Im almost home

Well, this trip has been really really awesome. God has done so much to grow my spiritual gifts and I am so greatful for how much He has blessed me so much with everything that I have been given.

That being said. I am soooooooooooooo ready to get home. I really really miss Florida. And I absolutely miss Lexy. She is amazing and has been so great during this time, but we are bith ready to be back together. I only have two weeks till I fly back. To the date. I am ecstatic to get there and to be back with her. I can not wait.

For now I am doing 3 more events with the kids and we will be done with the internship. Once again. A bittersweet ending. But this time im leaving with and going to alittle bit more.

God Does Greatness

    Hey guys. Sorry it has been so long since I have posted. I have been meaning to jump on and get some stuff going, but I have been pretty busy. Thankfully I have been busy being with students, seeing and seeking God move.

    Three weeks ago I gave my first talk here. Talking about identity and what identity in God looked like. It went over pretty well and I felt pretty good about it. Later on through talking with my fellow interns and the head youth pastor, Harold, I found that I was really conversational. That isn't always a bad thing, but in my situation it made it that I didn't communicate fully to everyone. People that didn't know me well or know my speech pattern didn't understand everything. And the majority of my talk lacked the full passion that I actually had for the subject. Fast forward to Wednesday night I had another crack at it. I did things much differently. Trying to communicate the best that I could both with passion and what message God gave me. I was talking about living a radical life. The cool thing about this is that I got to share a lot about what I was doing in St.Pete and God truly blessed that.

Last week I had a great opportunity to do a missional retreat with the middle school kids. We went to the Wounded Knee American Indian reservation in South Dakota for the entire week. South Dakota is beautiful by the way. Evidence by the pictures. There Victoria and I were in charge of doing vbs for the kids of the reservation. Four of the day's that we were there we had the kids come and do vbs at the church we were staying at. The kids we brought were amaing. They were all crazy and energetic, but they loved the heck out of us. The picture of the little girl is a girl that became my buddy. Her name is Grace. She was absolutely amazing. Lots of fun and lots of learning about Jesus. She stuck by my side, on my back, on my shoulders, walking on my feet, etc the entire time she was there. The last day we took her home was so sad. Seeing a little girl just crying her eyes out because she didn't want me to go. She didn't want me to leave. She said that she would miss me. That broke my heart.

    This week was pretty crazy too. We had a lock in with the highschool students. That's when I gave my second sermon. Just to give some time reference. It was great! God really blessed the time we had with those guys and girls. Lots of good conversation and hangout time with kids that I didn't know berry well. It was great. Then last night we had a guy's and girls night out. We all went to qdoba for dinner and then went to see monsters university! It was great! Had a great time with the kids. Thought the movie was great. It was awesome.

    Thanks for sticking around. Hopefully I will be able to keep up enough to blog a bunch more. I'll be shooting for at least once a week. So stay tuned! And please continue to pray for me. God is great!

My First Day in the New Office

So, today was my first day in the office.

I ended up waking up like and hour and a half early due to my first day nerves, but it ended up being pretty good. I got the chance to be a bit more open with my time. Spending some time in the word and in silence just listening to God speak and that is always refreshing.

I get to share a car with one of the other interns, Kelli. Thankfully this is actually really awesome. Kelli lives just right next door with our boss and his wife, Harold and Veronica. Getting out to the car was funny because it was a bit chillier than I am used to. Especially this time of year. Back in Florida it is mostly around 90 degrees. Here this morning it was somewhere in the 60's and for my jeans, flip flops, and t-shirt it was a bit much. Didn't really matter much then anyways. I knew I was going to be inside for most of the day.

Once at work we had a big meeting called a 5 at 9. It is where all of the people on staff come together and basically have a run down on how everything is going. There we had a chance to, very quickly, meet everyone. Unfortunately I can't remember half of those people's names. It was really great to go and be a part of an official church staff meeting. It felt really right. I felt at home.

God has really blessed the relationship that I am beginning to have with Victoria and Kelli (both of the other interns) we are already starting to become good friends. It is really awesome to be with them and I can already see that the three of us are going to work great together. Even in decorating our office with cool stuff and putting together a new desk. I just can't wait to see what God does with us. Here at this internship and beyond as friends in ministry.

