It’s quiet here. The ministers and interns are in a staff meeting and the wives and children are at the beach. Week 1 is over, and by dinner time over 1,000 students will have arrived for week 2 of RUF’s Summer Conference.
Last week was wonderful. It was sunny every day. Hunter Bailey preached each evening on Sanctification. Hunter is a force of nature, and his bombastic sermons and infectious friendliness were perfectly suited to Summer Conference. Ruth attended the seminar taught by Derek Bates and Callie Miller from Pittsburgh on “Brain, the Self, and God.” It was a masterpiece of science and theology in a form accessible to students.
Meanwhile I spent most of the week in another location with the other coordinators. It was a profitable time to evaluate our work, reflect on the changes around us, and plan for the future. We welcomed Andy Wood and Chad Brewer as new coordinators. Andy will be covering Texas and Chad will be covering RUF-I and RUF-G.
I was free on Friday to visit with people at the conference, and had good conversations with Joe Dentici, Cyril Chavez, Cam Smith, and students from West Virginia University. Joe is leaving Penn State to take a church in South Carolina. He has done good work at Penn State and has been a valuable member of our Mid-Atlantic team. We’re sorry to see Joe go. Cam will be taking Joe’s place. He is a graduate of Penn State and has been an RUF minister in Tennessee for the past five years. Cyril is coming from Jackson State in Mississippi to begin RUF at Howard University in D.C.
Ruth and I drove Peter to the airport in the afternoon, then had dinner with the Bates family on Friday. I think this is becoming a tradition. We had offered to buy ice cream for the WVU students after the evening program. One student presented himself as a righteous defender of the constitution and is demanding that the traitorous government in Richmond submit to the true government of Virginia presently located in Charleston. Jeff Shaw will be horrified to learn that this defender of the constitution did not know what the 17th ammendment was about. The students mostly wanted to discuss baptism, so we conersed on that and related topics for several hours.
The quiet will soon give way to swarms of people. We’re looking forward to another great week and visits with more of our staff.
David Green 