College Funding Decisions

8:41am - This morning I rolled out of bed and read a couple chapters of Genesis. Breakfast was up next... cereal, apple, kiwi, and grape juice. Now I am about to start school, today I have a Latin vocabulary quiz and test. The quizzes aren't bad, but the tests are be brutal 2.5-4.5 hour ordeals. So thrilling.

2:10pm - Finally, done the test. I stopped for lunch, and a couple of breaks but otherwise spent most of the time working on it. Now I'm going to work on creating a topic for my first research paper since fifth graders. My brother washed and waxed my truck for me so I told him that I'd take him out to Sonic for a slushie. We'll probably head out around 3 for that.

6:55pm - I just go back from my afternoon excursion. My brother and I went to Wal*mart first,  to pick up paper, staples, index cards, and toothpaste. Then we hit the drive through at Sonic and got my brother a slushie. The library took up pretty much the rest of the afternoon.

While my brother found and read Star Wars, I began the research stage of my writing project. I was able to find and check out three books on my topic: Christians and debt. I parked on Money Matters by Larry Burkett for the time I had. It is written in a question and answer format using called in questions from his radio program, after which the book was named. I wrote out a pile of note cards as I read through the two pertinent chapters in the book--'Debt and Credit' and 'Budgeting'.

My reading in this book helped to clear up my questions about how or whether to use scholarships and church aid to provide for college education, which may rightly be called the Lord's work due to my future plans. My solution is this:

1. Pray without ceasing.
2. Do not engage in any future activity with the purpose of garnering scholarships, rather, do it as unto the Lord and for His glory.
3. Make use of every and any scholarship which may choose to support me insofar as it comes from an organization that is not blatantly anti-Christian.
4. Continue to maintain accurate progress records as I gain the support I need so that I can demonstrate to others how the finances are coming together as well as the continued reality of need.
5. Be willing and able to show a past accounting of my life which backs up my belief that the Lord is calling me to some sort of ministry work.
6. Make use of the time I have right now, develop virtuous habits, maintain personal integrity, and pursue the discipleship of church leaders in such a way so as to prepare myself to make the best use of my time in college, enable myself in the Spirit not to waste the opportunities for growth there, and develop spiritually right here where I am in the present.
7. Show how and why I believe college can prepare me for a future serving the Lord full-time in a later-to-be-determined ministry.
8. Make known my needs unashamedly yet not overwhelmingly.
9. Make sure that I never ask for financial support. To do so would be to rely on my own plea rather than the working of the Spirit in the hearts of those who hear or possibly it would be to cause the hearers to give out of compulsion rather than propulsion.
10. Submit myself to the Lord's will realizing that if He closes the door to college for the time being, it simply means that as good and beneficial as it may seem right now, He has a greater and more perfect plan for my life. College might seem ideal, but He may have something even better in store. He works all things together for the good of those who love Him.