I also got my schedule for the rest of the summer. Lets just say that I wont have any problems staying busy. Harold has a lot for us to do this summer. Between time to retreat, reading the three books assigned us, intern classes, hanging out with students, bible studies, and teaching we will absolutely have a lot to do and look forward to.

He made it very clear and I agree that the most important thing will be staying plugged into God. "You can't give what you aint got."Thankfully I have been praying and experiencing thirst and hunger. The kind that just leave you itching for what God wants to say to you that day and what time you can spend in His presence.

So, now I am looking forward to the next 10 weeks and what God has in store for this time. Please continue praying for me and what God is going to do here.

God bless and post ya later!

New Place, New Beginnings

So, I'm in Wyoming.

I can tell you I thought it was going to take forever for me to actually write those words. Even Friday it was amazingly ridiculous. I woke up in Florida at 5 a.m. to go to my plane at 8:15. The more unfortunate thing about that (other than the hour) was that I had a delay on my flight. That did not help things too much. You see when I booked my flight there was about an hour in between me landing in Denver and then me flying into Casper. Well, since my flight got delayed in Tampa that very quickly got taken down to about 15 min. Anyways, long story short, I missed my first flight to Casper and spent five hours in the Denver airport. That wasn't too bad. just a long time.

Well, eventually, I did make it to Casper, Wy. It took an entire day of flying and traveling, but I made it. It wasn't flawless, it wasn't pretty, but the important thing was that I made it.

I was greeted by my host family, whom I will (for now) leave nameless for their sake, with a nice sign with DREW written on it just waiting for me to get there and to start to get ready. While waiting for luggage we had our first meetings and greetings and I have to say that I had already thought that they were absolutely great. Displaying such courage and faith in God to leap into just accepting me, a college kid that they have never met, to live in their home.

Waiting for luggage got to be kind of weird as we found out very quickly that my luggage was still in Denver. Yepp. First time flying alone and my luggage was lost. A bummer, but a blessing. You see this way I immediately got to be humble. I knew right then and there that it was God calling me to be humble. Waaaaaay before anything could start I had to be humble. In ways that are not always easy. Accepting gifts of borrowed clothing, a cheapo toothbrush from walmart, and already a great time of laughing off the attacks of what could have brought me down.

What a great way to enter. Not sure I ever thought I would say that, but there it is!

Past that I was super blessed to be able to meet my fellow interns and actually start a work project on day one. I and a now friend painted about 10 doors. Super crazy, but absolutely God ordained. Great conversation happened and we brought the presence of God somewhere it was absolutely needed. It was a great time.

My first Sunday today was absolutely amazing. The message brought by the youth pastor that I will be with here spoke and brought a very highly called and received message of surrender and letting go. So amazing and exactly what I needed to get jump started. My spirit full and weight lifted right from the get go we were able to meet and hang out with some of our students. Some great kids with great spirit and awesome personality. I can already tell that God is going to be blessing us a lot with them. I have a lot to learn and a lot of room to grow with these kids. They are wonderful and I can not wait to see what God produces in and through them. It will truly be something to be seen.

A new place, a new beginning, and new ways to spread and see our Father. God absolutely blessed my coming to Wyoming and I absolutely can not wait to see what is next. I will definitely write when it does though.

Thanks for reading, praying, and really just being here. Please, continue to pray and seek God in what He is doing here and for now enjoy this picture of the beautiful view that I get to see from my back yard.

Bitter Sweet Endings and Beginnings

Yep, Lots of change happening here in my life. This week is my last week before I leave to go to Wyoming. I'll tell you; this is very exciting and I feel so ready, but on this side of things it just plain hurts. As much as I have tried and could try more it would do no good to fight the feeling of being pulled out of one place and put in another. It feels like how I can imagine a glacier sliding off some frozen cliff in antarctica. As I am leaving this place I am scraping and sliding away from the entire shelf of ice. As I leave my community, my family, and my girlfriend I am not only taking a piece of them, but I am also leaving pieces of me.

