DC Reflections.

Our trip to Washington D.C. was a blur, in a lot of ways, but a good blur.

I can't recount all of it, but plan to have a student story or two from the trip in our Mar/April newsletter that should show up within 2 weeks (that's called a teaser).

One of the most impactful experiences for me was the Seven Last Words of Christ service we visited at Georgetown University on Tuesday evening, the day we arrived.

Chi Alpha at Georgetown is one of several Protestant ministries affiliated with Georgetown's University Ministry. Like Loyola, Georgetown is a Jesuit Catholic university, however, their structure for Protestant student ministry is much more developed. As part of that affiliation, each of the Protestant groups are required to be a part of occasional meetings and special services. This Seven Words service was one of those required meetings.

My expectations were low: required cooperation in religious services tends to not go so well many times. However, I was moved and challenged, and really encountered God's presence in the remembrance of Jesus crucified.

The Gospel Choir led us in some hymns and spirituals, and each ministry had a representative share for 5-7 min on one of Christ's final words. Each representative had something truly powerful to share. I was especially blessed by and proud of Randy Demary. Randy was a student at UL-Lafayette when Jen and I were interns there, and is now a Chi Alpha missionary to Georgetown. He had to share on "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me!" not an easy assignment, but he did it well, and challenged all of us to see the hope tied up in that statement, as it connects to the whole of Psalm 22.

The trip got better from there.

Wed & Thursday: Daytime advertising for Holy Week activities and engaging American University students in conversations about Easter, spirituality, etc... good times!
Wed Evening: hosted a program on the origins of Easter
Thurs Evening: participated in and spoke at AU XA's Thursday Night Worship
Fri: touring and sight seeing - we weren't very good at this.
Sat: helped Godzwa's clean around their house and headed home.