Ann Chao '08
Email: annchao@fas.harvard.edu
Jam & Bread 4/23/05

You've heard a little about our spring tour in Korea. I'll just tell you about some of the things we did. We sang at the second biggest church in the country- where thousands of people watched us. Two big colleges, Yonsei and Ewha. The Seoul subway station, and on TV. But by far the most powerful performance was our last one, at a place called Angels Haven. Angels Haven is an orphanage and a home for the mentally and physically handicapped.

On a Thursday afternoon, we walked into a room of about 150 people whose ages ranged from 4 to over 30. Before we performed, they had prepared a gift for us. A group of seven or eight men with cerebral palsy, some in wheelchairs, some on crutches, sang praise songs, ending with Amazing Grace.

I just started to cry as they sang this song in English, the familiar words taking on a whole new meaning.

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound. I knew the song they sang was so much sweeter, much more beautiful than anything I could offer. I was ashamed at my vanity, how I^Òm always focused on sounding good and looking good for myself. But they were offering all that they had up to God, without pride, and being totally sincere.

That saved a wretch like me. Many people would look at these men with cerebral palsy, living in an orphanage at age 20 or 30, and pity them. But I realized how much of a wretch I am-we all are-regardless of how nice we look or how accomplished we are. Our hearts are crippled and yearn to be fixed and fulfilled by things like a significant other, a successful career, financial security, more friends or more admirers. These are our wheelchairs and crutches.

I once was lost, but now I'm found. The left half of the room was all orphans, most of them under the age of 10. They're children who are lost. I realized we are all lost, looking for answers about the purpose of our lives and our self-worth. It is God who finds us and becomes our permanent home. He has told me that He created me. And through Jesus Christ, He has told me how much I'm worth: I'm worth Him dying for me.

Was blind, but now I see. After they sang Amazing Grace, we sang Testify to Love, you'll hear that later on, it's probably our most popular song. And I finally saw what the core of every UC song is: Love.

It is obvious that all our songs are about God. But as First John 4:16 says, God Is Love, and so, all the songs we sing are about love, too-they're one and the same. Testify to Love, If I Stumble, Always be my Home, Shackles, all the other ones listed-- and the next song, He Won't Let You Go. God has never let me go, and I have learned again and again that we should just turn to Him instead of continuing to wander around lost, and that we should just ask Him to be our strength instead of using crutches of this world. When we can't walk, His hand will carry us. When we fail, He'll hold onto us. And until the last day, His love will never change, because He will never change.

The next song we're going to sing is called "Let That be Enough." I think the words are printed in the program. If you've read over the words, you may be thinking what I thought when I first heard the song: "Man, this guy's depressed. He has self-esteem problems. He needs a better self-image, etc." And at first I thought this might not be a great song to do for Under Construction. After all, most of you people in the audience are students at Harvard, and Harvard students don't struggle with the same things that the guy writing this song does. Harvard students don't say to themselves, "it all seems so helpless, and I have no plans"; they're going to be doctors, lawyers, i-bankers, etc. They have it all together, right? But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this song actually does have relevance for Harvard students, perhaps even moreso than the average person.

A couple of weeks ago I was telling a friend about the article in the Crimson that reported that something like 50 percent of Harvard students are depressed, and a significant percentage of those even contemplated suicide last semester. He asked me why that was the case. "Harvard students," he said, "have no reason to be depressed. They've got everything going for them: intelligence, talent, etc." And yet, while it may be hard for non-Harvard students to comprehend, I'm not sure the statistics reported in the Crimson were so difficult for Harvard students to believe.

Everyone finds some way to measure their self-worth. For successful students like those at Harvard, achievement is a pretty natural choice. Our parents are proud of us, yes because we're they're children, but also, because we go to Harvard. When you go home and are a celebrity, it's not because you were a really nice guy in high school. It's because you go to Harvard. Most of the time, this is great. I'm smart, I'm successful, and that's what makes me valuable. Yet, while this may be reliable most of the time, it is sure to fail at times. You all know the feeling of not doing as well as you hoped on a test or not getting that internship that you sought. Such disappointment can be devastating if you value yourself on those standards.

In such times, it is very easy to relate to the author of this song when he says, "all my sandcastles spend their time collapsing." Our sandcastles of achievement may be impressive, and may even be stable when the weather is nice. But when the going gets tough, when the storm of disappointment rolls in and washes it away, we are left in despair, struggling with meaning and purpose.

