Hi friends, my name is Luke Aminuddin (Ah-ME-new-din). As I write to you now, I am currently in a Starbucks less than a mile from Church of the Apostles–host church of the Raleigh Fellows—where I am working on some assignments for my fellows course curriculum. Straight up, it has been a whirlwind of a month here in Raleigh. It hasn’t been easy to focus and devote time and energy to the fellows courses in the midst of massive life change in my post-undergraduate career. But, by far, my experience as a fellow to this point is highlighted by the class sessions. Every book we’ve read in preparation of this fellows year and the class sessions I’ve experienced have been extremely thought-provoking and spiritually fruitful. I grew up in the church, led middle student ministries in other organizations preceding fellows, and I always sought fellowship and others who could teach me more about God in the context my faith. But I’ve learned so much more than I could imagine about myself, God, my relationship with God, my place as a young man in the church community, and new ways in which I can approach my faith. With all that said, know one thing: being Christian is not easy and takes constant work, but we live on this earth to work for the Lord—so delight in the work you have now because we don’t know what God has planned for us. For some, the summer reading books and the classwork are “chores” or busy work that gets in the way of other responsibilities as a fellow. My perspective is that God wants us to work hard to better ourselves as living vessels of Him so we can use the gifts He’s given us to bless the world and live in the way of Christ. Always seek to learn and pursue ways to strengthen your arsenal of knowledge.

I’ll end by briefly mentioning two other things that have been momentous thus far. Foremost, I feel blessed that my work as a reading tutor with my student through Neighbor-to-Neighbor (N2N) has immediately led to fruit. I am extremely grateful that God has lit a fire in my student to want to learn and to love learning. In fact, his mother told me a few weeks ago that the tutoring sessions has not only allowed my student to maintain pace with his primary school education, but that he is actually flourishing and excelling in his coursework. I thank God for putting him and I together as mentor and mentee, and that God will continue to bless our future sessions. Finally, I want to express my overwhelming gratefulness for God’s hand in securing my job placement for the year. It was a long, arduous process, but I finally started a position (two Thursdays ago) at Wells Fargo as an administrative assistant for a private wealth management group. I did not expect to work in finance (given my politics degree) but I feel extremely blessed that God has given me an opportunity that allows me to learn more about wealth and income management. Most fellows don’t go through such an extensive onboarding process for a nine-month internship, and it was not easy to wait for things to move along. But I think I am in a place where I can truly prove my God-given skills in writing, research, data analysis, collaborative group thinking, and presence in public forums. I pray that God continues to be with me as I continue on in this position.

Cheers, and happy October!

Many blessings,

Luke Aminuddin