Golgotha

Good morning! I decided now that the first week of school was over to give a little update. My classes are going well, even the 8:00 am class is facinating and a lot of fun to do. I have four classes on Tuesday/Thursday and only one on Wednesday/Friday which makes it easier for studying, and going home since I'm done by noon on Friday. I have Missions Survey, Intro to the Old Testament (OT), Writing and Research, and History of Western Civ 1 (from the beginning up to the Reformation) on Tues/Thurs and God's mission for the Church on Wed/Fri. The same prof that teaches Missions survey also teaches God's mission 4 the Church, which is cool b/c then I kind of know what to expect from him as a teacher. This past weekend was Golgotha, which is the most intense experience I've ever been to. Golgotha, is an intense training session designed to push your body to the limit and allow you to experience on a lesser scale the suffering that Christ experienced on the cross. Starting at 6:30 on Friday afternoon, everyone on campus that wanted to do some kind of sport this year did a 1.5km run. After that was a session of running/push-ups/crunches/futsol. There were 6 teams and each team did one of the four events until everyone had done everything. Points were given out to each team according to what they did, for example, running laps around them gym passing a medicine ball along the line of team members 10 times, earned one point. Every lap after that gave another point until the 10min time limit was up. Crunches and Push-ups, every person did fifty and that got the team one point every 100 push-up's/crunches that the team did collectively earned another point. My team got up to 300 pushup's!! Go Team 3!! Woot woot!! Then there was another game, that I don't remember what it's called but a variation of volleyball where you had to it the ball under the net and try to win.....really crazy. Then swimming and a bunch of relays at the pool until 10:30. That was fun, part of the swimming was to pull the brick up from the bottom of the pool, a thing we have to do in NLS for lifeguarding so I got to do that! Good times, then back to the RDAC (Rick Down's Athletic Centre) for volleyball until 2:30am. Thank God my team came in second, which meant we didn't have to be back at the RDAC until 6:30am. I was there at 6 b/c my roommate's team had to be there at 5:45, so her 5:30 alarm kept going after she left. 6:30 started with an 'Amazing race' game, first Jordan (our captain) had to carry each team member across this 'acid lake'. But he couldn't carry anybody the same way, like he gave Jorge a piggy-back and so couldn't do that to anyone else. Next event was throwing a medicine ball as far as we could. Then basketball, trying to make 150 baskets in 10 minutes, but each basket had to be made and then a basket at the other end of the court. We got up to 79 I think....nobody made it to 150, not even close! Then came trying to hit targets with volleyball serves, four little mats on the other side of the net, and when somebody hit a target, then they couldn't serve anymore. Oh yea, we did get breakfast too! Good times, food was nice. By 8:00 we were back in the RDAC for Ultimate frisbee and working in the weight room, then came basketball.....lots of basket ball. The RDAC has three full length courts, so there was no break inbetween games. Seriously, that gym is bigger than Castor's whole k-12 school!! Lunch was a definate plus for the whole day, and then came flag football from 1 until 2:00. I caught the ball once which made for a touch down!! Woot woot!! But football is definately not my sport, and Steph was the girl of our team!! Oh my gosh, she was good. Then.....hehehe the 4km run up to one of the 'three hills'. I cannot tell you how much it hurt to do that run. I didn't actually run most of it, just b/c my body was almost to the breaking point. We started that run at 2:30, and I can't tell you how long it took me b/c I don't know. But I have multiple blisters on my feet right now and it hurts to breathe or laugh or anything. Keep in mind that by the time of this run, everybody had been going hard for pretty much 20 hours with maybe 2 hours of sleep!! And finally, up to the top of the hill, nearly dead and nearly at the end of the reserves of strength, then came the last event. We had to run down the hill, we'd just come up and cut into a field at the bottom, carrying a hockey stick. Run through the field until getting to one of the coaches and being told to put the hockeystick over your shoulders (symbolizing Christ and the cross) and make your way up the other, steeper, grassier side of the hill. Yikes....I can tell you that when I first heard what we had to do, I cried. "God, I'm at the end of my rope, I'm tired, I can't do this....but I feel weak for not doing it! I feel weak for having to let my team captain take my place for my weakness!!!" That was seriously the lowest part of the day for me. Everything hurt, everything was sore. After a few minutes of reflection and watching others though, I decided to tell Jordan that I wanted to try, thank God for Jordan.....I really don't think that I could have made it through this weekend if he wasn't my captain. He was sooo encouraging and sooo supportive even though he was hurting just as bad as anyone. Finally, up the last hill, and done. The event was over. As a group, all 60 or so of us sat on the top of the hill talking about what it meant to be so physically exhausted and pushed to the limit. We talked about how it felt to have people in our group (designated people) being the "moles" the people with bad attitudes that brought everyone down. How the refs for games were unfair and biased, mixed up scores, changed results etc. The whole point the coaches were trying to make was that you can't control anybody else when you're an athlete, just yourself and your own attitude. Then came the time for silent reflection on the hill, prayer and a time to think about what you learned that day. How Christ felt sooo much more pain when he was on the cross. We could hardly walk, but he could hardly stand. We got to live, and he had to die. We were broken physically, he was broken physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally. We got to climb into 15 passenger vans and go home....to food and showers and friends and sleep. He went to hell for us. "Now then brothers, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles us; and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us" Hebrews 12:1 I learned a lot this weekend. About how much pride and selfishness I have. About how much I want attention and don't give it as much as I want it. But I also learned how much God works, when the devil was trying to push stuff on me, I would turn to that verse and tell him to go. And he went, thank God. "I can do all things through him who gives me strength" Phillipians 4:13 My God, thank my God, for he is the one who is able to do anything in the world. I can't believe how much he did for me, and how annoyingly inefficient I am when it comes to being a Christian. I can't believe how he can put up with me........but praise God he does. I hope you all learn the same thing. If you ever get the chance to do Golgotha, I would definately recommend it. I would not want to do it again for a long time, but would recommend it to anyone who wants to experience Christ's suffering to a very much lesser extent! Until then "I press on toward the goal, to win the prize for which Christ has called me heavenward" Phillipians 3:14 God Bless!! I love you all, have a great week!!