Pizza @ The Temple

Today is Temple Square day!
Our team waved goodbye to our lovely host families and the congregation at The Adventure church to head north to Salt Lake City to walk the grounds of the Salt Lake Temple in hopes of engaging in conversations with LDS (Latter Day Saints) members.

On the way, we stopped off at Sandra Tanner's bookstore where she shared her story of coming out of the LDS church and finding hope in Christ alone. She provided us with plenty of knowledge and resources for the journey!

Tonight we will be staying at Sandy Ridge church and finally getting in some wholesome team debrief time and partaking in some general shennanagins.

Hopefully I will be able to back track a little to tell some of the amazing stories of what God has been doing through our team for the past few days!

Please keep us in your prayers, we are definitely experiencing the effects!

Day 2: Ephraim, Tri-Grace Ministries & Snow College

We are in Ephraim, Utah!

Fun notes from the day: our 4 vehicle caravan spent about 4 hours on the snow swept highway, passing breathtaking scenery and exchanging hilarious walkie talkie babble. At one point, we even got stuck behind a GIANT herd of sheep on the highway! Luckily, their shepherd (El Shepheardo) was nearby to usher them off to the side.. although two of the four vans were stuck for quite some time.

When we finally made it to our destination, Tri Grace Ministries headquarters, the Solid Rock Cafe, we were greated by an enthusiastic bunch of college students and our lovely hosts, Chip, Jaime, Shane & Kim, who run the ministry.

We settled in, got to know some of the students involved with Tri Grace, ate some delicious home made diner and prepared to hear the testimonies of former members of the LDS (Latter Day Saints, Mormons). These are individuals who have decided to leave the Mormon church, and in this case, have found the true Jesus and the free gift of grace offered to those who call on his name. It was an amazing and convicting experience to get to hear thes stories (possibly, when i am near my computer again, I will add more detailed stories).

Tomorrow we will be doing some event advertising across the street at Snow College for an event tomorrow night called 'Scarf Your S'mores'. Looking forward to another day of opportunity!

(oh, yes, and we closed out the night with some line dancing at the Ephraim social hall!)

'Abide in me, and I in you.' Romans 12:15

First Stop- St. George Utah

After 7 hours on the road, 3 pit stops and some sweet scenery changes, our team has arrived in St. George, Utah where the lovely members of Calvary Bible church will be hosting us for the night. Tomorrow, after some maintenence and cleaning projects around the church building, we will continue our journey north to Ephraim to pair up with Tri Grace Ministries.
Tonight on the agenda: plenty of fellowship, getting to know each other better, loads of tomfoolery and eventually (maybe) sleep in our snuggly sleeping bags.
God is good!

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Our fearless leaders are with us, even if they aren't in the same van.. on the road to Utah!

T-Minus... 2 days of growing anxiety??

Two days from now I will be loading into a multi-passenger van, fully equipped with pillows, snacks and a plethora of iPod playlists and embarking on the first leg of the journey to Utah in order to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Mormon populations there. Our team of about 20 students will be serving alongside Evangelical churches already stationed in Utah and also will be starting conversations with Mormons we meet on the streets, on college campuses, in institutes and at religious centers, such as Temple Square in Salt Lake City.

My heart has been breaking for the Mormon church ever since I built strong relationships with Mormons during my high school years and I've always wondered whether or not those individuals saw the light of Jesus in me. So as we are preparing to leave for this amazing adventure that God has put in front of us, I feel a mix of the excitement of the possibilities and also the weight of the reality that these people are living.

The training that I've received from my education at Biola has prepared me well and I know that God is going to use me in great ways, yet I there is a faint whisper rattling around in my head telling me to be nervous because I'm not really as prepared as I think. In the support letters that I sent out, I emphasized how extremely crucial it is that people pray for our team. We are about to engage with a religion that is based on lies and one that is widely accepted as 'morally' good by many and therefore deceptively being passed off as glorifying to God. Please, please, please continue in pray for our team, we can not do this alone! Thank you so much to those who have been giving support in many ways, I can't wait to return with stories of God's amazing love!

"For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your sevants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God's glory displayed in the face of Christ.

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body."

2 Corinthians 4:5-11

So take the photographs and still frames in your mind..

The ever popular Green Day song.

Used year after year to commemorate the end of a landmark life experience.

The end of high school.

College.

Single life.

Adolescence.

Although it may be over played and cliche, the lyrics resonate with that desire to mark the big moments of change in our lives. While this is an important part in our continuous development, the true depth and meaning withers away if we do not intentionally learn from ourselves.

That being said, I'd like to introduce a new series for my blog (one that I intend to keep up with). As I am approaching the end of my undergraduate experience, there is some intentional reflection that I would like to do, as one of my Anthropology professors would say, it's time for some "navel gazing".

It seems that many college students don't spend a lot of time really thinking about their experience until long after it ends, until maybe they are married, have a career or have kids of their own.

My hope is that there will be some insight to be gained while I can still take action to do a few things differently.

Time grabs you by the wrist;

directs you where to go.

So make the best of this test

and don't ask why.

It's not a question

but a lesson learned in time.

It's something unpredictable

but in the end it's right.

I hope you had the time of your life.

Katie Steslicki is...

a Vagrant, a Nomad, a Transient.

but not Rootless.