Doing something awesome

One day of our mission trip we went to a place that works with the men of the community to rehabilitate homes while training the men with new work skills.
I was very impressed with the organization.
When we arrived the pastor say us down and played a video for us called Pep Talk by Kid President.

Maybe you've heard of Kid President, but I had not.
I enjoyed the video a lot.
You can watch it here if you like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-gQLqv9f4o

My favorite part in the video is when Kid President reads a line from Robert Frost's poem titled The Road Not Taken.
Kid President says, "two roads diverged in the woods and I took the road less traveled...And it hurt man! Really bad! Rocks!, Thorns, glass.....Not cool Robert Frost!

I watched that and I laughed. That line sums up my experience in this life.
It sums up 11 years of working with homelessness, the mission trip...A lot of my experience as a follower of Christ.

Philippians 2:12 is says "work out your salvation with fear and trembling,
It is work.
It's hard hard work. It takes a lot of uncomfortableness. It takes enormous patience.
It's clear why we don't like to do it.
It's no fun.

To make real change to have people really notice a difference in us the difference that Jesus talks about the kind that got him killed and his followers tortured that kinda difference takes enormous effort.

Diligence. Day in and day out focused attention.
Instead we settle for what the world tells us is acceptable.

We buy into the lie that it should be easy or at least not too hard.
If it's uncomfortable if it's causing us stress or taking too much time then we are told we should reconsider.

But, people are dying and going to hell.
People are suffering.
Hungry and sick.

I know I need to wake up.
I know I need to get on my knees before God and get out there and serve.
I know it's going to be hard too.
I think even harder than I care to admit.

In fact, Jesus showed us just how hard it is. Unto death kinda hard.
He even says this,
Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

That sounds hard.

We hold the weighty responsibility of doing something awesome.
Not just because but because there is a God.
A God who loves us and compels us to love each other.

Let's love enough to do something hard,
something uncomfortable,
something truly awesome.

Grace

I've been working with homeless persons for 11 years now.
Every winter for about 6 months I see what it's like to work with those in need to work with the church, and depend on God.
It's opened my eyes a lot.
I've been yanked and stretched.
I've been uncomfortable.
The whole experience has made me ask hard questions.

I would say it's been the best thing to happen to me.
I've grown closer to God and have learned more about love, trust and Jesus.

One thing though that has nearly crippled me is our talk as a church about serving Jesus, and transformation in Jesus, but seeing very little of it actually happen.
In my own life I see the gulf between my faith and my actions.
I'm just really content to live for my own comfort.

I've gone through a lot of anger the past 2 years.
It's really frightened me.
I haven't felt full of faith, strong and sure.
Instead, I've been afraid, full of doubt, unsure, and weak.
It wasn't always that way, so I've been scared of what that means.
Is God still there?
Does He still listen?
Has my love turned cold?
Will He use me anymore or am I shriveled dead fruit?

I never gave up though on God. When it comes right down to it,for me there's just no other answer to life other than Him. I know who I was before and what I experienced when I gave my life to Him and there's just no denying that something happened. So I believe. No matter what, I believe.

But the struggles and questions persist.

In 2 Corinthians, Paul was struggling,and he asked God to take away the thing causing his struggle and God said to him "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

I've come to the conclusion that God really means it when He says "My grace is sufficient".

He's not taking away my struggles they are part of who I am. I can beat myself up about it. I can rant at the world. I can run and hide.

I mentioned in the post before this that I was part of an all girls week of camp.
The whole week was about coming out of our hiding and being real with ourselves, God and others.
God showed me a lot through that experience.
So, here I am.
I have lots of questions, and I don't understand much. I'm even still angry sometimes :)

But, I'm stepping out from my hiding place with all my flaws and falling on His grace for I know that it's sufficient.

