Summary by Chichi

Last night was very disheartening and disturbing. A grad student at N.I.U took guns to school and started shooting up a lecture hall and then shot himself. The body count has climbed to seven, about fifty were injured. The first thing that came to mind was was our TERC sister, Rinsola who goes to school there, thankfully she is unhurt. The next thing was "again?" This is in reference to Virginia Tech, and in reference to the death threats from the very same N.I.U last year.It's crazy because after Virginia Tech, people transferred to other colleges, but this just goes to show that no college campus is really safe from this kind of senseless violence. School is supposed to be a haven of learning. Sure there are reports of thefts and rape incidents on campuses all the time but we should be complaining about mundane things like parking and homework not fearing for our lives. It's senseless, it's scary. Like we discussed at TERC this morning, with all this seperation of church from the state, the covering has partially left the building. We should add colleges and universities to our prayer list.

In the awesome and amazing way that God orchestrates things we voted on Jaycee's topic: The Selection of Fighters. The scriptural starting point reference being how God chose Gideon's 300 (Judges 7). Some of the important higlights include:

- Many are called but few are chosen, so we have to constantly be ever ready and on the alert so that we can position ourselves strategically in order to be one of the chosen.
- We cannot do it by ourselves. It is important to surround yourself with the right people, stay in the Word and pray without ceasing.
- When Shedrach, Meshach and Abednego went through the fire, there was a fourth man with them. When Esther went tthrough her fire (read: Haman) she had a mentor in her uncle.
- There can be no gain without pain. We have to acknowledge and accept that we will go through trials and have to fight really hard to get to cross to the glory side.
- The moment Hannah stopped making it about her and focused on a way to serve the Lord her miracle happened.

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