Seed Faith

This past week I took my daughter to Oral Robert University to start her sophomore year. She skipped 11th and 12th grade and this spring and finished her freshman year at Wabonsee Community College. As a tranfer student she is going through the normal period of adjustment at ORU. Please pray for my daughter as she makes this huge transition. Below is her essay that she wrote to ORU for her application. I have to put it out here because it is an amazing story about my maternal Grandmother and her seed faith.

Essay By Miriam:

"Christianity is something that I have been a part of since before I can remember, and I know I have grown into a strong walk with God as a young person. I feel as if it is time to take off as a teen and start another chapter in my life and in my Christianity and mature into adult, a “whole person in spirit, mind, and body”. ORU can provide me with a Christian background in every area of learning, which is the most important attribute when I was choosing a college. I am ecstatic that ORU can be an opportunity for me to be with other Christians in every aspect of school.

I heard about Oral Roberts University from stories that my mom told me about her grandmother. Mary Schanely was my maternal great-grandmother. She was a widow who invested almost all of her tithes and offerings from the start of Oral Robert’s ministry until her death. She watched Oral Roberts on Television and loved the World Action singers. The Lawrence Welk Show and the Oral Roberts shows, especially the nighttime specials, were the staple television shows in my mother’s childhood home. My great-grandmother, Nanny, as she was called, used to give so much of her meager income to ORU; her children threaten to cut off her allowances. This did not stop her. Whenever she was given money for her birthday or holidays, she always sent the money to Oral Roberts Ministry. When her children tried to take her on vacation, the only place she wanted to visit was ORU. My great-uncle drove her there on several occasions. When she was in a nursing home, where she was eventually moved, the top of her television prominently displayed her replica of the praying hands. Her seed faith was planted deep. She longed for one of her children’s children to go to ORU. Unfortunately, not one grandchild made it to ORU. I was born two years after she passed away. She never saw her seed take root.

My mother loved her Nanny and always hoped that my brother and I would go to ORU. My brother graduated from Oral Roberts University in 2006. This university completely changed his life for the better. My brother, Bradley Matthew Sheehan, Jr., decided to go to ORU in 2002, after visiting countless schools and hating the idea of all of them. This was until he saw the campus at ORU and could feel in his heart that ORU was the best place to go.

After just a month or two, everyone could automatically see a difference in him. His Christian walk with God had become dramatically better. He told me that the chapels and dorm devotions really brought him closer to God. He recently started a mission organization (http://www.dominicrusso.org) with Dominic Russo, also a graduate of ORU. Dominic has been interviewed about the ministry on Richard Robert’s Television program, “Hour of Healing.” They have put together many evangelistic short term mission trips and have already traveled to three continents in the past three years sharing God with pastors, business leaders, children and mass crusades. This work was inspired by all the precepts that are taught at ORU. Millions of people have been saved because of the work of these two best friends that met at ORU.

This school can help me because my goal in life is to help orphans that do not have the power to help themselves in Russia. I learned about adoption in Russia, and about the fate of children born with Downs Syndrome, my first year of high school. I was sickened by the thought of the tragic things done to these poor babies. My heart became broken for the babies and children, and it made me want to go help them as soon as possible.

This is why I decided to finish high school early and get to college, so that I could get all the knowledge and degrees needed to help these kids. I will require at least a bachelor’s degree in Social Work to help me achieve my goals. I have looked at several colleges, and ORU is the one that is going to get me an education in being “whole person” in God that can help others. I would like to study abroad and make connections with missionaries, so that I can get involved right out of college.

I think I can help and be a part of the ministries that ORU provides to their students. I live to volunteer. I just spent this past summer in Beho, Belgium with Teen Mission International. In Belgium, we did puppet shows and skits for children. My team's main project was to waterproof cabins for a Child Evangelism Fellowship camp.

ORU can help to complete me as a young adult, so that I can be sent out into the world as an adult and start my life. The great things that I could learn at ORU are endless, and the experiences I could have would be invaluable to my growth as a whole Christian woman of God.

I am praying that the seed that my great-grandmother sowed will bring forth fruit and provision so that I can attend the only school I believe God wants me to attend, ORU. Thank you in advance for your support in helping me to achieve my goal of graduating from ORU."