Bigstuf- Day 3

Well, another day- another thunderstorm. Once again, our free time on the beach was rained out. We didn't even get our (now traditional) 45 minutes- most of us had only 10-15 minutes before the clouds let loose.

I don't want you to get the idea that it rains all the time here... that's not true at all. It really only rains when we're outside. In fact, most mornings and evenings, it's been really nice. Unfortunately, that's when we're in the arena. The good news is, the students spent their time sitting in the hall and texting each other. In fact, at one point, two of the students were sitting right next to each other and texting back and forth. Man am I old.



We also had a special guest today. Dianne Kemp, who moved from Noblesville down to Orlando about a year ago, came to visit us. The girls were especially glad to see her, particularly the ones who were here the last two years when Dianne chapperoned for us.



We were able to redeem some of our time, though. Since we had dinner on our own tonight, we headed into town for the Olive Garden. When some of the students complained they don't really like Italian, we just explained that it's not really Italian, it's Olive Garden. The whole back room was filled with laughter from the time we arrived until the time we left (to the dismay of a few other families who lost the table lottery and ended up in our dining area). I heard several students say this was the "funnest meal they ever had." I think that's good.



Unfortunately, we arrived back later than we should have and weren't able to get good seats together for the evening session. This meant six students ended up in one place and four in another, with the leaders taking the "back of the house" for a while. This gave some of our leaders a chance to show off a few moves they learned on "So, you think you can dance." And no, we can't.



In case you were wondering, this mornings session was Andy Stanley talking about how our direction, not our intention, determines our destination. This evening, Francis Chan gave an incredible message on how we're called to deal with trouble in our life. Our small group time went so long, that I'm not posting this until very early Thursday morning. As you can imagine, I'm quite tired and excited all at the same time. I feel like I can go for another couple of hours, but I know I'll crash as soon as I hit the sack, so I'm headed there now.

Peace.