Tell us a bit about yourself
Hey y’all! I’m Caleb, a to-be 4th year studying computer science at UofT hoping to get into computer graphics. Music and sports are one of my favorite ways to rest and recharge. I love pretty much every sport out there (except baseball) and my music taste has been roasted too many times so I’ll just leave that to your imagination. This summer I have been working at code ninja where I get to teach kids how to code.
Did you have any frustrations in your missional journey recently? How did you find hope in the midst of it?
I think one area that didn't go as planned would be my job. My last job was remote work and all my co-workers were much older than me. I didn't really get any opportunity to get to know them let alone share my faith and so I was excited for a change this summer. At my work there is a camp running on weekdays where 3 ~ 4 teachers lead a class of about 10 ~ 20 kids. I thought it would be a great opportunity to use my love for coding and also build strong friendships with people that I work with. But on my first day I found out I would be teaching private lessons where I would be the only teacher with 1 or 2 kids and the last month I would be at an entirely different location teaching on my own. It was frustrating to not be able to use this job as an opportunity to share the gospel in the way I wanted. I find hope in knowing God can work in any circumstance to make his name known and is in control of it all. I work with the confidence that I can serve God with my heart no matter what work I do or where I do it and take any opportunity I get to reflect Christ to others, with the knowledge that as I inevitably fail to live up to Christ's example his mercy is greater than any of my failures.
How have you seen God at work this summer in your life / community / this world?
I've seen God working in the lives of my friends this summer. I have a close group of friends from high school that I keep in touch with and it's been hard to share much about my faith since none are really religious and our friendship was very surface level during high school. Over the past few years we've gotten much closer and I've seen them open up more, ask questions about my faith and p2c. This summer we even got to talk about life, death, and regrets and I was able to share my perspective as a Christian. One of them who's grown up christian that I've invited to church many times finally came out and is looking to start coming regularly. He even expressed interest in preparing for baptism where I can walk alongside him in clearly sharing the gospel and what life looks like with Christ. It has just been a huge answer to prayer and amazing joy seeing God working so powerfully in my friends' lives.
What are you hopeful for moving forward?
There's a lot that I am still wrestling with now and I've had many moments that brought sadness, frustration, anger, or just a feeling of impossibility this past year and yet I look back and all I see is God's faithfulness in my blindness to the great plan he had for me. With each trial, God has given me a stronger and stronger trust in him so as I look forward I am just so hopeful in God's magnificent work that I will get to witness and see knowing he is worthy and deserving of our trust and reliance on him.
