Break and Pre-Break

Sorry, it has been a while since I have updated y'all on my life! So the week before the break we had an awesome time learning from Frank Turek who co-wrote "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist". We learned and re-learned some very important issues necessary to defend our faith and some talking points to bring up with atheists or agnostics. His lecture was very insightful and helpful. Sunday we had a Christmas party at Chickfila and we were able to meet the founder of Chickfila, Truett Cathy and his wife. We also met all of Truett's children who are all involved with Chickfila. Throughout this year, I have grown to respect and love Chickfila even more than before I started IMPACT 360. Chickfila is such a solid and grounded company, willing to hold fast to its values in the midst or radical attacks from an increasing immoral generation. We had a white elephant gift exchange on Thursday which was pretty fun. It got quite loud with all 30 of us in the living room, talk about the noise! We ended off the week before heading home with a day of prayer. It was pretty awesome. I flew home December 7th and was pretty excited to come back. I was the only one from my core group of friends to come home so early. But I had a friend from LSU come home the next day, so it turned out to be fine. I hung out with that friend for pretty much the first week till the rest of my church's old senior bible study group showed up. I got a job at UPS the week of December 9th and started work that next week. I have had a lot of free time, and the UPS job was fairly easy and I got paid fairly well. My last day for UPS was Christmas Eve, so that was fun. I got my wisdom teeth taken out the 19th, and didn't really do anything for a few days, so I hung out and slept and watched movies without my parents getting upset! I had a few other friends who also got their teeth taken out, so I hung out with them as well. My family had a chill Christmas this year which I really enjoyed. I loved being able to celebrate Christ's incarnation as a man and the gift of salvation He brings through His birth. I worked on a puzzle with my family and we looked at lights and I went to the Meineke Bowl game this past friday to watch Tech wreck Minnesota! This break was definitely needed, but it was not without its struggles. I definitely found myself slipping back into apathy and laziness and not being proactive. Please pray that  I would be self-motivatated in the coming days as my team leaves for Brazil January 7th. Thanks y'all for reading and Happy New Year!

Prayer Requests:

• Please pray pray for my team and me as we head out for our mission trip to Brazil in a week!
• Pray for my family and that God would bring His peace and love into our house
• Pray for my friend's father who was recently diagnosed with cancer- pray that God's will would be done and for peace my his family
• Pray that God would reveal what I am doing this summer

Praise:

• Jesus became flesh a little over 2000 years ago and He died for me and you!
• ALL my funds have been raised for Brazil! Praise God
• For awesome time with family and friends
• A new year full of new and amazing opportunities

Thank you for reading!

Gig 'em & God bless,

Stephen Hargis

His patience

Today in quiet time as I read 1 Timothy 1-4, one verse just jumped out at me. I have never noticed it until today, but it speaks volumes about who God is and how patient and loving He is. The verse is 1 Timothy 1:16 "But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life." 

   1 Timothy is written by Paul who was a terrible dude. He was a killer, liar, slanderer~ just an all- around awful person, but I am no different, and neither are any of us. We are all fallen, broken and torn, but that's why God's patience is so amazing. We run away time after time, commit adultery, lust and lie, but God is always there waiting for us. If God can wait for a killer, blasphemer and hater of Christianity, how much more does He wait on us! Christ's love, goodness, and patience are shown most through the broken. Paul was a murderer, but now he is an apostle of the Most High. He was a deceiver, but now he speaks truth. When God changes you, go out and share the change that God has made in your life so that you may be an example of His patience for those who might see, believe and then receive. You are a tool that Christ can use to show His unlimited patience. Use that and walk in the light! If Christ can and did save Paul, He can and will offer us life. Live the life in which Christ has called you so that others can see His patience and might live. 

Grace & Peace,

Stephen

Update!

So, I haven't posted in a month! Wow, a lot has happened. We went to SIFAT in Alabama a few weeks ago. SIFAT, Servants in Faith and Technology, is an organization committed to giving third world countries the best principles to thrive in their community. We were at SIFAT from Wednesday Oct 31 through Friday Nov. 2. We arrived Wednesday afternoon and we were quickly told to grab only the necessities: a Bible and sleeping bag. We spent Wednesday evening engaging in an eye opening experience where we had to trade and barter for food like people do throughout the world. There were about ten or so huts in their world village. We got to see how homes are built in countries such as Nigeria, Nepal, the Philippines and Liberia. We slept out under the stars in one of the homes from throughout the world. It was an awesome day! Thursday was spent learning basic principles about how to obtain water safer and more easily, and how to purify water quicker. It was really interesting to see how difficult it is for others to get water. We learned about malnutrition among the people of developing countries and how basic plant leaves can satisfy the required nutrients that many lack. Thursday night we were split into six groups of five and got to go into the slums to experience; what one BILLION people live in daily. We had to fend for our families and tried to get water, food and shelter. It was definitely an eye opening experience and we struggled to understand how we allow this to occur and what our call to action is. Friday we helped clean up the SIFAT campus and left around noon. SIFAT helped us bond as a class as we walked through this experience together! It was truly eye opening! I also turned 19 which was pretty awesome. I don't feel any different, but in another 19 years I'll be 38, so I am getting pretty old! We have read an amazing book called "The Cure" by John Lynch, which talked about the masks we have as Christians and how there are two different paths we can take as Christians: Pleasing God and Trusting God. This book was one of my favorites, and I would definitely recommend it. I am still short for the mission trip by $1800, so if you feel lead to give, please make checks payable to: Impact 360, with International Experience on the memo line! I was able to go home for Thanksgiving and had an amazing time! I missed Katy, TX a lot. We just had a chill Thanksgiving at home with the whole family. I got accepted into Texas A&M University two weeks ago, which made my year. I am 90% sure I will go there for the fall of 2013. I hung out with my friends over thanksgiving and just had a great time seeing high school buddies. I went to the Fightin' Texas Aggie football game against Mizzou Saturday night and watched them BTHO the tigers. It made my break. I loved being in college station, hopefully my future home! 