One of the most common criticisms of Christianity that I hear is that it is a crutch for the weak. I agree. What those who say this fails or perhaps refuses to recognize, however, is that everyone is weak on his own; everyone constructs a crutch of some sort, a sandcastle if you will, whether it's achievement, relationships, good looks, wealth, etc. The irony in this criticism is that a relationship with God is really the only reliable crutch available; all others are sure to fail at times. We at Harvard are not valuable because of our academic success. In fact, what one does with his life should have nothing to do with his evaluation of self-worth. We are all inherently valuable because we were all created in the image of God, and he loves us unconditionally.

As we conclude the Easter season with the celebration of the resurrection of Christ, I encourage you all to consider what types of sandcastles you've constructed and the fleeting image of worth these promise for your life. Then consider the message of the Gospel: God loved us so much he paid the ultimate sacrifice, not because of who we are in the eyes of the world, but because of who he is. While our sandcastles may spend their time collapsing, as this song says, we can rest content in the knowledge that Christ's love for us is firm as a rock.

I encourage you, if you're ever struggling with the aftermath of a collapsed sandcastle, to consider the words of the chorus: "let me know that you hear me, let me know your touch. Let me know that you love me," and to let God's love be enough.

Hi, my name is Jinna Chung, and I'm a sophomore in Adams House, majoring in—I don't know, something-probably driving my parents crazy, but— I'm confident that I haven't wasted my time here or anything. Actually, I had a pretty amazing freshman year here, most of all because I realized a lot of things about my faith and about my life. So, I'd just like to tell you a little about that and about how I first became a Christian and about the years in between, when I was complacent spiritually and actually fell away from God.

I've been going to church for as long as I can remember. I grew up in a Christian home, so a large part of my childhood was spent at church—at Sunday school, retreats, lock-ins, Vacation Bible Study—the whole bit. I think I was blessed in that I was able to learn about God and to take Him into my heart at a pretty young age—I must have been in third or fourth grade at the time. I remember it was at a church lock-in, and as I listened to the message about the depth of God's unconditional, perfect love for each one of us, I knew that He had died on the cross for me because of that unconditional love, and I was so shaken by the idea of Jesus' ultimate sacrifice for me, that I knew I was ready to accept Him as my Lord and Savior. So, first and foremost, I feel privileged to have found Christ so early in life.

Still, I think that there were both advantages and disadvantages of growing up with a Christian background. Growing up knowing about God and making a decision for Christ at a young age made it easier for me to take Him for granted and to forget about the impact of His death and resurrection. As a result, when my family began going through much harder times and our usual routine of being so involved with church was taken away, it was easy for me to become complacent.

In sixth grade, my parents' business—their Korean restaurant—failed, and along with that came the end of their marriage. My father moved out, and my parents decided to get a divorce. My little sister and I moved in with our dad, and eventually, my mother moved all the way across the country, from Philadelphia to L.A. The divorce had been tough on me, but being separated from my mom was even harder—both emotionally and even spiritually. She'd always been my main Christian role model—the one who had always pushed me to seek after Christ in all that I did—the one who made me spend one summer reading the entire Old Testament in English and Korean. Even after she moved to L.A., she continued to remind me of the importance of growing in my faith, urging me almost every night—from 3,000 miles away—to remember to pray faithfully and to make sure to get to church on Sunday. But without her actually there, and with my dad caught up by all of our financial problems, I gradually found it easier and easier to stop making the effort to do either. Instead, I buried myself in my school life. Knowing that I lacked any sense of stability in my home life, I tried to find it at school—through my classes, my studies, my friends.

By the beginning of high school, I found it even easier to skip church—my father had sent me and my little sister to L.A. to live with our mom because of money problems, but I'd come back to Philadelphia so that I could go to my old school by living at a non-Christian friend's house. I'd succeeded in placing the whole of my security and so-called "peace of mind" in my school life instead of the Lord. I distanced myself farther and farther away from Him and His word without even realizing it, and the passion I'd once had for Christ slowly faded away— After a while, I'd forgotten all about His presence in my life. I figured that the only person that I could really trust was me, and I put all of my confidence and my faith in myself, in my own achievements and my judgments and my truth.

