Sometimes people will ask, "Where's your office?"  I usually respond, "Wherever I'm working!"  or "The campus is my office!"  I have a home office, but find that my most productive work time comes when I'm at a table in the vending room of the Union or at the library on campus.  It's a blessing not to be chained down to one place!

Recently I was walking through the Union on the way to my "office", and I came across the Campus Navigator.  Naturally the name caught my attention :).  I discovered that I was looking at the campus newspaper's summer guide for freshmen and others who would be arriving on campus this summer and fall.  The publication is full of articles by current students with common sense advice to those who are new to campus.  Good stuff.

Yet one article saddened me.  I wished it shocked me, but what I saw was all too common.  The article is all about tips on avoiding the "Freshman 15" (the infamous extra pounds an American college student supposedly puts on in the freshman year).

While most of the tips are in response to the consumption of all-you-can-eat cafeteria food and large amounts of alcohol by many freshman students on campus, the last "tip" caught my eye.  I'll quote it for you:

Have lots of sex:  This is what all the experts really mean by "living active lifestyles."  Seriously though, Google "calories burned during sex."  It's a workout!  --Daily Illini Campus Navigator Summer 2011, page 9.

That's what the article says!  Students (eighteen year old students!!) arriving on campus and picking up this publication will see that casual sex is a very normal activity on campus (which sadly, it is).  One might argue that the writer is kidding, but it's doubtful.

This unfortunately reflects our campus (and culture's) incredibly casual attitude regarding sex, strongly conflicting with the Scriptures view of sex as a precious gift, sacred act, and wonderful thing...in the context of marriage.

As we'd expect, the consequences of cheap sex is a whole lot of sexual brokenness--which is also very evident in the lives of students on campus-- Christian and not.  It's an incredibly sad state of affairs.

Would you please pray today for the sexual state of our campus?  Brokenness runs rampant here, but God offers hope, healing, and wholeness to those who desire it.

At the beginning of His ministry, Jesus declared Himself as the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy from Isaiah 61--

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.  --Luke 4:18-19

Please pray that this work of Christ would be fulfilled in the lives of many students on campus, as they come to Jesus for life.

You can find the aforementioned article here.

-Noah

Hello friends!

Today is Ellie's 2-month "birthday".  She's growing so fast!  I love making videos, and have made a short video with a few clips from the last month.  I've also been learning the basics of a program called Adobe After Effects, and this video gave me an opportunity to use a couple basic things I've learned.  Enjoy!

-Noah

Even before she was born Ellie would start kicking when she heard Noah's voice. From the day she was born, people have commented on how much Ellie looks like Noah. Now she smiles best when she's looking at her daddy. Needless to say we had a very special Father's Day!!

I can't find a newborn picture of Noah, but does anyone think Ellie looks like her daddy??:)

A hot sunny day, a beautiful daughter and some delicious grilled burgers. What more could you ask for on your first Father's Day??? (The answer is TRIFLE, which he got for dessert :)

She learned to smile a few weeks ago, but has been smiling much more the past few days! :) Happy Father's Day Noah! We're grateful for such a great daddy!

I have joked around with some students this summer that Ellie is already on a "college student schedule". For awhile now her last feeding has been at 10:30 pm and then she sleeps from 11 pm-7:45 am. (That *might* be when a college student goes to bed, although that's definitely not when college students wake up! HA!) It seems like an odd bedtime for a baby, but for our family and lifestyle, its working great!! She takes a great long morning nap, and then I usually don't get her dressed until after that (around noon.) Now that IS the college student life :)

Ellie continues to LOVE her sleep!!! (And her mama loves that too!) She's sleeping through the night and getting into a great routine throughout the day. It's hard to capture a picture of it, but she always sleeps with her hands above her head, its so precious!!

Other than sleeping, here is what Ellie likes to do throughout the day.

We are LOVING life with her! She is such a good baby. She very rarely fusses. She's a good eater (she's already gained 3 lbs!!) and a great sleeper. We are very blessed!

Prayer has been a big theme in our time leading up to this summer.

• Our summer study with students this summer is on prayer using Lee Brase's Approaching God, which uses different prayers found in Scripture to help us discover for about God's character and how we can more effectively approach Him in prayer.
• This spring, I received a free copy of Bob Beltz's Becoming a Man of Prayer, and have started to work through it this summer on my own.
• Students have expressed their growing desire and heart for praying for our campus.

It seems to me that the Lord is doing something, as all these prayer developments have seemed to pop up independent of each other.  I wonder if the Lord wants to do something big in the coming months...in us...through us?  How might He want to impact the campus, especially as many of our students are taking over the responsibility to lead our freshman Bible studies this fall?  It's exciting to think about, as I wonder if this season of prayer is preparing us for something exciting that is to come...

Would you please join us in praying this summer for God to do big things here at Illinois?  In and through our lives and the lives of our students?  You can find specific requests on the Prayer page.

-Noah

It's so hard to believe that the month of May is over!! Since Ellie was due at the end of April, I decided that my goal for the month of May was to do nothing. Or at least as little as possible (other than take care of Ellie and learn how to be a mom!) For me this meant not committing to meet with students, not having people over, not staying on top of life, or the laundry, or my email inbox... etc. Anyone who knows me knows how challenging it is for me to say no, to stop, and to do less :)

Well, the month of May is over and I think I'd give myself a B, maybe a B+ :) (The + is thanks to my mom for daily reminding me to do less and to take a nap!) I've LOVED life with Ellie so much, in fact, if I had it my way, I'd rewind and go back to 6 weeks ago and do it all again! (Maybe not the delivery/recovery part... although it was totally worth it!)

So June is here, and so is real life. Back to cooking, and cleaning, and hosting, and meeting with students, all of the things that I truly do love. Maybe just not quite as much as I love my precious Ellie!! :)  (But come on, you all know I didn't really take the month off. I had students over, I went to small group, we took our first road trip to Wisconsin, etc. etc. But I did learn to let my house get messy, and to not worry about my email inbox, and to go to bed at a reasonable hour... Speaking of which, its time for bed!

Happy 6 weeks Ellie. We LOVE you!

Ellie learned to smile a few weeks ago when Noah's parents were here. It's so much fun to see her interact!! I snapped this picture a few days ago and just had to share. Isn't it precious??