A couple of weeks ago I was in Globe, Arizona working with an organization that ministers and builds up leaders within the San Carlos Apache reservation. The missionaries there are amazingly Godly people. I was encouraged when I saw how much prayer is in their daily life. They go to God about everything, small or big, and they have faith that God will answer the prayers they lift up. During our stay there, I was reading Too Busy Not To Pray, by Bill Hybels which is an excellent book about prayer. Overall, the example of how integrated prayer was in the daily lives of the missionaries and reading about prayer have shown me that I don’t pray enough throughout the day, I don’t pray with faith that God will answer my prayers, and I don’t come to God enough with the things that are going on in my life. If anyone reading this can identify with one of the three things I don’t do, then I challenge you to make (not just set aside some time, make time) time for prayer throughout the day, pray for faith to know that God will answer your prayers, and pray to God about everything that is going on, not just the big things, but also the small things. Lastly, please don’t forget to listen to God, prayer is a time for 2 way communication, not just us blabbing on to God. Take time to be silent and listen to God.

How often do we pray about selfish things? God give me a great day, God help me to do well on this test, God give me strength, God give me wisdom, God give me patience, God give me everything that I want. Gimme gimme gimme. I am all too guilty at this type of prayer too. It’s not a bad thing to ask for wisdom, patience, or strength, but what I do want to focus on is how often is the subject of our prayers ourselves? How often do we pray for others?

To everyone reading this blog, all I’m asking for us to do is to take some time this week and while you are praying to stop yourself in the middle and see what you are praying about. If you find yourself praying about yourself, then shift your focus of prayer to other people. And you might say, well I don't know who to pray for!

Here’s what you do, sit down and make a list of all the people that are close to you then work outwards. family, friends, classmates, professors, the staff here, family group leaders, your family group members (an assumption that you are in a family group, if you're not I highly recommend you to join one), your church leaders at your home church, and if you are thinking more globally, then people in Haiti, people in Chile, or any other country where you know they need prayer. Now don't think that the list I just gave is the only list you can use to pray for, it is only an example, a guide to help you start thinking about others. Use this list every time you pray and go down it as you progress through the week.

As some of you may know, the Monday Night football crew has played a lot of Risk while watching the game last semester, and at Guys' Retreat we played for about 6 hours. When you spend that much time with a game, you learn a few things. I would like to share with you some lessons I have learned from playing Risk.

1. Do not expect to hold Asia for any amount of time.
2. Taking over South America AND North America will get the attention of everyone else on the board and they will form alliances to take you out.
3. Alliances are generally bad, unless you are the one to start one and can use that alliance to do your bidding (ex. take out another strong player).
4. There will be trash talk, but remember to not take it to heart.
5. The "advice" given is usually what they want you to do for their own benefit, but they won't tell you that. Just consider all the "advice" and do what you think will help you win.
6. If you have a history of being a strong player, beware of other players joining forces to take you down. Some players may devote their entire game trying to take you out.
7. Do not spread your forces out too thin. It may seem like a good idea to grab as much territory as you can but what good is it if you can't keep it for more than a round because you can't defend it.
8. Australia is a good place to hide and build your forces... if no one notices you doing that or you have a giant army in Siam.
9. Wait as long as you can before you hand in cards to receive reinforcements, the longer you wait, most likely the more you'll get.

If you are interested in playing some Risk let me or Matthew know! We would love to play. And look out, we might continue our tradition of Monday night Risk!

It is 2 weeks away from finals, and everyone is busy either keeping up with all work that has been thrown at them or they are just catching up from not keeping up with their work. Either way, you may all feel burnt out and just ready to have it all over with.

I found myself in that situation not too long ago and spent a good chunk of a night not being able to sleep and just thinking over all those things that I had to do or deal with. The next day, I thought about how if I had just spent some time in solitude thinking over things, praying or just dealing things that I should have, then I wouldn't have lost sleep after it had all built up.

Does this sound familiar to you? Has this happened to you?

Take some time this week, because you know you won't have any time next week, gotta cram for finals. And spend it in solitude. If you have a mind that likes to go off on a lot of tangents, write down a list of things you want to think over or things that are going on in your life right now and go through them one by one.

You don't have to spend your time of solitude going over the list, but do use the time to just think about what is going on in your life. It can be thinking things through, writing in a journal, speaking out loud, don't limit it to just what I have listed. I also find it very useful to start that time of solitude with prayer. I hope that I have saved you from some sleepless nights like me!

Yesterday was Tuesday, September 22, 2009, but it is also Transformer Tuesday. By that, i mean, a small dedicated group of guys (Nick Dano and I so far...) wear our transformer t-shirts and Nick, being the more dedicated one, wears Transformers pajama pants and a transformers hat.

I just want to encourage all you Transformers fans out there to join nick and i in our transformers appreciation every tuesday. just wear anything that has transformers on it.

And it's very easy to join in on Transformers Tuesday, just go to walmart, and pick up a transformers shirt and wear it on Tuesdays. If you're wondering, why should i join in? Well, i'll give you a couple of reasons why you should.

1. You can be "cool" like Nick and I every Tuesday
2. It is one less day you have to worry about what you will wear that day.
3. Because Optimus Prime says you should support the Autobots
4. I bought the shirt for $7.50 at walmart
5. Do you need more?

Also, sometime next week, i am planning to have a transformers movie night. we will be watching the old 1980's cartoon movie and the new transformers movie. So, if you are interested, let me know and look for the announcements!

I hope that answers questions about why I seem to always be wearing the same shirt on Tuesdays. And don't worry, I DO wash my shirt every week.