Moody Bible Institute

I have had a lot of people ask me how my schooling works over the past year. So, I thought this would be a good way to explain to everyone exactly how online classes work. Every day that I am going to work on school I log onto a website connected with Moody. When I'm there I can see all the classes that I am enrolled in. Once I can see them I click on one of the classes and then it's broken up into each week. I basically just work week to week and complete all the assignments that are in that weeks folder. I have really loved it so far. I feel like the time I am working on the class is very valuable. I haven't really felt that prior to this. Before I felt like about at least 50% of my time was just wasted, so this is a nice change of pace. I don't spend the same amount of time working as I did before, but the times that I am working is extremely intense. It's nice to not have an exact time limit on the work, it can be so intense that I need a few breaks in the middle.
My way of getting into Moody can only be described as a God thing. I had switched my major and minor so many times and still didn't feel like I was in the right place. After some searching I had found Moody and applied. I new it was a crazy good and intense school just by the application. So many essay question, I had to have my preacher fill out a few questions about my faith, and I had to fill out questions and make them extremely detailed. My school year at William Penn was ending and I needed to have my future plans figured out, so two week after I sent my application in... I still had nothing. I would constantly be looking in the mail day after day with nothing addressed to me. I finally had made the decision that if i didn't get accepted that was God's way of telling me I needed to stick it out at William Penn, and if I did get accepted that was God's way of telling me Moody and a career in the ministry was my path. I tend to be a control freak, so having this situation completely out of my control was stressful, but after a few days I finally got that envelope addressed to me with Moody Bible Institute as the return address. I opened it and it read Congratulations  Mr. Cody DeZwarte. To quote the great Paul Harvey "Now you know the rest of the story"

How did I get here?

Something I wrote in my first post was that I hoped to work in a church full-time one day, and right now I work in a church part-time. So I thought I would give you an insight of exactly what I do around Central Reformed Church and answer the question I constantly ask myself- how is the world did I get the honor of doing what I do? This past January I got the honor of getting paid to do something that I loved, and had been involved in since about 7th Grade. I still remember helping the sound guy at the children's Christmas program. My job- running the CD player. That's right, I was in charge of the fast forward, rewind, open and close, and pause buttons.  That was my start, something that was so simple, yet it gave me the feeling for helping do something that was bigger than me. At that time I would have never guessed that A. I would be going into the ministry and B. I would become the Technology Director nearly 8 years later! Craziness, I know. From the first time I pushed that play button  to now I can honestly say I still love it. I loved volunteering and creating an awesome Godly worship experience all of those years, and I still love all the additional responsibilities I got with this job. We have some amazing people who take their responsibilities very seriously knowing that they are doing their work for God and there is no way I could ever thank them for everything they do. It can be hard to remember that all of this is for the glory of God. When things get busy and there is a million things going on around the church I have found it extremely important for me to take a timeout and realize- it's all for God and his glory. It's about how  awesome a logo may be or how cool a certain effect was on a video or even how great the praise team sounded on a Sunday morning. It's about making a Godly atmosphere for the congregation or the people who will see the things we are doing, and there is no greater satisfaction for me than when everything comes together I see what God is doing in our church at that very moment. In fact, as I write this I can't help but to think what it would be like if we just showed up to make church a production. We would lose so much the congregation would lose so much. That is something that I have learned a lot about over the years, because a church without a God center isn't really a church at all.

majors and colleges and switches, oh my

As I sit here trying to decide what to write in my first post I feel as though I have a ton I could write, but where to start? I guess I will start with this- the purpose of this blog is to hopefully inform you on the life of a small town Iowa guy going into the ministry. I'm currently taking online classes at Moody Bible Institute and I absolutely love every minute of it. It's funny how God brought me to where I am at now. Growing up, and even through my senior year of high school, I was always one of those kids that said he would never ever switch majors and especially never switch colleges. I wanted to get in and get out as fast as possible, but God had very different plans for me. I went from a PE major to a business major to a business major with a religion minor then back to a PE major and a religion minor- that was almost painful to write- it took me back to the days when I was going between two advisors and two completely separate class schedules. Can you say STRESSFUL???? The funny thing is God still had different plans, because after all of my searching for the major that I wanted with the minor I wanted I could tell God wanted more of me. That's when I did a little internet searching and found Moody. It clicked right away- that is what God was calling me to do. Waiting for my official acceptance letter was even more stressful that anything else I had gone through that year. Finally after about two weeks of running out to the mailbox everyday hoping to finally see that envelope addressed to me and not the ones with the low rate credit cards, it came. The rest is obviously history, I was accepted and finally felt relieved that I was doing exactly what God was calling me to do. That is such a great feeling. I think I told everyone I know how I had finally felt in the right place with the right major and more importantly how honored I was that God was calling me so strongly to do his work. I had felt the tug on my heart to go into the ministry about as far back as I can remember. I just always shoved it in the back of my head thinking God would never call me to do his work. I type that with a smile on my face because not only am I going to school with the hopes of one day working in a church full-time, I already work at one part-time. It's like God new what he was doing all along- crazy concept, right?