/prayer journal etc. Whether it's one or the other or both...it's all something to learn from and to help me grow closer to the LIVING GOD.

What is YOUR interpretation of The Living Word? I was going to write about one other thing, but leaving things on a question note might be a good idea. :-) That will leave more to come!

"Disability" and the Bible

My papers in my New Testament class this semester all had to do with "disability" and the Bible.

What came out of it for me is that more often, "disability" is used to explain something spiritual. What we understand is physicality, so it's used to help our understanding.

But I'm wondering if, for the pharisees and for people in our day, it really backfired and people look at it as physicality and exclude themselves from passages.

And there are passages where I'm wondering if Jesus was feeding into the way society looked at "disability". (There was a part in Luke 7 last night where my version used the word "wretched" while other versions use poor. Some think that that's another group of people, but if it's looked at as the people with "disabilities" in those days WERE part of the poor/oppressed/wretched, couldn't that just be explaining each group talked about before (it was verse 22).

I get that a lot of healing etc. was also used to show who God was, and is still used today. But why does it matter? Is it important because YOU need it to really see and believe in God or because you think I do? If it's the latter, you don't know me very well.

The one thing that I will say is that I used to beg God for it if it meant that someone I loved would come to know God. I know I don't need it for myself, but if someone else does, I hope that God will use me in that way. But I get to see how God uses me the way I am every day. Those who can't or don't allow themselves to see it, I think, are those who are truly blind. Isn't spiritual sight etc. way more important than physical? Look at the blind men in the Bible who knew Jesus and what He could do even before they could see with their physical eyes.

I could go on...I just wrote a 20 page paper about it all... :-)