Week 6!

Well, we’ve come to the end of another week here at Capernwray! This one has flown especially fast since we had a long weekend and didn’t resume school until Tuesday.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, we had the 2nd part of Walk Thru the Bible program, looking at the New Testament. Everybody loved having the presenter, Paul Keyes, back. He has been one of my maybe 2 or 3 favorites so far. He has such great energy and humor and it made sitting through 6 lectures a day much easier. I think it was a very smart way to break us back into school. Even though we only had a 4 day break, I only spoke to one person who was excited and ready to go back to lectures! =) At the end of the lecture series, Paul had us put the Old Testament and New Testament keys words and motions together and it took us about 5 minutes to go through the whole thing. He said we were the first group he’s ever tried that with! =)

I think Paul enjoyed having an audience of solely young people because it allowed him to do certain things that he wouldn’t do with an older audience. For instance, one of the NT phrases was ‘a storm stilled’. When he introduced it to us, he was talking normally and then all of a sudden, he yells “A STORM! – stilled (in a quieter voice)”. It made me laugh so hard! He said he never dared try that with an older audience for fear of giving one of the members a heart attack. ;)

Anyway, the Walk Thru seminar was great and I now have a much better understanding of events and their timing and placement.

On Thursday we had another break in our routine by having a day of prayer. The day was a combination of personal prayer, group prayer, worship, and communion. It was very refreshing and nice to have a quieter day and to be able to just calm our hearts, sit silently, and talk with God. Even though we are at Bible school, it is still a struggle to find quiet time each time (both in terms of devotions and literally finding a quiet time and place with so many people running around campus).

At the end of the day, we were in the mood for a nice and relaxed girl hang-out time, so we watched a chic flick, ‘Wimbledon’, with a few other girls from our dorm corridor.

Then, yesterday (Friday), was work/ seminar day as usual. Every Friday, the students are split into 2 groups. One half attends a seminar, while the other half works, cleaning the entire campus. The boys do outside work like raking, cleaning out drains, cleaning the pool (even though that’s not outside), and I don’t know what else. Then the girls clean the inside: changing sheets, vacuuming, dusting, and everything else necessary to keep a large place like this in good shape! However, I got off with an easy job. Every so often there is a need that isn’t necessarily cleaning for the girls to perform. So yesterday, I got to decorate menu covers for the huge Christmas dinner that is held at Capernwray every year (after the students are gone). Even though we didn’t have much freedom to be creative, it was nice to do crafts instead of hard-core cleaning! =)

However, the gem of the day was our evening’s activity: A SCHOOL TALENT SHOW!! Let me just say it was way better than I expected and it was HILARIOUS! I was able to catch most of it on video. Unfortunately, I have no idea when internet might be fast enough to upload any videos. But *some* day, you will all get to see lots of videos that I’ve taken both of last night as well as videos in all my travels! =)

So… today! Today I went on our optional weekly school trip to Skipton (we go to a different place each time, the 1st time was that infamous lake district trip!) =) Skipton is a small, really pretty and picturesque town that boasts a 900 year old, well preserved castle! The castle was really pretty (and one day you'll get to see pics). The castle is even still occupied by some of the descendants!

It was a very fun trip. It took us about 1 ½ hours to get there via our school minibuses. Not too many of us went so it was a nice change-up to not have dozens and dozens of students there and get lost in the crowd. After visiting the castle, I walked around with my roommates Maggie and Angelic, and another student named Adrielle from Manitoba, Canada. Today was market day in Skipton so we got to browse lots of street vendors in addition to all the cute shops. Surprisingly, there were at least 4 thrift stores in town! There are lots of different chains of them here in England, and I haven’t even seen a Salvation Army or Good Will store! It seems to be an almost trendy way to get clothes. All the thrift stores in Skipton were down the main street! Since things are so expensive here, thrift stores are a pretty popular destination for students here. =) Before heading back to school, Adrielle and I stopped for a snack at a local bakery (we had split up with Maggie and Angelic by that point).

And now this evening, the optional school activity is a game of capture the flag. However, I’m not playing… it was raining today and I don’t feel like getting all muddy just now. But you know, while I’ve been sitting here, we’ve heard fireworks going off in the distance and I have no idea why. Today is not a holiday, as far as I’m aware.

God’s been really good to me, esp. in the past few days. Making friends is just an on-going issue. Everyone here is really nice, but it’s been hard getting to know anyone well since there are so many of us. My room was talking about this and I know I’m not the only one feeling a bit lonely at times. But slowly and surely I’m know I’ll get to know people better and make close friends. Specifically though, my answer to prayer is that I’m developing a Christmas travel plan with my roommate Korina. I was praying for someone to travel with and was getting a little bit nervous about it because SO many people (most, actually) are going home for Christmas! I’m still hoping we might be able to find another person to travel with for a least part of the time. But we’ll see. All in God’s timing!

I’ve uploaded a few more pictures from Scotland onto facebook. Again, slowly but surely, I’ll get more up for you! =) I probably sound like a broken record, but the internet connection here is really medieval. I always upload pictures whenever possible so if you haven’t seen some in a while it doesn’t mean I haven’t been trying. =)

Well I’m going to go be social now!
Thank you for all your prayers.
Tons and tons of love to all.
~Sarah