Why Kauai Bible College? (Part 1/3)

Why Kauai Bible College? (Part 1/3)

Last summer I went through a period where I was not walking closely with God, and I wrestled with questions about my faith. Questions like "Why would a good God send people to hell?" and "Do I really believe in God, or have I just been indoctrinated by my upbringing?". Eventually I worked through some of these issues and decided that yes, I do believe in God, and I want to serve Him.

But it wasn't until one night in October or November that I finally sat down and had a really good quiet time with God. I was reading in Ruth, and the verses right at the beginning jumped out at me:

Ruth 1:1-2

Now it came about in the days when the judges governed, that there was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Bethlehem in Judah went to sojourn in the land of Moab with his wife and his two sons. The name of the man was Elimelech, and the name of his wife, Naomi; and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Bethlehem in Judah. Now they entered the land of Moab and remained there.

Elimelech moves his family away from Israel into the land of Moab. Moab in the Bible is Israel's bitter enemy. So it seems that Elimelech went off on his own, rather than being where God wanted him to be.

As I was reading this, I just felt convicted that I was not where God wanted me to be. So I decided to quit my job. I would stay on until the end of the project, and then move on to wherever God wanted me to go. I started toying with the idea of attending Bible College, but at this point it was just as likely that I would spend some time travelling or working on my own projects at home.

Arrival

(I wrote this on Friday, but I only had 1 hour of internet access and couldn't get it posted up in time, so here it is now.)

My flight arrived at 7:40 pm local time, 10:40 pm PST. There were no hula dancers greeting us, just a regular small town airport. It was already dark out, but the temperature was comfortable for shorts and a T shirt.

The Dean of Men picked me up at the airport and took me to the campus. It's on the same property as the church, just down a hill. We got there just after the Wednesday night Bible Study ended, I met a few people and hitched a ride to a beach bonfire. Both of the vehicles I rode in that night had a broken door.

There are 3 people in my tent including me. The girl's tents have electricity from a generator, but the men aren't so lucky. Still, it's a nice tent, we have bunk beds and carpet.

The showers have cold water, but it's not too bad because of the climate. It feels brisk and refreshing, definitely wakes you up in the morning. They painted the pipes black so the water will warm up during the day. The first time I took a shower I was bombarded with a high pressure jet stream of water, afterwards I noticed that all the other stalls actually had shower heads installed.

We use outhouses for the bathrooms. The ones next to the guy's tents don't flush properly, so we can only pee in them. Unfortunately I didn't realize this at first...

The weather is beautiful. Sunny, partly cloudy, frequent breezes. It's rained several times since I got here, all just quick showers. It gets hot during the day, but the clouds and breezes keep it from getting too bad.

Most of the students were here by Wednesday night, except for a few who read the wrong section of the website and came in on Thursday. One of the guys in my tent misread the start date and showed up 10 days early!

We had orientation Thursday and today. Thursday afternoon we went to the beach for a few hours. It was nice: big waves, warm water (very salty!), beautiful beach.

They posted the class list, I signed up today. First semester students have a list of required classes: Genesis, Romans, Hermeneutics, and Discipleship. Plus the Wednesday morning prayer meeting and Wednesday evening Bible Study are required for all students, along with "Chuck Tracks". For the Chuck Tracks we listen to 6 hours of audio each week, it's Chuck Smith teaching through the Bible from start to finish and takes 4 semesters to finish. On top of the required classes I'm taking John and the Pastoral Epistles.

Classes officially start on Monday!

Almost There

The last few weeks before I go have been busy and hectic. But in a good way. Aside from packing, moving out, and finishing up other errands, I've been trying to see friends and family as much as I can. I appreciated seeing everyone I was able to, but naming them all would take too much time so I'll just pick out a few highlights.

Friday the 7th was my last day of work, and they took me out to play whirlyball. Whirlyball is a sport, with rules similar to basketball, but you use wiffleballs and you have special rackets to catch and throw. And everyone is in a bumper car. My team lost every game, so they switched me to the team that hadn't lost yet, and then we lost.

Sunday the 9th I went to a show in Seattle called 7 Strangers. It's a live action spoof of reality TV shows. It's set in a huge mansion where 7 people act out their characters and the various fights and drama that happens, and the audience just wander around the house and observe whatever action they happen to stumble across. I enjoyed it, it was definitely a novel approach to improv theatre.

Wednesday the 12th I had a court date to fight a speeding ticket, so I made a beach trip out of it. The skies cleared up and we saw some awesome shooting stars, it was the second best time of the year to watch them. There were some huge ones, a few of them lasted close to a second and left trails across the sky. Then we built a huge bonfire. Not a normal bonfire; a huge one. The kind where you can't stand closer than five feet away because it's too hot.

I went back a week and a half later and built a fire at the same spot, but this time the tide was not friendly. It came up far higher than we were expecting and flooded us out.

Friday night the 14th I went camping at Lake Wenatchee, and again watched the stars. There weren't as many shooting stars this time, but the sky was still beautiful away from the city lights. I spent the night in a hammock rather than a tent, and despite being a little chilly I got more sleep than I would have on the hard ground. I'm definitely bringing that hammock to Hawaii.

And since then there was a going away party, a campfire, I moved out, visited friends and family... like I said, keeping busy. I fly out tomorrow, it's coming up so fast!

Introduction

That first post was mostly a test, I'll try to fill in a little about me here.

Since 2007 I've been a programmer at Airtight Games in Redmond, WA. I was working on Dark Void, which is shaping up to be a fun game when it comes out early next year. The work was challenging and interesting, I liked my coworkers and my boss, and overall it was a good experience apart from working too many hours.

But now I'm moving on! I'm headed out to Kauai Bible College, in Kapaa, Hawaii, on the island of Kauai. I wanted to get away from things for a while so I could focus on God and study the Bible.

I've never visited Hawaii, and I don't know anyone who lives there, although I know a few people who come from Hawaii. Here's a few tidbits I've managed to gather:

• Kauai is the 4th largest Hawaiian island, and is inhabited by over 60,000 people.*
• Kauai is known for being laid back and having beautiful scenery. Many movies have done filming there, such as Jurassic Park.
• Kauai Bible College is affiliated with Calvary Chapel, and from what I hear has about 30 students.
• I'll be staying in tents.
• The meal plan provides 18 meals a week.
• They eat lots of spam in Hawaii.

My flight leaves on August 26th, and I'll be coming back for Christmas break on December 16th. I'll do my best to keep this blog updated consistently.

It's a Blog!

This is my blog. Here you can find updates about my adventures at Kauai Bible College in Hawaii. I'll also be posting about God and life and the Bible, and programming and video games, and whatever strikes my fancy.