The Value of the Seed

During the second week in December, the interns visited Heartbeat International, a non-profit organization whose mission is to Reach and Rescue as many lives as possible, around the world, through an effective network of pregnancy help ministries that Renew their communities for life.

Here's the amazing reflection of one of the interns:

Visiting to ‘Heart beat’ totally changed my thought about abortion. I used to support abortion because I thought that it is better for both mom and her baby to avoid all the difficulties which they will face to in unsupportive situation before her baby is born. Even when I watched the TV show which talks about teenager’s mom and her struggling life to support her baby alone, I did not think her choice was good to her and her baby. 

However, after I visited to ‘Heart beat’, I realized that my opinion of abortion came from self-centered and denying God’s control. I memorized a lot the verse of Luke 9:23; ‘whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.’ God helped me to find myself who still try to control my life through this visiting. I and all of us don’t know whom this baby becomes in the future like the video. 

Let me tell my story here, I was grown up with the dysfunctional family and that family background all the time bothered me. I used to complain a lot to God that why God put me in this family not in happy family. In order to hide my unhappy family situation, I tried to study hard in school and I felt happy when I got higher grade than friends who seemed to have good family background. 

Whenever I feel depressed with the idea that I would live like my parents in the future, I am encouraged by reminding of the verse 2 Corinthians 5:17; ‘if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come; The old has gone, the new is here.’ And that is really true because that hurting memory becomes the precious resource for me to comfort and more understand friends and kids who are now sad with their family situation. 

God keeps transforming me and my life and now I believe that God will transform my parents and my family. From now on, I also trust God’s plan on the babies who are born with unsupportive family like He has done for me. I really thank God for giving me an opportunity to visit to ‘Heart beat’ and change my thought about abortion. 

My first INK Conference 2013

Before actually going to INK 2013 Conference, I was helping the INK Committee to design/create the handbook which we used at the conference for this year. I knew there would be tight schedule, interesting seminars, and a lot of international friends, however I did not know what exactly it would be until I was there.

During the one-week conference, we had one plenary session in the morning and one in the evening, and the topics were more profound. In the afternoon, we had two workshops, for each one we were able to choose one topic that interests us the most among the three. There was a variety of topics, including Reentry Transition, Memorize Scripture, Values of Kings, Reaching Different Nations for Christ, etc. I really enjoyed the workshops in the afternoon, which I found very applicable and interesting. Especially the Topic "Beyond a Gift and a Goodbye Party: TIPS on Effective Reentry Transition" that Lisa Espineli Chinn discussed, which was very helpful information for international students who are or will be going though the transition. There were so many other wonderful workshops and seminars which focus on different aspects.


Other than that, we had Talent Show on the last night before we left which was amazing. To sum up, I felt delighted and blessed during the conference, not only because I've learned so much from the speakers, the workshops but also I've seen and heard so many beautiful and amazing testimonies from God's children who come from all over the world. The stories and messages we shared really made me realize how great our Lord is that he has done so many miracles in our lives.

Here's some pictures taken from the conference.

Welcome table in Ohio Union

On Jan. 2nd & 3rd, we set up a welcome table in Ohio Union to welcome new coming students.
I was there on Jan. 3rd with Jay, Lexie and Yan. At first, we were shy.......Every time when we say Hello without saying more, people just left...All right, we finally decided to step out of our comfort zone so we really MET students instead of just SAW them.

Interestingly, we met more Malaysians than Chinese..
Also, we also got some help from a student whom we shared with. He was helping us send out the booklets...


The picture was taken on Jan. 2nd. It was Estera, Francisco, Chloe and Yan who were volunteering~

Making pies for homeless on Thanksgiving

The following happened on Wednesday Nov. 27th.

Ellen (Phil's wife) invited us to make pies for homeless on the day before Thanksgiving.

Personally, it was my first time to make pies and I was very excited!

People started having fun...

   Easy to mess up TBSP (Tablespoon) and TSP (Teaspoon) at first...

 Cute chefs with cute Aprons:)

 Mixing the ingredients of Pecan pie

Put it into the pre-made crust

 Oven time...~~~

 Let's cool the pumpkin down 

 Ready to have the first bite ;)

 Phil couldn't wait..

 Can we win the photo contest????

Hope that the homeless will enjoy their desserts.

It is very fun to serve the poor :)

-- End --

Xiaoxi - A hint from God

This is a summary that Xiaoxi (China) shared with the IFI staff during our Tuesday staff meeting:

I was enrolled in IFI internship program and worked on a data analysis project for two months. Two-month is not a long period, but I learned a lot and got well trained in both technical field and spiritual field.

This internship program is divided into three parts: technical work, spiritual formation and campus ministry. 

For the technical training part, we have a WAM House Character Formation, which mainly talks about the important characters at work, like the motives to achieve success, and influence to friends and colleagues. In the WAM House, they will also invite some successful men in both academic and business area, like dean from college or CEO from a company. They would like to share their amazing experience and give many precious tips to us. 

For the spiritual part, we have participated in some lectures given from IFI volunteers. For now, we are learning prayer listening with Karen Oliver. She guides us how to purify the noise apart from God, and encourages us by providing solutions when sometimes we did not get an answer from God. Another interesting training is the Ministry part. There is a WAM House Service Learning Project. Being an intern, we have a chance to get a vision for serving the poor, the homeless, children and immigrants who need help, just like the discipline from Bible. 

