Family

I've spent some time praying and asking God what is the word you have for me this new year and this new semester.  Over and over  again I think of the word family.  I think of my life and my family.  I think of my son and husband and how much joy it is to call them my family.  I think of the delight it is to "share" them with others, to have YL alumni or leaders come around our table and eat with us, laugh at Otto throwing food with us, share conversations with us.  I feel God pushing me more to welcome in others into our own family.

If you ask YL students currently in LS what they love about YL they say it's...family.  I love that.  We want to be a place where the outsider feels like an insider.  Where students are welcomed into a family and feel wanted and accepted as they are.  Where they can discover at their own pace who they are and who Jesus is.  The verse that echos in my head daily is:
                                  
Psalm 68:6 God sets the lonely into families. 

I love our LS YL leader team.  I love our family meal before club where we fellowship together, laugh hard, and pray over our time with kids.  It is rich and full of goodness.  Each week there seems to be someone new who has wandered in and wants to be at the meal, who wants to be on the leader team, who wants to be in the family.  I'm thankful for those people.  We will continue to be a family to one another and offer the YL family to students.  We are glad to have kicked of this semester as a family. 

YL Leader Family (plus some YL friends :)