Why would you go to EI?

You had the potential to have two years of college paid in full. Why would you give that up?
You have a good church, family, close friends here in Tennessee. Why would you leave?
They have a really strict guy/girl policy, even stricter than your parent's rules. Why would you let them control your relationships like that? They make you wake up at 6! You will be working on landscaping for two years, how is that going to help you provide for a family in the future?

        These are all thoughts that have run through my head. The struggle has been this, Do I really trust God with my whole life? Am I willing to "count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord?"(Phil. 3:8) Do I really believe that if I "seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness" that all these things, and even more can be added to me by the Lord?(Matt. 6:33)

I am beginning to believe His word. I am willing to "make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in your eyes. " (2 Sam. 6:22)

I am willing to die to my desires. "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." Gal. 2:20

Galatians 5:24  "those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires."  

I am open to poverty, to persecution, to have a "boring" life, to be less that He may be more.

John 15:20 "Remember the word that I said to you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also." Matt. 5:11 "“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account."

So, Why go to EI? You haven't answered the question yet.

Ok, here it is.

#1. The purpose of bringing me closer to Christ. The goal is, through the teaching, the physical labor, everything about the school is aimed at cultivating a Heart for the Lord. 

How does that look drawing closer to Christ look day to day? (These are in "my order" of what I am looking forward to most.)

a. The Staff and the Students: Their love for Christ is what I want. I have seen their eyes light up when they speak of Him. It is like watching a Bride-to-be talk about her fiance.

b. Teaching of the Word: They go through the whole Bible in two years. 

c. Prayer: Students are REQUIRED to be in prayer seven hours a week. There are even more opportunities to be praying outside of that.

d. The Homiletics Course: Learning how to preach. Even though I don't currently feel called to shepherd His sheep, I would love to see God use me to save souls by proclaiming His word. "How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?" Rom. 10:14

There it is, I'm going to EI: School of Biblical Training this fall. I hope to share some of the things that God will teach me while I'm there. 

Shalom!