Basically, I was completely empty spiritually—and I don't think I particularly cared, either. By this point, it didn't even matter if I did go to church of if I prayed; I was just going through the motions. Over the summers, when I would be at home in L.A., I did go to church every week...and I would sit there, listening but not hearing anything, not really thinking about anything, least of all God. I would pray, but my prayers reflected my empty heart^×they were all shallow and self-serving—not prayers at all, but mere wishes... "Dear God, please help me get an 'A' on this test." "Dear God, please help me get into Harvard..."

But, for some reason, God did answer my prayers...so I came here last fall, full of ambition and my own arrogance, with no idea what He had in store for me here. I didn't even plan on finding a church or any of the Christian groups on campus, but after my mom started urging me to try to join a fellowship, I began going to Asian Baptist Student Koinonia Bible studies, if only to please her. It was the first time since before my parents' divorce that I experienced regular fellowship, and with other Christians my own age. As I spent more time getting to know other Christians, who were committed to following after Jesus and devoted to their faith, I began to see how different their lives were from mine...which was very strange for me, because, somehow, through it all, I'd always thought of myself as a Christian—and a good one at that. I'd known all the Bible stories, the parables, praise songs, church traditions—so I'd figured I knew it all, never seeing the truth that knowing these things isn't worth much if you don't know God. But now… I was surrounded by images of the life that God wanted me to have—a joyful life of loving Him and glorifying Him—than the life that I'd been living—a life of serving only myself. I realized that I'd been guilty of being at the core, a selfish Christian in that I'd accepted the fact that Jesus had died for my sins, but I'd never thought of loving Him back in return. I'd accepted Him as my Savior, but I hadn't allowed Him to become my Lord. And...as others began showing me God's love through their friendship, I realized that I had been wrong for so long—all that time when I was looking for stability in my life, I had had it all along—in Him. God is unchanging; He is the one constant. I finally saw that—through everything—my parents' bankruptcy and their divorce, my separation from my mother and then from my whole family, and especially the years when I'd been completely unfaithful to Him, He had always, always been there for me—loving me and waiting for me to return to Him. And... so I decided to surrender my life to Christ, because of His faithfulness.

                 Now, I am just starting to come back on the right path, but already I feel so much joy from this new life I have in Him. I guess the greatest lesson that I learned last year is that salvation is not a one-time process—after you become a Christian, there's so much more to learn and grow—and I think the best part is that you can experience the joy of salvation continually, for the rest of your life. More than anything, I'm filled with hope and excitement at the prospect of how much I have left to experience... Although, to be honest, sometimes I am filled with regret, because I know that if my faith is weak now, it's because of all those years I spent not growing in my faith—but then I am reminded once again that He has forgiven me of everything. By the grace of His love, I've been saved…again. And now, I can't think of a better way to repay His faithfulness than by returning it by trying to be a faithful servant to Him.

        Now, we'd like to share a song with you... It's called "How Beautiful," and it means a lot to me, because last year did make me see how beautiful the unified body of Christ truly is—because it was my brothers and sisters in Christ who made God's love concrete for me again and who showed me what it means to be a true Christian.

It's been a real pleasure singing for you tonight. This is my eighth and last concert....This is kind of like the climax of my time in UC. But I'd like to share a little bit with you before I go off this stage for the last time.

They say you don't know what it's like to be a father until you've actually been a father. I've been a father. I had my first child two weeks ago: It was my thesis.

And for all you thesis writers out there, you know what it's like to write a thesis. You know it's like giving birth. You carry it with you for a long, long time, and it's always on your mind. You always gotta be careful; you take care of it; you nurture it; you make sure it's going to grow up to be a nice, healthy thesis. And then, there comes that day -- that special day -- when it all comes out and is handed in. And it's a glorious time where everyone is rejoicing because you finished...or at least, you are, because you're finished.

I loved my thesis. You might think that's funny -- but, you know, I slept with it. And I carried it with me wherever I went. I put it in my bookbag all the time, and I would show all the people when I was done and in the binder; I was like, "This is my thesis. Look, aren't you proud of me?"

I loved it, even though it couldn't hug me or kiss me or...uhhh...although I kissed it from time to time. Even though I put in all this love and effort and work into my thesis, it would never say that it loved me, that it appreciated all the work that I had done.

