By Amy Huynh
For Capital Fellows Season 13, the end is very much in sight. Last week, we wrapped up our final classes, and this week, holding a final banquet with loved ones to commemorate our experiences this year. All these fanfare events, as expected during this pandemic season, will be modified to occur over Zoom instead of being in person.
Honestly, it has been hard and disappointing to finish our Fellows year this way. Instead of dining with and hugging the ones we’ve walked so closely with this past year, we have to settle for pressing “unmute” to laugh and share news with one another across a lagging computer screen. Almost none of us knew that the last time that we were all together at the church would be the last time that we were all together in Capital Fellows. Many of us have spent this past month and a half isolated from one another while neck-deep in job searches and future housing plans, feeling like we’ve been thrust into this next stage of uncertainty and transition much sooner than expected.
The grief and heartache are real.
Yet, there have been great blessings and praises during this time as well. This season of isolation has led to greater bonding within our respective host families and home families who have so generously provided for us. My own host family’s graciousness in taking me under their wing has brought more joy and tenderness than I could have imagined. Not only that, but between Roundtable, classes, prayer calls, check-ins, and Corona-Free-Zone calls, I often get to see my Fellows even more frequently during the week via Zoom now than I did before isolation! Within that online time, we’ve laughed until we cried, played horribly competitive games, shared our hearts with great vulnerability, and prayed together. Community lives on despite so much of our normal everyday experiences shutting down.
These touching experiences, enveloped with love and hope, have helped point me in an otherwise dark and heavy time toward the ultimate source of love and hope that we have in Christ. In our group discussions and in our own personal lives, we’ve had to wrestle with questions concerning how to live in the midst of this looming uncertainty regarding future jobs, housing plans, health, finances, and COVID-19. We, along with the rest of the world, are facing the reality that nothing and no one of this world can give us the answers and security that we so desperately desire. It is a daily battle to let go of our own worldly methods of gaining control and trust the One who offers us peace and rest even in the most stressful situations.
Now, more than ever, we need the shared laughter with others to remind us that though isolated, our hearts are connected, though the sufferings of the world are heart-wrenching, our God is mightier, and though darkness is present, our shared hope is radiant.
During the National Fellows Conference this past weekend, we were left with a final charge that included “longing for holiness and the One who created us.” My prayer is that this season of pressing uncertainty in so many different directions would lead us to greater desire to bask in God’s steadfast love and holiness, allowing His grace to cast out all our fears with light. That we would press forth one day at a time and like the Son in the face of ultimate discomfort and suffering, finish strong and cry out with full confidence in a God who hears and who has good and holy plans for each one of us.
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:11-13
Pictures from the Week
The girls have been gathering with our very beloved assistant director, Lauren Stephens. Here she is sending us off with a reading of Don’t Forget to Remember by Ellie Holcomb!
A throwback to much missed shenanigans, mayhem, and joy during our winter retreat
Another throwback to my days working in the MPC office and seeing amazing artwork that our children drew on letters that they wrote to their future selves
Benefits of The Fellows Initiative
You probably already know that Capital Fellows is one of 31 fellows programs in The Fellows Initiative network. But, did you know that the sponsors of TFI offer great benefits to Capital Fellows alumni? For example, Reformed Theological Seminary offers a 33% tuition discount for 5 years, and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary offers a 40% tuition discount! You can learn more about TFI's sponsors by clicking here.
If you know of a graduate school, seminary, employer, or other organization that would be interested in becoming a sponsor, please contact TFI by clicking here. Thanks!
Want To Read More?
Signup for the Capital Fellows blog email! Emails are sent weekly during the program year. An unsubscribe link is provided in every email.