A Case of the Mondays

The Fellows Program is an explosion of activity. Most of us are fresh out of a college, just off our 12-hour weeks and 12:30 classes. Now we are reading books and writing papers in graduate school one day, answering calls from angry constituents or creating spreadsheets on Capitol Hill another, and trying to lead a group of boisterous 6th graders or melodramatic seniors the next. The sheer volume and variety of experiences is part of what makes the Fellows program so challenging and rewarding. From Sunday to Saturday, we never stop living and learning, sharing it all with the 12 friends at our side. Yet, while all these things are a piece of the program, they are not its essence; Monday is.

Every Monday morning we get up early. The guys and girls meet separately for breakfast and accountability. Here we hold each other to higher standards we profess and lift each other up towards the Lord in any and every area of life. Then, we head to class for three hours in the morning. During the first semester, the Rev. Dr. Art Lindsley firmly planted our feet in the foundations of our faith. During this second semester, Dr. Steve Garber challenges us to decompartmentalize our lives, to connect what we know and believe to how we actually live every day, and to see in all things what is good and true and beautiful. At night we come together as whole group over a meal to join in fellowship, worship, and discussion, growing as a family in our journey to follow Christ in a broken world.

Monday is about accountability, coherency, and community. Monday is the Fellows Program; everything else is practice. And it is all the Mondays which I will take with me for the rest of my life, no longer just a wide-eyed college student but much more of a mature and complete man of God. Yes, I will always remember and treasure my time on Monday, because life is full of Tuesday-through-Sundays.