A Glimpse Back in Time: Part 6

It’s funny how, although it’s only been a month and a half since junior year wrapped up, it already feels like so long ago.  It was a great year, but part of me doesn’t know what to write that would entertain you as the reader.  So much of my story in college seems the same:  We prayed.  No one came.  We prayed.  No one came.  We prayed.  Someone came and was touched, and God reminded us that it’s all worth it.  Repeat.  Boring, right?

But it’s not boring!  Because each of those times, there was a real person at the center of it.  A real person giving their life to Jesus or recommitting or being changed.  And that matters!  As does all the time in between, where it was just me, Chris, and Joy huddling around the space heater, praying in the cold.  Because it was not just me, Chris, and Joy in that room.  It was me, Chris, Joy, AND the God of the Universe.  And regardless of how I felt during those meetings, He was never bored.  During every meeting, Jesus was on the edge of His chair (well, throne if you wanna be technical), listening to our every word.  What a special thing!

So though the year may seem like a lot of the same, there are amazing stories between each of the periods where God seemed quiet or distant.  One night, we had a friend bring a student from a nearby community college, and although we thought she hated the prayer meeting (which is generally our conclusion when someone sits stiffly with their eyes open and doesn’t speak), she returned a few days later and shared that she had committed her life to Christ because of that visit.     

Later in the semester, a Jewish student came to the Prayer Room.  I’m still not exactly sure why she came, but she kept on coming for many weeks.  And not only did she come, but she asked questions, started attending Joy’s Bible study, and began to read the Word.  Eventually, she concluded that Jesus really is the way, the truth, and the life.  Praise the Lord!

A few weeks later was our craziest night yet.  We were having a pretty average prayer meeting when one of our friends knocked on the door and motioned me to come out.  She explained that there was a girl in her car who had possibly overdosed on drugs.  Not knowing what to do, she had brought her to the Prayer Room.  After some VMI cadets (who happened to be praying with us, thank God) determined that she didn’t need to go to the emergency room, three guys who were also in the car carried her into the Prayer Room.  I couldn’t help but think of the paralytic man who was brought to Jesus on a mat by his friends.  Like him, this girl was helpless as the guys laid her on the floor with a blanket.  We prayed silently as she shook and cried out, and Joy often recounts that she was preparing for the girl to die before her eyes.  It was scary!  But as we prayed, she began to relax and her breathing slowed to a normal rhythm.  Finally, as Joy played “You Make Beautiful Things,” she stood up.  It was crazy...the closest thing that we’ve seen to healing.  At least so far.

 

Those are just the Prayer Room highlights, though.  I did other things of course.  I stood with one of the middle schoolers that I work with as she announced her decision to give her life to Christ at Young Life Camp.  As an RA, I prayed for and with freshmen girls that I had the privilege of getting to know.  I wrote a 30 page poverty capstone, which was the most difficult school assignment I’ve ever done.  And I went to a Switchfoot concert with Chris to celebrate the end of our first year of dating.  It was an awesome year!  But the best part by far was Spring Term, where some of the underclassmen who had come to the Prayer Room on and off really began to catch a vision for wholehearted pursuit of God.  

To be continued…