Remember. Grieve. Celebrate.

A lot has happened in the past couple of months.

I'm sure you wish that some of them hadn't; and I bet that you cherish the memories of others. We've had a few of each of those as well. And, while I am grateful for each turn of events, at least one of them was not a welcome change in direction.

To begin there, about two weeks ago Kristin and I were in Weatherford visiting with our student leadership team at SWOSU. We were taking them through some training in planning for the semester, and not everyone was completely engaged in the process. We all seemed a bit worn out. During one of our breaks, around 5 p.m., one of the students received in a phone call the news that one of the students, James Hensley, had died in a traffic accident that afternoon. Nobody moved. Nobody spoke. It was all shock for about the next hour.

James Hensley was a student who had just begun to get involved with Campus Crusade this year, although he had been involved in the Baptist Collegiate Ministry, a Christian camp, and his church back home for many years previously. Although he had a few mild handicaps, he was a guy whom everyone on campus knew by virtue of his introducing himself and asking how he could pray for you. And then he would run off to someone else. Everyone, it seems, who knew James felt that he had challenged and shaped their life by his tireless friendliness and concern. At the campus-wide memorial service, a video memorial was shown in which there were pictures of James serving with and befriending all sorts of people and a short clip of James sharing about his relationship with God and the things he cared about. Hundreds and hundreds of students came to the memorial service. It was standing room only. And every single one heard and saw the life of Jesus and the glory of God standing in the ballroom at Southwestern Oklahoma State University.

The students are doing well now. They continue to remember, to grieve, and to celebrate. Of course, James wasn't perfect, and it's easy to forget that or feel bad about remembering it, but my prayer is that students would remember how the life of Jesus was remaking James into His image and would seek more passionately the same for themselves and others that don't yet know Jesus.