SPEAK

Acts 18:9-11 (NIV)
One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision: "Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. [10] For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city." [11] So Paul stayed for a year and a half, teaching them the word of God.

This weekend was definitely one for the record books. We had an awesome staycation in SD for the SPEAK retreat at the Town and Country hotel. LA and SD came togethor and glorified God with epic fellowship, inspirational lessons, and deep Discipling times. I have been super convicted by the lessons from Ron Hammer, Jake Rock, and Steve Lounsberry. I realized that I need to be WAY more surrendered and WAY more open with my entire life, especially the little sins. I had SUCH an amazing time with my lovely girlfriend Lisa Hinton. She's so beautiful, gracious, and strong. I got to give her a big hug and tell her I missed her the moment I saw her, and we got to sit next to each other during the first lesson which was Ron Hammer preaching the word HARD about how society is so delicate that they whine when challenged by the truth. He claimed that we MUST judge people, just not hypoctritically. Also, society is more concerned with freedom than truth. He ended it stating that silence is acceptance of an eternal destiny. Don't worry about what the world judges because you might just save their soul regardless of how they feel in the moment...THEN we split up men and women...We got an AMAZING class on purity and Jake ROck got SUPER open about his life and talked about how essential it is for us to be desperate to change, we have to desire to get WELL. We broke up into Discipling Groups and i was with Patrick, Lee, Christian, and Jeffrey (from OC). It was an awesome time of openness, I'm so grateful for all those guys. THEN, we got to go to PB so I met up with Lisa, Wes, and Kate and we went to Cafe 976. Stuart made an announcment about Mission PB but it was just the four of us plus Wouter...but it was cool because we hit a bunch of blocks on Law Street. Afterwards, I dropped Lisa off at the hotel and Wes and I went to get his luggage and we ended up chillen at the house until the game. THere was a BUNCH of people at my house it was kinda crazy...I made Lisa a quick candy card and ran to her the moment I saw her and handed it to her :). I got to sit next to her for most of the riveting game (we ended up losing 27-30 after missing TWO simple field goals...) But afterwards we all went to Denny's (2 denny's after the first one was WAY too small...)and I got to share a $2 meal with my amazing girlfriend. It was a crazy night of weirdness but LOTS of joy and laughter! After chillen with the boys a little later I got to bed around 2 and woke up at 8. Had a good prayer time with God and then got to go to church and sat next to Lisa again :) after Ron preached another POWERFUL lesson about
1. Let your light shine! (speak up and people will listen..pray for WORKERS, not open hearts)
2. Putting an exclamation on your life (3 purple exclamation invitation)
3. Draw the line in the sand (stand up to the tanks)
Ron's a man of extraordinary talent and life stories, make your own!

after church I got to watch my girlfriend baptize ELMA!! SOOOO cool!!! OC girls had TWO baptisms today :) Elma and Brittany
After that I got to go to chipotle and have some more fun with Lisa and some of the OC peeps and it was soo cool. She gave me a big hug and then we went our separate ways.
I think I'm definitely a step closer to falling in love, this weekend was epic, I just got to spend a lot of time with her. SO grateful thanks so much God for putting her in my life, please give me the strength, wisdom, and courage to lead to heaven in whatever capacity you want. AMEN!