Yet I still loved it, because it was my creation. Something about men and the imitation of the divine is that we rejoice in what we create, whether it be a thesis, your child, or beating Final Fantasy X with all the legendary weapons. Yeah -- all the men know what I'm talking about, right (or some of them)?

So even those stupid and earthly things give us joy because we delight in them, because we love them. And my career though UC has been sort of like that. In looking back now from my eighth concert, I see how I am a child of God and how God loves me, even though sometimes I don't say that I love Him or express my affection for Him or my dedication to Him. He still is my Father. And just as I love my thesis despite it being cold (haha) and unresponsive, God still loves me. And He is so much more pleased when I lift up my praise to him, and that's what my life in UC has been about.

Now in this skit [based on John 9], we have this man called Blind Davy, who is blessed by God because God loves him. God restores what was lost -- his eyes, because he can't see. God brings him back to that fullness. And the mission that we talk about at the end of the skit is, "What happens now?" What happens now that you know God loves each and every one of you? That's what we've been singing about today: "Crash and Burn," a song about how God promises to take care of you; "Somebody's Watchin' Me," even the rap -- "I'm down with the king so I got it like that" -- about how we don't have to fear what comes in this world, because God is taking care of us and protecting us as His children.

He loves you. And He asks for you to return that love. There is so much more fun and glory you could have when you commit to the relationship with Christ, with God, who calls and beckons you into a relationship with Him.

And even though my thesis will be put into some dusty library where probably no one's ever going to read it, I delight in the fact that it's been accomplished; it's there; it was put in that library. If anyone wanted to read it, you can go read it -- it's probably in Tozzer Library (though no one knows where that is, anyway) -- it's there. And I think that's a kind of hint of what rejoicing there will be in heaven when we finally meet God, when we're able to live with him forever.

I know we've said a lot of things tonight. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask us.

I once was a Krok. For those of you who don't know in the audience, that's a secular a cappella group [at Harvard], and I guess I would just like to share with you my conversion from secular to Christian a cappella.

The Kroks, they have a saying: Once a Krok, always a Krok. It means a lot of things. It means that once you audition and get into the group, you never have to audition again. It means that alumni are a very central focus of the organization. But perhaps, most fundamentally, it implies that when you join the Kroks, it becomes so much a part of you--that you become a part of their tradition.

So I was in the Kroks freshman year, and it was quite an experience. We circumnavigated the world. We toured 15 countries, 5 continents. We sang for concert halls filled with 4,000 people. And when I finished that year with the Kroks, when I came back from tour, I remember thinking that even though I knew that I wouldn't be singing the next year, I was a Krok, and I would always be a Krok, and I would never sing in another a cappella group.

During sophomore year, someone mentioned that since I wasn't singing in the Kroks, I should try out for Under Construction. And I thought about it for a little while, but I dismissed it pretty quickly--mainly because, well, I was afraid of losing the "Wow, you're a Krok" reaction. I didn't know how I would deal with going from singing to 4,000 people to singing at churches. And I didn't know whether it'd be a wise way to spend my time. So I pretty much decided that I was never going to sing Christian a cappella while I was at Harvard, and I went to my first Under Construction concert last spring.

I came. I sat in the audience. And I watched the performance. And I was totally amazed. I was amazed at the joy that I saw in the eyes of the people performing. I was amazed that they weren't just entertainers or performers--they were messengers. And I was amazed that I could actually see the love of Christ in every one of them.

I had a revelation that night. I realized that regarding, you know, my reputation, what was I thinking? Seeking glory from other men, when I should be seeking glory from God? About my time--what nobler way is there to devote your time than to using your talents to a result that pleases God? And what greater audience could anyone ask for--than God and His people?

It was really a paradigm shift for me, because my whole life, I had been one of those people who'd dedicated every pursuit to crafting the perfect profile, to putting together a resume which would impress other people and which would impress colleges and grad schools and get me the perfect career. And I thank God for opening my eyes and for helping me realize that there's such a greater purpose to life. I thank God for giving me the opportunity to be a part of Under Construction, because He has given me so many blessings through the group. And I thank God for giving someone like me the chance to raise my voice to Him.

