Back At Purdue

Ok, let’s see if I can cover a lot of the topics I promised in the last post without making this one too long. I also have some, err, interesting links for you guys.

First up, we had the first night of Cru last week! The turnout was incredible; we pretty much filled the whole main level of Lobe Playhouse in Stewart Center. I was going to help with the Powerpoint for the night, but they ended up having another computer to handle it, so I just had to drop off the CD. Then Shane recruited me to help dump balloons from the balcony onto the crowd right as the night was starting, so it was cool to sit up there and people-watch as everybody arrived. We even had a return of the gorillas! For those of you who don’t remember me linking to their first video before, we have a couple of guys who’ll don gorilla costumes and run around campus making videos (and general havoc sometimes). For a refresher, here’s the link to their first project (it’s especially funny if you watch the somewhat bewildered parents in the tour group, the students waking up from their lecture in Class of 50, and turn up the audio when they zoom in on the Prof as they run by).
Monkey Madness (DIALUP WARNING: 31 MB)

This year, after a brief intro/welcome from Andy Good, we kicked off the night with this newest of gorilla videos:
First Week (DIALUP WARNING: 28 MB)

After Cru a bunch of us were going to go to Steak ‘n Shake as I suggested on here a while back, but Kyle (one of my cell group leaders from last year) got up on stage and announced a party at his house; so we ended up going to that instead. Here are a couple pictures from Ali’s camera that night:
Chris Rausch:

Rebecca (she’s actually laughing, but somehow most pictures of her make her look like she’s crying):

Dustin (in the trademark duct tape hat) traumatizing a couple of the new freshmen:

Bob Mann (famous for the infamous “Uncomfortable Mann Hug” tradition the Earhart guys are so proud of):

And finally, Ali and I (with Chris’s hand interjecting from the right):


In other news, my brother Scott has recently moved away to college, so word on the street is that life is pretty quiet back home. He doesn’t know what he wants to major in yet, so he’s taking a year of Bible at Trinity International University in Deerfield, IL. What makes his school of choice so interesting is our family history there. My Dad met my Mom in seminary there (better known as Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, one of the top evangelical seminaries in the world). Apparently he even has one of the same professors as my Dad did a little over 25 years ago.

As for Perelandra, the latest news is not good. When I last updated you guys on it in May, we were trying to determine if the signals being received on the Chray band were actual signals, or merely a stuck transmitter (the leading theory at the time). Obviously, research had to stop over the summer, but now that I’m back I’ve discovered we aren’t receiving anything on that band at all. So either the stuck transmitter was turned off or more likely, it was simply aimed in another direction. I did start recently picking up a fairly strong signal on the Arbes band, but we’ve known for a long time that there’s a particularly powerful transmitter stuck in that range, so I’m not even going to try establishing contact. Since Chray is no longer a prospect and there aren’t any new leads to follow up on, we’re going to have to temporarily bring our contact efforts to a halt until something changes.

Now for some better news; my church has FINALLY found a new senior pastor! My first day visiting Evangelical Covenant Church was the last day of their old pastor, and that was the very beginning of my freshman year. Now, two years of searching later, they’ve finally found someone to fill that role. His name’s John Erickson and he’s been the pastor of Brickyard Bible Church in the Chicago area for the last 12 years (I’ve never heard of it before, but some of you might). He also has an engineering degree from Purdue and did his theological training at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School! I’ve got a small bio on him that I can email to any of you who are interested to learn more. He’ll start on the 17th of this month.

The library is going to be closing soon (I’m at work), so I’ll have to save the other updates I promised for next time. One quick bit of good news; I had Chip, Shane, Scott Carrington, Scott Brown, and Adam Purvis over the other night for that “spiritual housecleaning” session I talked about, and based on the last couple of nights it seems to have worked. Praise God! For any of you who are wondering; I won’t be going home for Labor Day weekend (I don’t want to fight the traffic, especially on Monday, and gas is just too expensive), so let me know if you’ll be around and we’ll hang out.

One last thing, please be praying for everybody down south who are experiencing the aftermath of Katrina. Thousands of people have died already and many, many others are fighting terrible conditions just to stay alive. Especially pray for all the rescue workers that are down there trying to help, that they would have energy to keep going and that they’d be safe from the maniacs running around with guns. The Astrodome’s already packed to capacity and they’re struggling to find places for all the other refugees slowly making their way out of the affected area.