Chicago, Camp, Catching Breath

The windy city! Joey, Stacie, and I left for Chicago around 5 pm Tuesday night. Wednesday we got to Willow Creek Church...that is one ginormous church...and our Arts Conference began! I was most impressed by the quality of everything they put out...their music, set, dramas, videos, graphic arts, building...everything 100%. And the conference too, I would say.

Now, I am not done thinking about this conference yet, but my response surprised me. I've been really feeling like God wants me to use my art and my writing more for him. So, I took a lot of sessions on things like "Starting a Visual Arts Ministry." Sitting in those sessions, I realized that though I would really enjoy being part of that kind of ministry...I wasn't really that excited about creating and leading that kind of ministry. Maybe I am? Maybe I have no idea. Let's go with the last one. Maybe what I like about art ministry is what I like about most ministries...the relationships and the teaching. I think my heart beat is teaching. Whatever that means. Ha! Surprisingly, the level of anxiety I've had around this whole "who am I...where do I fit?" issue has decreased a lot post-conference.

The conference ended Friday, and I got dropped off at our high school camp in northern Indiana. What an amazing weekend. You can check our andersonyouth blog for that update...because....well, this would just be a ridiculously long blog post otherwise.

So, we got home Sunday and slept. And then yesterday...we slept. We did bike to the library and rent Dances with Wolves. All in all, a good day. :)

So now, it is Tuesday and the world starts again. We have a lot of family coming into town this weekend (which equals some cleaning for us to do!) and I get to preach this Sunday in our main services (which equals...some quality time with my notebook VERY SOON to get everything straight!). GO TEAM LARSON!

Here are our camp videos (produced and filmed by Philip A. Larson):