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Hello Everybody!

It’s Tina again, just writing another newsletter.  I’m back here in pretty little Tulsa again.  Well actually if I’m being completely honest Tulsa isn’t all that pretty, it’s a little dull.  Sometimes I like to pretend like Tulsa is pretty and imagine that the infectious amounts of construction cones are really giant candy corns enticing people on their way to work with happiness as they glitter in the sunlight, or that the smallest, ghetto-est mountain in the world, Turkey Mountain, is actually a billowing fortress of licorice and the puny trees really a forest of candy canes!  Pretty much I image Tulsa as candy land. 

When I first got back we had “monastery” for a couple of days.  We would go into this big room with all these couches and candles and lamps and just spend time reading our bibles and talking to God for a couple of hours.  At first I thought it would be really boring, but I actually really enjoyed it and time flew by.  It was a really good time to reconnect with God since I had done a lousy job at staying disciplined over break.

We have jumped back into school and ministry again.  We do a lot of different ministry things like working with homeless people, kids at an orphanage, youth kids, inner city kids, and people in poorer neighborhoods.  We had this one ministry day where we had a list of random but interesting things to do in Tulsa, like go to a fire station and thank the fire men, (then thank God afterwards because they were so good looking), find an orthodox church and have a conversation with their priest (still not sure what an orthodox church is…), give a bible to a girl at a bus stop, pay someone’s bus fare, give a sandwich to a homeless person, and stuff like that.  It was probably one of my favorite outreaches so far.

I am seeing a lot of progress in myself since I have come out here.  The more I realize who I am in Christ the more confident I see myself getting, and bold to do the things God has called me to.  I am learning a lot about myself and learning to not put my identity in things that aren’t God, which has been a hard thing to learn!  I’m really excited to finish off this year and see what new ways God is going to mold me as I keep following after Him! 

Thank you so much for all the prayers and support and care packages!  It’s almost always that I’m having a terrible day that I will find that I have a letter or a care package sitting in my room which, honestly, you can’t continue to have a bad day when you’re eating chocolate or reading a letter from someone you love.  I will still need about $800 to finish off this year, so if you’re wondering what to do with any extra money you can always think of me ;)

Thank you so much for all your prayers, this year has been awesome, but also really tough so I really need them!  Love you all!

Tina