Craig Miller--Program Team/Southwoods Office

This fall semester has seen a flurry of activities on Wheaton’s campus in the form of the HoneyRock Adventure Trips. During September and October, we took students waterskiing at the Rock River, whitewater kayaking up in Wausau, WI, canoeing and camping on the Mississippi River, and rock climbing at Devil’s Lake, WI.  Dan and I also led regular mountain biking trips on Wednesdays and Thursdays at a nearby forest preserve in Cook County.   Our purpose behind these trips is to provide students with a chance to have HoneyRock-type experiences, which reflect our core values of enthusiastic involvement, authentic community, purposeful challenge, and experience in nature. The shared experiences of overcoming challenge, whether running a rapid in a kayak, conquering a 60 ft. cliff, or making it through a formidable section of bike trail unscathed, create a common bond and sense of confidence that are what HoneyRock is all about.   But as I’ve lead these trips, I’ve come to see them more and more as unique opportunities to create space for reflection, another one of our core values.  I’ve found the time spent together in the vans back and forth from these adventures to be a great opportunity to get a window into what God is doing in the lives of students and to ask questions that will spur them to reflect on their relationship with Christ.   

One such conversation occurred recently as I was driving back to campus late one Saturday night.  I was chatting with the student riding “shotgun” and she was sharing a little of her background.  We got to talking about our families and I listened as this student shared some difficult things in her relationship with her parents.  When I suggested she should intentionally sit down with her parents and talk about some of these things, she paused hesitantly, but admitted that would probably be a good idea.  By the end of the conversation, she had decided on a creative plan to spend some time with her parents the next time she was home.

I'm always so grateful for the times when God grants me the chance to see how He uses my words to effect change in students' lives, though certainly not all of my conversations go that way.  But I'm reminded that the important thing is being faithful to speak the truth in love, whatever the outcome.  The Heavenly Father uses our words and our actions as seeds and He is the one who makes them grow.  In Colossians 4:6 we are encouraged to "let [our] conversation be full of grace, seasoned with salt."  Are we willing to be used by him and let our words be words of life to someone today?

  Pictured below are Wheaton College students participating in HoneyRock Fall Adventure Trips.