In a way, that's kind of what this next song ["Alas! And Did My Savior Bleed"] is about: the ultimate, the unfathomable grace of our God. That He, our Creator, would come down from heaven, and for petty sins which you and I commit, that we don't really think about--He would be nailed to the cross, that our Creator would die for us.

You know, I once was a Krok. But God has given me so much more. And it's for that that I sing.

Hi, my name is Jen. I'm a freshman, first year in UC. For those of you that are out there and for those of you that don't know me, the ones that are in the audience that do know me, they can tell you that I have a habit of thinking I'm as strong as a rock. Nothing can ever tear me down, nothing can hurt me, nothing can ever bother me. No matter how bad it is, I try to smile--yada yada yada, the story goes on. And that's how I've been for the last nineteen years of my life.

I came to Harvard, ecstatic. I'm thinking--new faces, new people, but sad at the same time because I was leaving my home: my family, my sister, my parents, my dog. And adjusting to college hasn't been easy. The last four months have been the hardest four months of my life, and that is because since I was so attached to my family, it really, really killed me when I got a phone call in October saying that my father had passed away.

Now, the first impulse from those that were here was, "Well, maybe you should take the year off." No. "Well, maybe you should take the semester off." No. "Well, maybe you should take another two weeks." I said, "I'm going back." And the weekend after my father's funeral, I came back. And it wasn't out of disrespect to him, it was out of respect and because education was number one [to him], and I loved the family that I had created here, loved the friends that I had met, the people that I had seen. I'd already lost one thing; I didn't want to lose everyone else.

Now, I still think I'm strong as a rock, but it's not without God that I'm here. And as I've said, the last four months have been the hardest four months of my life--spiritually, academically, emotionally. I've gone through it all. Even though I'm standing here still feeling that I'm exhausted, I know that He's holding me up and He's giving me the strength that I need. So I'm going to sing the next song, our signature song, "Peace of the Rock."

Hi, my name is Stephanie, and I'm a junior in Cabot House. I would just like to share with you some of the ways that God has worked in my life this semester. In our skit, we were talking about how we--Under Construction--can forget why we sing, or forget about the amazing God that we sing for. We want to reflect His love and His holiness in our lives, but we also forget about our first love, that love that we first felt when we first believed in Him and gave our life under His control, that love where He is everything to us, and we just desire to be with Him, and to do His will, and just tell others about Him.

For me, I actually don't remember having that first love because I was really young when I became saved. But throughout my life, I've always wanted to have that love--that kind of passion--for God, knowing that He's worthy of that kind of love. This year, I've been really wanting to grow in my relationship with God, and I'm just feeling frustration--about a lot of things, but one thing in particular is the pride that I saw in my heart.

It was just very easy for me to compare myself to other people and compete, I guess, with people around me and to put my self-worth in what people thought of me or talents that I had or status or experiences, rather than to put my self-worth in the love of God, which is constant. It's difficult to put your self-worth in those kinds of things because they don't last, and they're very unstable--but God's love is constant.

I was really ashamed and shocked at myself, at the thoughts that I would have. Even the people closest to me, I would see them as competition in certain areas. I knew in my head that my self-worth should be in God, but at times I didn't know it in my heart.

About a week ago, I was in church, and someone gave a testimony and something inside really spoke to me. He said that he realized that in order for him to change the people around him, he would have to be changed in his own life. And he realized he wasn't changed in his own life because he wasn't surrendered to God. I thought about my life and realized that in some ways, I wasn't surrendered to God. I was clinging onto things: reputation, image, talents, and I feared losing them.

But that day, God, God's Spirit, worked in my heart, and what I had known in my head I felt in my heart. I looked again at the cross, and I just thought--I realized, that all those things don't really matter. So what--if I can sing, so what--if I go to Harvard, so what--if I have all these friends...

When I look at the cross, I see Christ's love poured out for me. I see Him there, dying, because of my sins, and I realize that I have nothing to boast about. And all I want to do is tell others about His love for me. Things like that just confirm to me that God is real--that He knows me and that He loves me. He knows what binds me, that those kinds of things just lead to jealousy and insecurity in my life. Because He loves me, He wants me to put my self-worth in Him alone and to give my life over to Him.

The next song we're going to sing is called "He Won't Let You Go," and I find such incredible joy and peace and stability and comfort in knowing that He will never let me go.

