We encounter God in an intimate relationship through daily prayer, the sacraments and the Scriptures.
Hey! Thanks for taking the time to consider going on mission with me. Know of Christ’s love and my prayers for you!
“For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” -Jeremiah 29:11
Growing up I was the oldest child in a deeply Catholic family and from an outside perspective, it seemed as though I had everything figured out when it came to Catholicism. I frequented prayer and the sacraments and grew quickly in knowing and wanting to serve our Lord. I also worked in many ministerial roles throughout this time, most frequently as a church camp counselor. However, I still had a long way to go in fostering a personal relationship with Christ! For a long time, a lot of my faith became knowing all the answers instead of knowing Him who provided them.
In a bit of dramatic irony, I most clearly experienced this lack of personal relationship with Christ when I went into seminary after high school. Even though I was happy to be doing what I thought was God’s will for me, I frequently struggled due to not really encountering Him in prayer. This, coupled with my battle with depression and anxiety, drove me into a period where I didn’t really trust God had a plan for me when I most needed to lean on Him. However, my last semester of seminary brought about a profound change in my understanding of the Lord. Spurned on by a summer of working Totus Tuus, I started to really engage prayer with enough honesty and humility to understand that God was calling me to leave seminary and pursue the vocation of marriage.
The seed of true faith in my heart was now ripe for God to raise up with the assistance of FOCUS! While I was working and doing online school full-time through Franciscan, my sister invited me to start coming to FOCUS events at the University of Central Oklahoma. It was through this community that I truly learned what it looked like to love and live for the Lord. I was quickly drawn into the discipleship program, but even this was not the best part of my journey of faith thus far. The best part of being around FOCUS was the example provided to me by my missionaries, Daniel and Raul. I had never seen two men so purely joyful simply by living in union with Christ, and this zeal for Christ spoke so profoundly to my heart that I knew I simply must find what they had. And I did! By living in union with them and the other men on campus, I grew to have a profoundly deep relationship with Christ that drew me closer to Him every day. It was this desire for intimacy that led me to join FOCUS, as now I want nothing more than to show Christ to others as I have come to understand Him.
As I look ahead to my first year, I am most excited about setting the world ablaze with the love of Christ! He desires all to know Him more personally and intimately with every moment, and I have the insanely humbling role of being able to be His voice of love to a world that needs Him more than ever! The world is broken and crying to be healed, and I am ready to lay down my life in service to Him who calls me to bring His loving Gospel to it!
Here I am with the UCO missionaries and a few of the other students after one of our Upper Room discipleship meetings (April 24′)!
One of the most amazing parts of working for FOCUS is that I get to take those closest to me on this journey by asking you to be mission partners with me! Though you may not physically be on campus with me, your spiritual and financial support allows me to fearlessly go wherever Christ asks I follow Him. Few people get the opportunity to go on mission with Christ in this life, but we are blessed with the opportunity to share the Gospel together in this way!
If you are interested in hearing more about this possibility, in joining me on the path Our Lord has set out for us by becoming a mission partner, or just want to learn more about the work of FOCUS, feel free to reach out and schedule an appointment with me at 405-588-3367. May God who has begun this good work in us bring it to completion, and know as always of Christ’s immense love for you!
We encounter God in an intimate relationship through daily prayer, the sacraments and the Scriptures.
By building genuine friendships, we meet students on a deeper level.
We teach students how to share the gospel, who in turn teach other students how to pass it on.