Hello y’all,
[I e-mailed this out to the ARC yahoo group, but decided to post it here as well 
this really is my first post on Arc Blogs *yay! I finally posted*, and yes, this italicized font with brackets is a formatting joke -hope you got it Daniel G. 
]
Congratulations to everyone that went to the Houston warm up and competed there. By going to these tournaments you are taking another step in the process of becoming a better communicator for the Lord. This was the first tournament for some ARCers, and for others it is one in a very long list of tournaments. : )
Congratulations to you all who competed in speeches. I know that you all put in a lot of time into your speeches. The awards ceremony was only a small reflection of the amount of work that a lot of you put into your speeches. ARCers placed in the semi-finals in seven out of the ten events. In four of the events we placed in the top eight. Overall, ARC placed in eight of the ten speech events. We did extremely well in comparison to our ‘standings’ at past tournaments.
Congratulations to the students that competed in debate at the tournament. Whether you broke or not, you are learning how to logically analyze and research arguments. Five ARC TP teams and two LD teams broke. It was very encouraging to hear about your many successes at the tournament.
For others of you, competition didn’t go your way; it often doesn’t. Part of what makes debate so difficult is accounting for the different teams, cases, and judges that will be thrown your way. My worldview teacher once told my worldview class about one of his college friends that used to say, “prior preparation prevents poor performance.” Then again, after you have put in all the time you can, and do your best in each round, you have to let the Lord control the variables. Its amazing to see how He works with them.
Amongst all the competition and tournaments I would like to reiterate what Shaney Lee shared with y’all at ARC at our last meeting; that is to put the Lord first. That means putting him above speech and debate. That means truly spending time with Him daily. If you have to spend less time preparing for a speech or preparing your affirmative evidence to spend time in the Word, so be it. At times, over the past few years, I’ve let school or speech and debate take the front seat, letting them run my life. As I think back on that time, I regret putting myself first. I was saying that I could do a better job running my life than the Lord could.
In the later half of 1st Samuel chapter, two, a from the prophet told Eli that that his family would no longer minister for Israel anymore because his sons had rebelled against Lord and not honored Him. It tells is in 1 Samuel 2:30b “Those who honor me I will honor, but those who despise me will be disdained.” The Lord says that those who honor Him, He will honor. Perhaps that means by speech awards, perhaps not. Perhaps it means by holding a prestigious public office later in life, perhaps not. Perhaps it means in this life, perhaps not. It will look different for each person, but it certainly means that He will reward you for honoring Him.
There was once a man named Eric Liddell. Eric loved competing in sports, rugby and track. He became such a great runner that he decided to compete in the Paris Olympics in the 100 meter race, his best event. Once he got to Paris he found out that the 100m race would be held on Sunday. Eric decided that because it was the Sabbath, he would not compete. He entered in another race a few months later, a 400m race. As he stood in the blocks, preparing to run, a friend gave him a sip of paper with the words “ He who honors me, I will honor.” Not only did he win that Olympic 400m race (which wasn’t his best event) but he broke the world record in the process.
On Friday evening as I congratulated one of the ARCers he encouraged me that it was the Lord who worked everything out. He told me that he couldn’t have broken or done well without the Lord’s help. As I sat there listening to him tell me of what the Lord did, I was so encouraged to hear how God is working and how ARC is responding. As you grow in your relationship with the Lord, you will also be able to explain your faith better in your Apologetics speeches too.
God bless!
In Christ, Ben Snodgrass
Here’s how we ranked at the tournament.
Apol: SF, SF, SF, 1st
DI: SF
Duo: SF, 5th
HI: SF
Imp: SF, SF, 8th
OO: SF, SF, SF
Per: 4th
TI: SF
LD: 8th, 4th
LD Speaker: 32nd, 28th
TP: DBO, DBO, 13th, 4th, 2nd
TP Speaker: 31st, 20th, 11th
IE Sweeps: 5th