The nice thing about all this is that I don't have to say goodbye because I know that I will coming back and I know that I will meet back up again. Unfortunately it doesn't change the fact that I wont be here. I know that I will miss them and some people that I know very little, but our interactions have been presented by God. Even my customers at publix when I worked there. Those people. I may never see them again.

Now dont get me wrong. I still get to pray for my cancer patients that I met, for the random Christians that always spoke blessings on me, for the people at work that I was reaching, for all of them. It still just plain sucks.

Thankfully I do have God on the other side waiting for me. I can almost hear Him call my name. Egging me on. Moving me closer and closer to what is next. His promises are ringing very true. His passion and strength is really starting to build. I can feel my faith growing and my heart growing fonder and I am ready. Truly I am ready for what He has.

So, now is a time to cherish, to pray, and grow. Time for new people to enter my life, for new spiritual movement, time for definitions to be made, and most of all it's time fall deeper in love with God, His people, His Kingdom, and the people He has placed around me.

Thanks so much for reading. I'll keep you posted on all the happenings in Casper. Please pray for all that God is doing. That would be a great service.

Prayer Matters

Prayer matters.

That's a funny statement isn't it? I'm sure that you readthat you automatically agreed and on anyday would. That is great and really it is a huge blessing that most of us were brought up to sit around a table every meal and pray before we eat. Even though it has become more of ritual for moat of us out here in the west; it doesn't take long to see the beauty in literally thanking God for every meal. Because truly every single meal we eat is a blessing. Every single one.

I say that because I don't want you to missread this next part. That kind of prayer is absolutely good and really does help. It makes you literally stop and put God in front of your food. Reminding you of His presence, but that's not the kind of prayer I am talking about.

When was the last time you sat down before your meal and intensly prayed for something, someone, someplace, or really legitimately asked for God to do something?

These last few months have really grown my prayer life. Tones of new things have been going on and God has blessed me with so much, but I know that prayer has been a huge factor in a lot of my decisions and God has answered in a lot of really awesome ways.

As you may remember reading that I have been praying about an internship and really asking God where I should go. Well, he answered. I applied for a youth ministry internship that could have sent me one of three places. One in Wyoming, one in California, and another here in Florida. I had been praying and listening and discerning this for a good bit and for some reason I had really been feeling that I should go to Wyoming. That's why it was on the top of my list. I had no clue and still don't know why exactly Wyoming, but I was sure that I would be spending my summer in Wyoming.

Well, about a week and a half of discernment, an interview, and a little more discerning I found out that I got the position!

It didn't stop there though. God kept answering prayers. I needed a vehicle to drive while I'm there so I wouldn't have to sell my truck. God provided that. My girlfriend needed something to drive while I will be gone. God provided that. I stillness a flight, but God is already working His way into that.

God has provided so much and has come through with so much past months. It would be hard for me to believe that all this happened by chance.

" even you father's, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much better does our heavenly father give to those who ask? "

Key word. Ask. Pray big bold prayers! Nothing is too big for Him! If you believe God created this entire universe in 6 days, don't you think He can help you with what you need or want to see? I dare you to pray for your city to turn and follow Jesus! How about even bigger? Our country? Slavery? Human trafficing? All addictions? Racism? You name it. Go for it. Be a part of itcoming to be. Dream big dreams. He will finish what he started in you.

Good Things Come to Those Who Wait

Good things come to those who wait. Scripture, tale, story alike. This rings more than true for me for these past weeks.

Sometimes when you talk to God its not that you don't hear anything or that you are distant, but sometimes you only hear Him say one thing. This has been what's been happening with me for the past 3 or 4 weeks. I've heard one thing and one thing only. To wait. To wait for Him to work and put things together. So I waited. I felt weird for a while, because I was waiting and nothing happened. I tried to be patient. (not always easy for me) I prayed and prayed and kept giving my trust. He made me patient and made me wait. In reality I'm still waiting, but last night I heard something different. He offered me a new sentiment. He told me that its time. That He is starting His work in me.

I know a little bit of what its about, but only the beginning and ill ask you to wait for something good. God is doing a lot and we can all be hopeful because I can tell you that the kingdom lives. And its getting stronger.