Backing up before going forward

In order to make sense of everything I've learned in these last 2 weeks I have to look back to all girls week at Wolverine Christian Service Camp. 
There was a lot of planning and preparation that went into that week of camp.
Creating something that will impact others forces you to look at yourself to see things differently and make sense of your personal story.
The camp theme this year was step up! Be the change
Our week focused on stepping up to ourselves and coming out of hiding. Like hiding from our pain hiding from God and others.
We wanted to inspire them to  step up to being loved by God loving each other and doing good.
I know I learned much about myself.
I hope the girls learned a lot too.
Throughout the week the girls were encouraged to use a canvas that hung on the wall to write down the things that they learned or things that inspired them. 
It was a great assessment tool.
By the end of the week it was filled with prayers and glimpses of the impact the lessons had on them.
We had small groups where the girls could really open up. It was at these times many of the girls just really let themselves be real and honest. 
It was beautiful.
Hopefully, the girls will remember that week. Hopefully, they will remember that God loves us so incredibly much just as we are that we can start now to step up and make a change in our lives.
I know I will remember.

The last day. Charleston, WV Mission Trip

Today's theme: Empowered
Devotions.
This morning we asked ourselves questions about how this mission trip has empowered us or not empowered us.
It seems that our students really have been empowered this week by all their experiences.
The last question to consider is How is God empowering me to go back to my community and make a difference?

Work Sites:
My group headed over to West Charleston where Daniel Boone's Cave is and Booker T. Washington lived.
The community there is tight knit. We spent the morning listening and working alongside and older gentleman who just loves the people around there. He's just full of life and energy. He was inspiring. 
He works for an elderly home called Good Living. 
It's a beautiful big home where elderly reside and are cared for by live in staff.
It's really amazing.
Our job for today was actually to go help a 90 something retired High School teacher that lived nearby.
We cut down an enormous hedge for her.
Then we crowded on her porch as she shared the story of how she came to possess Daniel Boone's powder horn.
Very cool! We all got to see it and hold it. 
Then we helped them with their doggie 4th July parade! That was a lot of fun.
Beautiful community with beautiful people.

Jonathon and Mike's group had a terrific time at a different nursing home. 
I share this because they really seemed to enjoy their time and are eager to continue once they get back home.
That's exciting!
All our students seem eager to continue serving and don't want to forget this.

Dinner:
Cook out with the community surrounding the church we are staying in. 
Great food and a good time.
One thing that stood out to ya from this weeks club talks or Devo?
How will remember that help you later?

Worship:
Tonight was reflection on the week. 
Again we focused on how we are empowered.

Day 1: Desirable
Day 2: Broken
Day 3: Pursuit
Day 4: Restore
Day 5: Empower

We read John 13
Serve one another. Serve to the point of stretching personal space. To the point of death even as Jesus did.
Lord make me a servant. Humble and loving. Love and be loved.
Help me be obedient.
What does community look like?
How do we do this at home? How do we continue this?

We ended the service time by the YouthWorks staff washing the feet of all us youth leaders!
This was my first foot washing. It was weird and beautiful!
Then we turned and washed the feet of our students.
I washed Megan's and Raychel's feet and prayed over them.
What a beautiful time!
It was awesome to see my husband wash the boys feet and pray over them!

It's been an annoying, tiring, amazing, hard, encouraging, beautiful, week. 
This is so needed in our own community. 
We need to continue this. I am convinced that this is how we get to know Jesus.
We read what He says and does and then do it!
How else can we be like Him? 
How else can we know Him more?
Lord, come and change us forevermore.
Amen.

Goodnight!

Day 4 Charleston, WV Mission Trip

Devotions:

Today's theme was Restore.

Definition:

Verb
Bring back; reinstate.
Return (someone or something) to a former condition, place, or position.

Is there restoration happening here in the work we are doing? In us? In the church as a whole?
Show me I prayed before we headed off.
There's still too much of a sense that this is supposed to be fun all the time. 

We need to connect Jesus to our daily lives.

Work Sties:

Came to hope community development corporation.
Sat through a long orientation. Waited forever to do anything. It's hard to wait because we are so tired. It makes us sleepy.
Hope is a community restoration project. They go in to run down neighborhoods and renovate. They take men from the community and train them to do the renovating. It's pretty awesome.

We headed over to their warehouse. We didn't get to do any renovation. They had us sort and clean their inventory of household items. Very dusty! With my allergy to dust I needed a mask. They went and got all of us masks.
That was some of the most miserable work! I thought I would die from heat exhaustion!