Besides those trainings, we also involve in some arrangement for lunch or dinner with IFI volunteers. They shared their stories and how did they approach to God and became a Christian. So it is very encouraging with lots of fun.

My data analyst project is focusing on the IFI temporary housing volunteer survey. Leila, as my mentor, helped a lot during this process. First we learned exactly how it works through VerticalResponse, which is the main tool we used for the survey investigation. Over 50% volunteers responded to this survey, thus we got a clear picture about the profile of our volunteers and collected lots of useful information and suggestions. Using this information, we got an idea about what is to be improved and how to serve the internationals better in the future.

Here I also want to share one amazing thing happened to me when I look for a job. At the first several months I worked so hard to apply for the job, but I got little response. Then at one Bible study night, I was having dinner at IFI, and there was a guy sitting in front of me. So we start talking. Then to my surprise, he told me that he was working at Alliance Data, which is exactly the one I was waiting for the news from HR. And he agrees to refer me to his manager. At that moment, I looked at him as an angle sent from God. When I look back now, I believe that is a hint from God and He has made the best choice for me.

Now I have to finish my internship at IFI, but I treasure this period I spent with all of the volunteers and interns, and I will apply the knowledge I learned at IFI to my job and life in the future.

International Amity(which means friendship) ;)

In September, I joined International Friendship, this big family as an
analyst intern!
This is my first time working in the United States so I was so excited 
about it~
It is a privilege to serve the Lord with other brothers and sisters : )
I was also amazed by the spiritual training IFI provided. It helped me
 grow a lot.

Some changes (Spiritually):
1. After the prayer meeting with Karen, I bought a One Year Bible and
 decided to have a quiet time every morning and meditate on the Word.

2. I have more understanding of the significance of prayers. I also 
joined a prayer concert in Xenos with my home church leaders to ask
 for people to pray for our home church.

3. I have more boldness to share with other people about Jesus' love.

4. I learned servant leadership. It is about serving people, just like 
how Jesus humbled himself, be humiliated, died on the cross to cover 
humans' sin. When he was in the world, he served lots of people!

5. Be gradually transformed into Christlikeness through training.

Also, I have the chance to hear other interns' stories. It was encouraging 
to me because I recognized that we are the body of Christ. We share the 
joy and the suffering together. It is not only me who face the persecution 
but lots of other Christians are fighting the spiritual battle as well.

Okay, let's have some fun discovering about this intern program

Intern Lunch with an IFI staff

 We are at Cheryl's house.

Participants: Cheryl, Estera, Tyche, Yan, 
Pyung On, and Amity.

We are at Bruce's house.

Participants: Bruce, Alice, Tyche,  Pyung On, 
Alyssa and Amity.

We are at Guy's house.

Participants: Guy, Kathy, Tyche,  Pyung On, Chloe, 

Halley, Estera, Francisco, Lexie and Amity.

We enjoy their stories: how they became Christians, how they got 

involved with IFI, how they met their significant others. Since the interns 

are all girls, we showed special interests on their love stories. ><

WAM HOUSE - Amish County

 The church we stayed for a night. 

 We are visiting LaRed. Dawn is speaking. 

We got a booklet about leadership.

 We are playing Apple-to-apple.

We are sightseeing on Saturday afternoon.

We are at Morning Star Fiber, visiting a firm 

making yarn.

 We are at Coblentz Chocolates. 
(I am not sure whether it is this name..)

We got some free chocolates :)

Intern Evaluation

 We are doing some fun team building activities 
suggested by Phil.

 We are at Bibibop Asian Grill. 
It was our first time to try :)

MasterLife 3

Let's remember this cute little picture and prepare 
ourselves for spiritual battle by putting on 
the armor of God~

IFI Christmas Card Making Party

Be prepared for Christmas *.*So excited about making 
lots of different creative cards:)

Thanks Kathy for organizing this!

More posts coming............

By the way, my name is Amity. In less than a month, I will graduate 
with my Bachelor degree in Mathematics and then start my one year 
internship with IFI. I will travel around the United States 
with my family. Hooray~~~

Two months of IFI Internship experience - Xiaoxi from China :)

This is a note from Xiaoxi (China) who will finish the IFI Internship at the end of November 2013.

IFI Booth at OSU Student Involvement Fair, August 2013

In the first month of this semester, there is a welcome event on campus. IFI being one of Christianity organization joined in this event, introduced the normal activity every year to internationals and invited them writing any comments on the white board. It was a lot of fun!

IFI Pumpkin Carving Contest, October 2013

As was hosted every year, there was a Pumpkin Carve activity in one of the Friday bible study evening before Halloween eve. Isaac and Sam’s  work won the first prize—a special cake! Every students enjoyed in their creation.

IFI Trip to Hocking Hills, October 2013

About a hundred students and most of the interns went to the Hawkins Hill when the autumn came. It was a good opportunity to respect how amazing the nature is , as well as a good exercise to climbing.

IFI Staff & Interns Dinner, Wood Table brought from the Philippines 

On Nov.7 all the interns got a chance to have dinner with Guy and Kathy in their house. We had a special taco dinner and homemade apple pie as dessert. Guy and Kathy shared their experience in Philippine and showed us the ancient furniture they brought from Philippine.