Tonight ends one of the best days in a long time.

Today Manhattan was completely covered by a thick sheet of ice. Almost the entire city's electric went out for most of the day, starting last night. Mine went out this morning. People were without lights and heat, almost all the stores were shut down, the school was closed, and tree limbs were crashing down everywhere.

But, it was one of the best days in a long time.

Why? Because I am surrounded by a bunch of people who truly live the Acts 2 model - they take every chance to be together and take care of one another. This morning after my power went out, I bundled up, de-iced my car, and slip-slided over to our campus ministry student center to assess the damage. About five or six students had already gathered there. The power was out there, but we figured out that the house where three of our guys live has a gas oven and stove, so we piled in each others cars and slip-slided a couple of blocks over and joined them in the making of pizza and brownies. From there the crowd kept growing and the festivities became all the more merrier. After several hours of food and games we learned that our student center had power again so we slip-slided back over there and resumed the party. By this time a text message had gone out to everyone and their dog and the student center became a madhouse of board games, video games, movies, communal food cooking, studying, and hard-core Monopoly. (I dominated, of course, after 7 hours.)

But, amidst all the merriment was the common theme of people helping people. Texts popping up on phones of students with power offering beds to those without. People donating tons of their own food to feed the crowds. Students hooking up portable heaters to un-freeze others' cars. People ganging up to free lightweight rear-wheel drive pickups stuck in the ice. What occurred today is almost exactly how I picture the gatherings of the first Christian believers described in Acts 2. It's a wonderful sight. Everyone should have a community of people like this in their lives. I don't know how people exist without it.