Goodness!!  Hello everyone.  I'm really sorry about the delay in updates.  I can't seem to find the time/energy to sit down for a while and type out everything that has been happening.

On the job front, I am happy to report that I am working for a company called American Customer Care as a Customer Service Representative for Vitamin Shoppe.  American Customer Care is a company that does customer service for a bunch of different companies after hours or as a whole depending on what the client wants.  I'm probably going to cross-train for different projects, but for now it's just Vitamin Shoppe.  It's a rather small business here in Dubuque, but they have a parent company so as a whole I guess it's good-sized.  I have no idea how big the other offices are, though.  It's not as good as i wireless, but it's a job.  I'll be glad to get back to i wireless in the summertime (if they still want me).  This past week I had training from 6pm to 11pm Monday thru Thursday.  I’m *so* glad that isn’t my regular schedule.  I wouldn’t be able to keep up with my classes and work at the same time, which would be extremely counterproductive considering I’m working to pay my tuition.  Just this week I already fell way behind in my reading.  My regular schedule is going to be Sun 4pm to 7pm, Mon 8pm to 11pm, Wed 8pm to 10pm, Fri 7pm to 10pm.  It comes out to be 11 hours a week.  I would like to have a few more, but not many.  Like I said, I thought I was going to keel over after this week was done.  It was so nice to be able to just stay home on Friday night.  I'm also still doing SWAP on Saturday evenings in the kitchen washing pots and pans.  I'm not as happy doing it now as I was at the beginning, but it could be a lot worse.  It could always be a lot worse.  :}  I get to work with some cool people so that makes it better.

I've been here long enough to distinguish between my friendly acquaintances and my friends.  Everyone here is really great and there isn't anyone mean, but some people are nicer than others.  The friends that I hang out the most with are Christina, Miriam, and Rachel.  We all live on the 3rd floor, but Rachel and Miriam live in different halls.  Tina lives across the hall from me.  I find it odd that I haven't made more guy friends, considering my group of friends is generally dominated by males.  Don't get me wrong, I do have guy friends, but I don't hang out with them in my free-time very much.  Just at mealtimes and in class, generally.  There is a slight (and I'm talking .000000000000000001%) chance of romantic interest in there somewhere.   I thought there may have been a couple stronger possibilities, but was sorely mistaken upon closer inspection of personality.  I must say, though, that the scenery isn't bad at all.  :}  hehehe 

I finally got my score for the Bible Inventory that I took at the beginning of the year.  I got a 64%.  I think I'm a good guesser cuz I didn't know the answers to a good majority of the questions.  We'll see how I do at the end of the year. 

I'm learning soooooooooooooo much.  There is a lot of reading.  I haven't been doing all of it, especially this past week, but I'm going to try to catch up. 

In Old Testament Survey we've learned about the different creationist views of Old Earth vs. Young Earth and the different theories that go behind them.  I decided that I'm a Young Earth Creationist because that's the only one that really makes sense to me when you match science to Scripture instead of the other way around.  Basically I think that God did literally create the world in 7 days and that the Earth is only tens of thousands years old instead of millions of billions years old.  I have scientific stuff to back up my views so ask me if you're interested. :}   Then we went thru the creation and fall of man as well as our relationship to God, each other, and creation.  Humanity is under God, but over the animals, and man & woman are equal allies, but are also in a functional order (more on this when I write about Survey of Doctrine).  After that we learned about the flood and different views that Christian scientists (meaning scientists who are Christians, not to be confused with Christian Scientists) have on that.  Needless to say, I also believe in a literal world-wide flood that wiped out the entirety of mankind except for Noah and his family.  Again, if you want specifics on why, lemme know.  We'll spar.  :}  After that we went on to the Abrahamic Covenant.  We're still on that one.   Basically, God made a covenant with Abraham for land, seed (offspring), and blessing.  He made that covenant literally, unconditionally, and eternally.  It's really awesome that God made the covenant with Abraham in such a way that there was no way that Abraham could break it so it was totally up to God to fulfill it.  I think it's really interesting that God revealed the Israelites’ 400-year bondage in Egypt to Abraham many, many, many years before it actually happened.  It's one of those things that there is no way Abraham understood it back then, but it was recorded so that after it happened people could look back and see how God's plan has been going on since the beginning.

Intro to Missions is absolutely fascinating!!!  We're learning about how the gospel has been spread across the Earth to different peoples over the centuries.  One of the more amusing tidbits I've picked up is that back a long time ago the king of Denmark got saved and so made his country into a shipping country so that he could send missionaries all over the place to spread the Good News.  How awesome is that?  We've learned about different martyrs and how and why they died.  One of the more encouraging things I've learned about the Catholics is that there were still true believers in the faith way before there was an official Protestant sect.  Every single hour of class is so jam-packed with information about different people and situations that there is no way even to give a brief over-view.  I'd have to write a book.  Speaking of books, I've found out that there is one book that I'd really like to add to my collection.  I'm going to have to find the specific name of it, but it's something like Somebody's Big Book of Martyrs.  These are really fascinating people!!!  There is nothing better than dying for your faith (well besides spreading it) and there are some people that did it in some really awesome and God-glorifying ways.  I can't even begin to explain.  I really love all of my teachers, but I'd have to say that Mr. Schneider is my favorite.  He is one of the most interesting men I've ever met in my life.  I hope to get some time to just hang out with him to shoot the breeze.  I can't imagine how much more I'd learn and how interesting it would be!!!  :} 

English Comp is English Comp.  Mr. Lange is really interesting and a great teacher, but I've never been fond of English classes.  The week before last we read an excerpt taken from Henry David Thoreau's book Walden and Other Writings.  We read the chapter Where I Lived, and What I Lived For.  If I understand correctly (and I'm not positive I do), it was about Thoreau's views on technology and it's relationship to society.  It was also about why he went to live in the woods.  "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."  It had some interesting parts to it, but I probably won't read the book.  I did like what he had to write about imagination in relation to buying and owning property, though.  This past week I had to write a paper about a life experience that I had learned from.  I had an extremely difficult time trying to decide what I was going to write about, but finally decided that I would write about how the experience of being abandoned by mom and living in a foster home taught me that I could survive anything.