Obedience matters

So, for these past couple of years I have been trying to dig into my spiritual listening ears. A lot of people say that they feel like God has been trying to say something. Me, I can hear Him. Yea. I know. That sounds pretty crazy and I am sure that there are people that woulda tell me that I have multiple personality disorder, but I would tell them that the sequence of my life would say otherwise. Especially since I have been following His voice. Trust me when I say that I don't always hear correctly and that my humanity gets in the way and I sometimes tell God no. The past 6 months have been a big growth period. God has really shown me a lot. When God first gave me this gift He spoke in music. I've played guitar for 10 years and I think in music a lot, but He would put songs in my head. Even specific parts that he made clear that spoke into the situation that I was in. When I told my friend about this he commented that I was the Christian equivalent of Bumble Bee, the camaro from Transformers. I laughed and agreed that his comment made perfect sense and was kind of true.

God has slowly developed me into a new kind of hearing and is still developing a trype of hearing where I can audibly hear him speak through my thoughts. "He thinks thoughts toward you". This has been interesting and has made listening to Him even more interesting and effective. His words have not only become a hideaway and a hiatus from work and school, but they have also brought life to my relationships with my girlfriend, my friends, and my family.

Lately I have been given a lot of direction. For future and for now. For the future God has called me away from my place in st.pete. as unfortunate and sad this is for what is here and what I have here in in the kingdom I am excited for what He is doing in my life. God has called me to a new school. Warner university will be my next school. This school is basically polar opposite from what is here in st.pete. It is literally in the middle of no where Lake Wales, Florida. Not exactly ideal in thought for someone who has been doing urbanized ministry for the past two years. All I know is that God has called people to many crazier situations. I don't know why God is calling me there, but I know what I have heard. I have been called to rise up a generation. How does warner fit in to all this? I'm not sure. I just know that the puzzle would look a lot different.

For now. God is telling me to wait. Wait for what specifically? I'm not sure, but he wants me to wait for Him to work. For now, you can find me doing ministry in st.pete and waiting for God's next move.

Ie. The kingdom lives.

The kingdom lives

So, this is a story all about how my life.....

Jk. That would be cool, but I don't think I can pull a Will Smith. (Not on this one anyway). To be honest, I kind of had to pick this name out of necessity. All the other "good" names had been taken. I am someone who is really interested in the Greek language. Especially because of the bible. Although I am part greek. My name is Drew. That is short for Andrew. (just in case you didn't know). Andrew comes from the greek word andros which is an island in Greece that was for training warriors which in turn means warrior. God has really given me a lot of purpose through this name and made me a kingdom warrior. So, for all of you that have that as your blog name. Thanks for crushing all of my dreams. Don't worry though. I will survive because God really gave me a new and better name for my blog. The Kingdom Lives. The kingdom lives is a big statement and it is so true. Every day God moves in different and new ways that sometimes we get to see and sometimes we don't. I want to write about the moments that I get to see and be a part of. And trust me. That is probably going to be a lot. I am very fortunate to have a great community of ministry friends around me and that God uses me in a lot of different places and ways. Some of them are still coming to be and some are getting ready to pass, but I can assure you that He is surely not done with me and He is not done growing His kingdom.

Just a bit more about me is that I am currently a student at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg and I am a part of a couple of ministries. On campus I lead a bible study with and I am a part of the core group of Intervarsity Cristian Fellowship. Currently we have 3 bible studies all with 2-3 leaders and 2-3 people training to be a leader. None of the bible studies are the same. We all do things differently according to what we feel God wants us to say to our group. I am a sophmore and have lead since my freshmen year. This bible study that I am leading this semester is the 4th one that I have had the opportunity to lead. Our intervarsity chapter is a smaller part of our bigger community that is a group of people hooked into our church, the Underground Network (tampaunderground.net). The Underground is a giant network church out of Tampa that is comprised of around 80 house church ministries that are all over Tampa and St. Pete. Our community is comprised of about 20-30 people that all live in intentional house communities in south side St. Pete. There are 4 girls houses and one guys house. Within the houses we work a ministry that we started to tutor and mentor kids in the south side. So, in other words, I have a lot of ties to the kingdom in the greater Tampa bay area and God is doing a lot. Trust me.  And there is more. If you stick around I am sure that you will hear more. This is going to be a wild ride.

Gods peace and love.