This past Monday, our Gathering staff team spent the day together looking back at the fall semester and looking ahead to the spring.  I gotta tell you, it was a pretty amazing time.  First of all, God has blessed The Gathering with a pretty incredible staff team.  Whenever you spend a day with Nick, Brett, Natalie, Whitney and Pete, it’s going to be a good time and inspiring!  But it was more than just hanging out.  It was also dreaming about the future.  Now’s not the right time to talk about what’s ahead, but trust me, God is stirring some great things on the campuses of DC for this spring.

But we spent hours looking back at this semester.  We talked about what worked and what didn’t, what we would change and what surprised us most.  Being able to look back over what God has done in the last three months was breathtaking.  Just think back to where we were on your campus during Welcome Week.  So much has happened since then.  At least 19 students have come to faith and nine have been baptized.  We’ve had dozens of community events.  We enjoyed our first ever fall retreat.  UMD has had a successful Wells For Change campaign.  Homeless Outreaches are spontaneously erupting on all of our campuses.  We’ve been to Daybreak.  We’ve given to Turkey Outreach.  We’ve worshiped.  We’ve made it through 2 chapters of Galatians.  Friendships have been formed.  Freshmen are stepping up to lead.  Seniors are dreaming about the future.  And Jesus is in the center of it all.

As we all get ready to celebrate Thanksgiving, I just need to say how grateful I am for each one of you.  Laura and I love being able to walk through life with you.  We love following Jesus with you.  He’s done so much already.  There’s more to do this semester before finals.  And there are great things ahead.  But for today, I’m just grateful to be on the journey with you.

Happy Thanksgiving,

John