Prayer:

• Funds to get raised for my mission trip
• Pine Cove summer job
• Finding a job for Christmas
• Turning to the Lord everything
• That I would get the NROTC scholarship

Praises:

• Acceptance in A&M! GIG EM!
• Scholarship to OSU
• Seeing my brothers and friends
• Going to an aggie football game
• My birthday! 

Fun week

So this past week we had a lot of fun! Three of my classmates had birthdays, so there was a lot of celebrating going on. I got to have dinner at Cracker Barrel tuesday night with our SLC! I love cracker barrel, it is the best place to eat! We had a project assigned on Tuesday and due Wednesday morning. It was sort of stressful, but my group really came together and did awesome! Our topic was Longing & Hope and we had to prepare a 23 minute presentation over the topic. We were up till 2 a.m. working on the project. We had a good time and there was no arguing or conflict which was awesome. That was the best of our week. We had class the rest of the week and on Friday we didn't have class which was pretty cool as I got to sleep in. Friday night I went with some classmates to Columbus and went roller-skating. It was pretty fun and we had an awesome time. Then I met up with some other classmates and tried to find a place to go dancing, but there were no options, so we went to Steak n Shake! We had a dance party once we got back to campus. Saturday we had an awesome block party in a lower income neighborhood which was amazing! We interacted with the community and just had an awesome time reaching out to families and kids. We were able to get involved with a lot of homeless and it was an awesome experience, despite having some of the vans broken into. After the block party, we went to Auburn to watch A&M BTHO auburn! Gig em! That was a lot of fun, but the turnout was fairly low for the aggies. Sunday my community group went out to Cracker Barrel which was just as good the second time. Today I have my pine cove interview at Auburn and am praying that God's will wold be done. I am taking some classmates to go as well, so that should be fun. We have a SIFAT this week where we get to experience poverty of third world countries. This week should be fairly exciting! Also, ONE WEEK till I'm 19!! Not a huge birthday, but still... pretty excited!

Praise:

• A&M won
• Great conversations this week with my IMPACT family
• Awesome block party
• Good quiet time

Prayer:

• God's will for Pine Cove interview
• Continued perseverance with my Bible study
• Good relationships with classmates
• Humility and patience while on SIFAT this week 
• guidance and patience in college decisions
• That i might decrease and He might increase

10/23 update

We were assigned a project over Engaging God's World By Cornelius Plantinga Jr. today. We have to come up with a 23 minute project (due tomorrow) over the first chapter in the book, which explains longing & hope. It may be a stressful day, so pray for patience and gentleness today among my community group. Can't wait for the Texas A&M vs. Auburn game this weekend! Gig 'em

Picture from our dinner after etiquette classes!

First Post! Whoop

Well, this is the first time I am posting on here! It has been an interesting 6/7 weeks. We have done so much stuff. The first week we went to Chickfila headquarters and Coca-cola h.q. and we toured everything. We had an awesome dinner with the founder of Chickfila's daughter and had an awesome time. We have been on adventure module in alabama for a week and hikes close to 10-12 miles. We had an awesome time. We had a few technology fasts which has been pretty good for just some away time from my phone and laptop. We've had a lot of guest professors, my favorite was Dr. J.P. Moreland. We have dived into to so many topics from worldview to vocation to apologetics to politics. It has at sometimes been overwhelming, but the best part of my week comes on the weekend when I get to watch my Fightin Texas Aggies BTHO visiting teams. While we can't have t.v., our RA has one, so I get to watch the game in there. This weekend against LSU was so close, I'm so mad we lost... I got to go home for fall break a few weeks ago, which I definitely needed. Fall break was a lot of fun, as I got to see my parents and watch the V.P debate and just take a much needed vacation from Pine Mountain, GA (the location of Impact 360). We have Bible study every monday, and we have SO's (service opportunities) every week. SO's are sort of like community service where each student goes and helps out for at least 4 hours a week at his/her site. My site is the volunteer fire dept in Pine Mountain. It has been pretty good so far. Everything is just a little overwhelming. You are here with 30 other students and you never get a break. The weekends are good breaks, but we often do things out in community! It has been pretty fun here so far, but we are only just a month and a half in for the year.

Here are some things I would love prayer for:

• Patience and love when dealing with other students
• Consistency when doing my school work
• That all the funds for the mission trip would be raised in time
• That God would use this year for His glory
• I would be accepted to A&M.... gig em! 

I'll try and update this weekly! 

Gig 'em & God bless,

Stephen Hargis

P.S- Sorry for my terrible grammar and sentence structure. I'm just trying to get everything I've done written down.