Picking up where I left off...

Church on Sunday was great. My boarder family sits in the second row, so I felt right at home. (I'm like a little kid--if I sit in the back, I spend the whole sermon looking at people.) The sermon was on Romans 8, which is one of my favorite Bible passages. It was a really encouraging message.

We had a psalm sing that night in a local park. There was a great turnout, and it was a lot of fun, even though my voice needs major work. Our music professor led the psalm sing. He is very passionate about music. It's almost intimidating. He said that if you're the type to cry during a hard final, you will cry in his final. I guess I'll pack the Kleenex when the time comes!

Immediately after that, we had a freshman/sophomore party called Freshmeet. Or FreshMeat, depending on the person you asked. Haha. We played "I Have Never" and I met a TON of people. Occasionally, I met them twice, because I'd forgotten that I met them the first time. So embarrassing, but everyone understood. The guys played this ridiculous game called Buck Buck. It's a bizarre combination of leap frog and dogpile...I was very glad that I was exempt from participation. ;) At the end, all the sophomores gave us advice and a bunch of the guys prayed over us. The advice I took to heart the most was "Call home often!" which I know I will forget to do. It's hard enough to find time to talk during the day, but then there's a three hour time difference to deal with. The other advice that was the most important was to not neglect your quiet time. We got that speech from both faculty and students. Definitely good advice, because when you're in an environment where you're studying your Bible all the time academically with your professors and classmates, it can be so tempting to just skip having personal devotions.

Today, we had orientation all day long. All-freshman orientation, freshmen women orientation, and all-student orientation. I feel pretty oriented! ;) Mrs. Wilson's talk to the freshmen women was the best. She is so gracious in her speech...you feel loved, even though you're being rebuked and convicted by her words of wisdom. We got a bunch of great advice from the school faculty members, too. I think a lot of people have preconceived notions about the school, so it might come as a surprise to you that very little of the advice had to do with academics. Sure, we were told to stay on top of our school assignments and to attend class, but we were told over and over that being an academic nerd isn't the point. Man's chief end is not to be a geek. We are called to live as mature Christians and to be involved in other people's lives--not to stay holed up in a room reading and studying so that we can get the best grades. The president himself told us that he'd rather us get low grades because we were involved in our community or helping others than for us to get good grades by being an unsociable nerd. All my life, I've tended toward the unsociable nerd side...school came first, always. But I'm learning that academics is not the end all and be all. Funny that I had to go to school to learn that, isn't it? ;) As the school president said, we are called to hide God's word in our hearts, not just our heads.

In short, I love it here. Yes, I miss a lot of people in FL...and in GA...but I have never once regretted coming here. I feel so at home at this school. It's not perfect, and I'm not trying to idealize it. And yes, I'm probably still high on excitement and anticipation. But I just got our first week's homework assignments, and I still love the school! So there. ;)

Tomorrow is the first day of classes. I can't wait!

I'll try to post pictures later...