Passion Conference, Part 2

After lunch, we had our fourth session. I don’t remember exactly who led worship; I believe it was the Passion band. Beth Moore spoke on 1 Timothy 6:11-16, and focused on three words: Time, Fight, and Confession.

Matt Redman led worship for the fifth session! I was really excited to see him. Then Judah Smith spoke on 2 Corinthians 5:17-21, focusing on the transformation that occurs after we become a Christian. He was high energy and very funny!

After that, we had a longer break to go get some dinner. That proved to be more difficult than we expected! Just imagine 20,000 people trying to eat dinner within the same few blocks of town. The lines were insane, and some restaurants closed presumably because they ran out of food! I ended up eating at the hotel restaurant (expensive as it was) because the line was the shortest. By the time I got my food, it was time to start walking back to the conference center.

The last session was the crux of the event. We were grateful to get two full rows of seats quite close to the front.

The Passion band—with the addition of Kari Jobe and Matt Redman—led the worship. It was incredible! I am so excited for the CD to come out, so I can continue worshipping to the same songs!

Louie Giglio closed the conference by speaking on 3 common threads of those who’ve encountered God. They are stunned, seared, and sent. After such an incredible time of worship, refreshment, and discussion of justice, they did an excellent job of making it clear that we are SENT. We had just had a “mountaintop experience”, but it was now time to go and minister in the valley.

The conference ended around 10:30 p.m. that night. One of the leaders of our group had ordered pizza for everyone. We looked like a bunch of hobos at the hotel, sitting in the middle of the hallway, eating pizza without napkins or plates! J But we had so much fun. We talked, played the guitar, read Bibles, talked more, and just enjoyed our last evening together. Everyone started to trickle off to bed slowly. Eventually, I was one of four people left. We stayed up laughing and talking for quite awhile. Then we had the bright idea of going downstairs to the hotel restaurant and buying our breakfast now instead of fighting the lines early in the morning.

That will probably be the last time I go down to a hotel lobby at 2 a.m. I was thankful to have a guy with us three girls. Needless to say, we bought our bagels quickly and went back upstairs. I ended up going to bed around 3:30 a.m.

After a couple hours of sleep, I got up at 6:45 a.m. I showered, packed up my things, and headed down to the lobby with my roommates to meet everyone else.

We walked to the bus and pulled out around 8:30 a.m. On our way home, we stopped at the famed “Buc-cees” for a break. Then for lunch we stopped at the same area we had Friday.

Eating at Whataburger with some of my new friends!

We made it back to town around 3:00 p.m. It was good to be home! I had such an amazing time, and learned so much. I would highly recommend that every college student attend this amazing conference! I hope to go back again in the future!