FAREWELL CHRIS!

Isn't life funny? I have been going to the University of North Dakota now for just over three years, I happen to be working on my forth. Every year since I started attending I have lost all my friends from that year. You may think I am joking or only giving a half truth but it’s all true. My freshman year I had three friends Ian, Dave and Chester all three left. Ian and Chester went to UND's satellite school in Hawaii and Dave went back to Montana; out three friends. Then at the end of my sophomore year my new friend Ryan decided to drop out of school and go live at home; out another friend. Now my junior year was really awesome I had some really great friends, Chris being one of them. But that year has already come to a close and I have already had to say goodbye to Chris Shaw Gust a truly good friend. He is on his way to the southern end of France to a small town called Reberac where he will be employed teaching elementary children English.

It's kind of crazy how life works out. My freshman year I didn't follow the path Jesus wanted me to follow but instead was foolish and followed the ways of the world. There wasn't a friend of mine that I could have called Christian and so I fell into secular ways. I suffered from depression almost everyday, my heart felled by the weight of my own sin. Somehow I had forgotten what Jesus had done for me on the Cross and the liberation from sin that was extended to me on the day of my salvation. My second semester I began to realize the selfishness of my actions and the consequences I deserved for my disobedience. But then I rediscovered God's grace through his son Jesus Christ and I was once again able to understand and know that all my past actions were covered under His blood, I was set FREE!

Even after all this I still had my struggles and I might have taken the wayward path again if it wasn't for one person at Intervarsity, his name was Chris. It was the second semester of my sophomore year by the time I went, it had taken a whole semester of procrastination to get around to going. But it was where Jesus wanted me to be, something I didn't know at the time. You know it wasn't good worship music or incredible speakers that kept me coming back to IV instead it was one man being obedient to God's love in his life. Every week I came to IV Chris would come up to me and say Hello and talk to me. He even went so far as to sit next to me to make me feel welcome; this is absolutely unheard of in our generation. It was these simple acts of kindness and love that drew me back week after week until it was my home and my community. Chris was showing me what it meant to be a Christian and what it meant to love your neighbor. My life is forever changed by one man listening to the call of his Father.