Family Visits Jackson

This last weekend, my parents and brother Alan came to Jackson and joined me for a whirlwind tour. I was so blessed to have them come and see how so many of my friends were blessed to see them. Today was scoop’s birthday, so I took him out to lunch. Over lunch he told me how he just loved to see how my family and I related so positively together. I told him that it hasn’t always been this way, but that it was a huge blessing from God. 

They arrived on thursday afternoon and I’ll try to give some stories soon and maybe have them write a couple entries, but here’s the basic itinerary:

Thursday:  5:00PM pick up from Jackson Airport

            5:30- 7:30 Dinner at E and L  

Good Hair and Multiethnic Discussion

Documentary by Chris Rock

This last wednesday, a group of black and white friends decided to watch the Chris Rock Documentary “Good Hair” together and have a discussion about the film. The movie is about African American Women’s hair and the title is based on the premise that straight hair is viewed as good hair. Chris Rock exposes some deep issues, but doesn’t really play them out, he leaves it for the audience to think about them.

Fall RUF Conference and Roomer Mill

This last week has been a busy one. It’s homecomming week at JSU and so the RUF numbers were a bit down last night, but we still had a great time at After Hours with about 15 students involved in the discussion. The sermon was about Genesis 3 and the fall. It made us think a lot about the grace of God. We’re heading to Twin Lakes camp this weekend and taking 16- 20 students. I’ll give an update about the camp on sunday night. We’re going to be joining about 250 other RUF college students from around MS. Please pray for our time.

Also, the roomer mill is a blaze with a potential girls house in the works for next semester. Stay tuned!

RUF After Hours aka Afta Party!

 

RUF After Hours discussion

Tonight we had between 25- 30 students over at the house just after RUF. We were here from 10:30 until 1am. The first hour is just a time to hang out, play pool, listen to music, and eat some brownies, ice cream, some of my home made chai and some party pizza. Then we get into the “after hours” portion and talk about the lesson at RUF and encourage people with honest questions about God or how to apply the sermon to ask the group. We try to start out the time with some songs and prayer and then let people know that we’re not looking for opinions, but rather looking for what Scripture has to say and how God’s word directly applies to our lives.

8 Principles of CCDA: Redistribution (3 of 8)

Redistribution (Just Distribution of Resources)-When men and women in the body of Christ are visibly present and living among the poor (relocation), and when people are intentionally loving their neighbor and their neighbor’s family the way a person loves him or herself and family (reconciliation), the result is redistribution, or a just distribution of resources. When God’s people with resources (regardless of their race or culture) commit to living in underserved communities seeking to be good neighbors, being examples of what it means to be a follower of Christ, working for justice for the entire community, and utilizing their skills and resources to address the problems of that community alongside their neighbors, then redistribution is being practiced.

JSU Poster Design

This poster was for a JSU assignment where I was supposed to design a poster advertising my department: Department of Urban and Regional Planning (DURP). Scoop helped me out with photo shop, but I sketched out the basic design. The sun is rising over the Jackson, MS skyline… rising from the location of JSU over the skyline. 

Devounte at the Jackson Fair

  Devounte asked me a couple weeks ago if we could go to the fair. I wanted to go to the fair with him, but asked if he’d had any money saved to spend or if his mom was able to contribute. He told me that she didn’t have any money, so when he told me that he’d be happy to work for some money, I told him that I’d see what I could do. 

Crossin the Tracks #1

This last Thursday, my housemate Jonathan and I helped to host our first meeting of “Crossin the Tracks.” We intend this to be a time to get students together across some sort of cultural barrier and to talk. We started our time with some worship songs and some prayer. Jonathan (Scoop) led some discussion about the problems ailing our community and what we can do as the people of God. We looked at verses in James about having compassion for and caring for physical needs, we looked at Matthew 25 to see the outworking of God’s love for us being displayed in caring for the least of these and finally talked about practical ways that we can make small steps to be loving the people that God has placed across our paths. We’re talking about meeting every 2 weeks or so. We hope to be able to meet some community needs together and form community in the process.