Survey of Doctrine is going along at kind of a slow pace, but that’s because Mr. Glock tells the greatest stories for illustration.  We’ve learned about the different philosophical arguments for the existence of God (Teleological, Ontological, Cosmological, Anthropological), the different attributes of God (True, Immutable, Omnipresent, Sovereign, Holy, Love, Just, Omnipotent, Free, Infinite and Eternal, Omniscient), a definition of the Holy Trinity (There is one only and true God, but in the unity of the Godhead there are three eternal and co-equal persons, the same in substance (deity), but distinct in subsistence (person head)), the subordination within the Trinity (the Father sends the son, the Son sends the Spirit, the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son), and that even though there is subordination, roll has nothing to do with inherent value.  Now this is where the rolls of man and woman come in (from Old Testament Survey up above).  It works in kind of the same way as the subordination of the Trinity.  The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are equal in deity (have the same value), but there is a definite subordination structure for functioning sake.  Woman is subordinate to man for functioning sake, but is in no way inferior.  Subordination has no bearing on value; it’s just needed in order for things to function well. 

Christian Life and Bible Study is getting seriously heavy in the "Study" part.  One of the texts that we're reading is called Living by the Book by Howard G. and William D. Hendricks.  If you've ever wanted to learn how to study the Bible so that you really get something out of it, I'd highly recommend it.  One of our most recent assignments was to come up with 30 or more observations about Joshua 1:8.  I was incredulous when he gave us the assignment, but after reading about how to do it in Living by the Book, it wasn't so hard.  After we went over our initial observations in class, he wanted us to come up with 30 more, but I didn't do that assignment (BAD STEPHANIE!!).  I'm sure if I tried hard enough, I could have come up with more.  We have another text that we will be reading for this class, but we haven't started in on it yet so I'll leave it for later. 

I’m not positive I’m going to continue with the Christian Service that I chose.  I’m working at a program called Kool Kids that’s at a Lutheran church here in town.  I don’t know why I chose to do it because I am distinctly not fond of the age group I’m working with.  I didn’t like 6^th thru 8^th graders when I was their age and I don’t really like them now.  I’d rather work with babies to toddlers.  I’m trying to look at this as an opportunity to get over my prejudices, which is why I haven’t quit it yet.  Pray for me that I’ll quit dreading going to do my service. 

I have had visitors the past two weekends!  Last Saturday, Aunt Joan and her friend Linda came to visit me for a couple hours.  We went out to a Chinese buffet here in town and I showed them my dorm room.  Aunt Joan, very graciously and without prompting, donated to the Stephanie Is a Poor College Student foundation.  She also brought me some stuff from home that I had forgotten.  It was good to see her, I’m glad she visited. 

This Saturday, Dad came to visit for part of Parent’s Weekend.  We went out to lunch at Applebee’s, then he took me shopping at Wal*Mart and Aldi for some supplies.  After that we came back and I gave him a tour of the college and introduced him to different people.  I was really glad to get to spend some time with him.  He also donated to the SIPCS foundation with the shopping trips and gas money.  At lunch when I told him that I was probably going to intern in Kenya my senior year, he said he was probably not going to visit me there.  How rude!  As if it’s really that far away.  It’s only on the far side of a different continent.  I mean come on now.  hehehe  <g>  :}  My dad is great.  :}

Speaking of the SIPCS foundation, I also have received some donations by mail.  Gramma Williams sent me some funds that I’m going to use to start an account at a local credit union.  Also, my aunt Cherry sent me a gift card to K-Mart that took care of all the school supply needs that I had.  Additionally, my uncle Matt sent me a care package with some food and basic care items.  Matt’s package also included some Spam as “Emergency Dorm Food” that is to be opened only at “my own risk”.  I have since had to hide the Spam away because while all food has been declared clean and good to eat, Spam is pushing it.  hehehe :}  A donation of sentimentality was sent to me by my awesomely great friends at i wireless.  They sent me a journal with a bunch of different magnets, quotes, and letters from people in my old department.  It brought tears to my eyes as I read it cuz I miss being there so much and everyone had such awesome things to say.  Throughout my life, God has really blessed me with some great friends and family.  I thank him for it every day. 

I want to make a note that donations to the SIPCS foundation are not required nor solicited.  I just wanted to make a mention of the ones I have received because I am 200% grateful that people are helping me so much in my great adventure.  God has really blessed me greatly.  I am completely not worthy, but he does it anyway.  How could I not dedicate my life to someone like that??? 

For anyone who is interested in reading the assignments that I have had to turn in for different classes, very soon you should see some links over to the right that you can click on.  They will take you to yet another one of my websites (I have a total of four, for anyone who is keeping track) where I will be posting them for perusing deeply.  :} 

K, hopefully I won’t go so long before the next update.  Again, I’m sorry this took so long.  I hope everyone is well.  Don’t forget to write me to let me know what is going on in your lives too!!  :} 

• Theology Proper - Study of God the father
• Bibliology - Study of the Bible
• Christology - Study of Christ
• Pneumatology - Study of the Holy Spirit
• Angelology - Study of angels
• Satanology - Also the study of angels (Satan is just a fallen angel.)
• Anthropology - Study of man
• Hamartiology - Study of sin
• Soteriology - Study of salvation
• Ecclesiology - Study of the church
• Eschatology - Study of the prophecy or "End Times"