This weekend I took three of our girls to The Awakening in Frankfort, IN. If you have ever heard of The Great Banquet, The Awakening is the high school version. In a nutshell, it’s a three day experience with Jesus. There’s a little mystery surrounding it because it’s one of those things you just have to go to to understand what it’s all about. Otherwise, if it was all laid out on the table beforehand, you wouldn’t be able to drag a teenager to it. That’s pretty much what happened with our girls. None of them were overjoyed about giving up the last weekend of their spring break to go to a retreat they knew nothing about, except that I wanted them to go. But by Sunday they were all changed, all crying, and had all encountered Jesus in a big way. One of the girls said they hadn’t FELT God so close in a really long time. Another explained how she had been able to forgive a family member that had been so hurtful she didn’t know how to let it go. Still another said she was going to go back to school and love people she had a hard time loving, and that she planned to tell her family how much she cared about them, even when she doesn’t show it. Don’t get me wrong, they all wondered what I had gotten them into on the first night when their cell phones had to be shut off for the remainder of the weekend and they weren’t allowed to wear a watch-but all of this was so that the noise of the world could be left behind, even just for a moment, so that they could hear Jesus calling their name. Sunday afternoon our girls were truly able to say to The Awakening community that they were thankful that they got to experience what God had for them out in the middle of no where, in Frankfort, IN. It definitely wasn’t a breezy weekend. Satan came out in full force to try to stop all the girls from hearing what God wanted to speak into their lives-there was a gal there that didn’t want anything to do with anyone and let us all know it right off the bat, and of course she was assigned a seat right next to one of our girls. But even in that situation God was good and began to soften her heart, little by little. She didn’t leave praising Jesus but she had stopped cursing him!!! All this to say that this weekend blessed my soul to see our girls loving and getting loved on my our awesome friend, JESUS!!!!!