Hi, my name is Peter Chung, and I am a sophomore at the College. Over the past summer, I had the privilege to work with a camp under PBHA, a charity organization on our campus. It [the camp] was called the Boston Refugee Youth Enrichment program. It was an ESL program, designed to teach Vietnamese children in Dorchester English.

I had a really good time teaching--there were about 9 12- to 13-year-olds [and we taught them] English, social studies, history, anything I wanted them to. But when you teach ESL, there's bound to be some kind of miscommunication. And I think the best example of that miscommunication was the fact that I was called "Big Sister Peter" for the entire summer...

Anyway, but the first three phrases I learned in Vietnamese-the three phrases I heard most often--were "no," "I don't know," and "I don't want to do that." And I tried so hard to get them to do, to try to learn different things. We did bottle rockets, we studied poetry, the Backstreet Boys, all these different things designed to reach out to them. You know, at the end of the summer, I think that a few of them did come away with some of the knowledge I wanted them to have.

But it was frustrating because there's so much that I wanted to tell them, but they were unwilling to listen sometimes, and they were just unable to understand sometimes. And I was always searching for that kind of symbol, that translator that could show it to them.

You know, I'm not God--contrary to popular opinion, haha--I'm not God, but to me, that shows a little bit about how God would feel in the position that He's in. He's trying to show His love to all of us, and we are saying, "no," "I don't know," or "I don't want to do that." But the real symbol, the demonstration of God's love to us was sending down Jesus Christ, to be our Lord and Savior.

In ancient Israel, they used lambs as sacrifices, to atone for the sins of the nation. God, by sending Jesus Christ down to us, provided Him as the perfect Lamb, the sacrifice for all our sins. This next song is about that, about how He was the Lamb of God--and how much that shows the Love of God to us.

My name is Janice, and today I'm gonna read from 1 John:

"The love of God was manifest toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him. And this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation of our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also have to love one another. No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, because He has given us His spirit. And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world."

The reason why I share this verse is--one of the ways that God has showed me His love has been through Under Construction. I've sang in this group since my freshman year, and I just remember freshman year, I came in kind of like this insecure, scrawny little fresh not really knowing what to do, actually really scared. I mean, in name I was Christian, but really scared to even say "Christ" in front of friends. A spotted high school past kind of made me ashamed to say that I was a Christian, and God provided me with a family here in UC. I first met Steph, who's now my closest sister and my roommate, and God just sent me people to show me His grace, that I didn't have to feel guilty for these sins, because He first loved me and He died on the cross for me. I was saved, and He took these sins away from me.

And all I had to do was receive it; I didn't have to do anything. Like this Harvard mindset--"do, do, do, do this, do that, accomplish this, succeed"--I didn't have to do any of that. And even through sophomore year--I had a really tough sophomore year--struggling with grace, struggling with relationships, but God provided me again throughout the time [with] Under Construction, to be there to pray for me, a place where I could find solace and comfort, and a place where I didn't have to fear, knowing that God was with me, that I shouldn't be afraid, for He is my God, that He will strengthen me and help me, that He will uphold me with his righteous right hand.

There was this one particular time sophomore year when everything seemed to be going wrong, and I just felt the healing prayer of this group, and for an entire week I just felt like my heart was going to physically explode. I knew that this couldn't be a human emotion, and for the first time, I felt like I understood what it meant when God said, "I will give you peace that transcends all understanding in Christ Jesus."

With these experiences and lessons that I learned throughout sophomore year, I came into junior year and I was so blessed by this group, and unfortunately, I feel like I have been called to leave the group this semester, and with that decision, I know that I've hurt a lot of my brothers and sisters here, the family that I had come to love. And I'm scared about what's going to happen; I'm not sure what my future's going to be like. I have a lot on my mind: I don't know what academics are going to be like; I have to write a senior thesis. And I have to leave this family, and I know I've hurt and disappointed people here, but even in that, the only promise and hope that I can claim is the redemption that Christ promised us by dying for us and loving us first.

I had a really tough week; I'm really tired; I'm really weak, but still I'm glad to be here. And again, all I can remember is that God says, "My grace is sufficient for you, for through [your] weakness, my strength is made perfect," and all I have to do is just stop and ask God to come and be with me. I have faith that He will continue this group; I have faith that He will lead all of us wherever we need to go, as long as we hold His hand--and, in all that time, He will never let us go.