We finished everything they had for us to do and they were very grateful. 

The place will be used as a free exercise facility for youth and senior citizens as well as a resource center.

Dinner 

Pizza!!
Then we were supposed to be able to go to a black baptist church. But that changed. We were actually all looking forward to it. :(

We ended going into town to see fireworks. What a terribly confusing trip! And so many people! It was too nerve racking for me trying to keep track of all our students. 

I felt like a sheep herder :)

Worship
The prodigal son
My thoughts so far from all this week leading up to this day's theme are:
Have we missed something? Do we need to restore our relationship to God?

So many of the youth seem so disconnected from what we are trying to do (not so much our youth group. Just youth I've observed in general here).

Many of the youth leaders talk about decreasing youth groups and low attendance at their churches.

I need to think on this some more and try to get my brain around it.

Church Time:

Our youth group seem to be "getting it" more and more. 

Their prayers and highlights from their days reflect some real thought going into what they are doing.

I'm encouraged overall by them. 

Tonight we talked about not forgetting this experience. 

All of them expressed their desire to continue to stretch, grow, and get involved in their community back home.

We need to encourage them.

This is an opportunity to step up and really follow through with these young people.

Lord, make us yours. Fully. Completely Yours.

Jesus finish this good work that has begun in us. Amen

Good night y'all!

Charleston WV, Mission Trip Day 3

Our devotion this morning focused on our value in Christ.

We had some questions to consider. One of them was What do you think of this mission trip so far?

I couldn't answer that yet. I'm still processing. There's a lot of things that I'm seeing about us as a church and God.

One thing I didn't expect on this trip is the clear division between what we say we want to do here and what we actually do. They want us to focus on being Christ's light and rightly so, but how that plays out gets kinda lost.

I'm hoping to see a difference in these last couple days as we talk to our group about this.

Some thoughts from this mornings devotions:

We need to acknowledge our brokenness. Accept it. Don't hide it. Don't rationalize it. Don't dwell on it. Yet don't forget it.
It is reality and God takes us right here in this broken state and wants us to be His. Take who we are face it and let God in to move and shine.
To accept our brokenness means we can accept others as broken.
Accept that God meets them right where they are too. He loves them and calls us to love them.
Jesus takes the brokenness and calls out to all of us "You are my beloved. Come to me."
Stop seeing each other and ourselves as unacceptable, unloved, undesirable, unclean etc...
Instead you are clean, desirable, accepted...yes even as you are broken.
Just as I have called you accepted, beloved, desirable so too are others around you.
Treat each other as such. Be loved, Love God, love others, do good. 

Work Site:
Finished our paint job for covenant house. The manager got us all frosties from Wendy's

Then we went and  hung out with the people at golden living nursing home.

I Met a very lovely woman who talked to me about her life. She has a lot of wisdom! I enjoyed my time with her.
Megan even came out of her shell a bit and painted a lady's nails. I was so proud of her!
High point was we had an opportunity to have a little more of a private shower experience.

Dinner:

After work sites and free time my group were on duty for dinner prep.

We talked to the rest of our church group to see how their day went.
Mikes eye is hurting.
Raychel feels a little sick.

Everyone was tired but had a good day.

Worship:

All of us youth leaders were part of a fashion show tonight at club.
We all wore youth enterprise t shirts. Check them out online. They're really cool t-shirts. I have several favs.

Heard a testimony from a youth works staff.
Talking about God's pursuit of us.
Allowing ourselves to be found. Seeing ourselves as valued and others as valued.
Question to think about fot the night is do you find it harder to ask Jesus to help you?
Or is it harder to believe others have value?

Many of our kids said it was harder to ask Jesus for help. 

Church Group Time:

Boys shared their excitement of working with the kids and their challenges.
Each of the kids had positive things to share about stretching themselves.
They have been open and encouraging to each other. It's really cool to see.
We ended in prayer with each one of then participating.
I really see God working a God work in them.
Lord, Jesus let us bear fruit that's pleasing to You. Amen
Goodnight

Charleston, WV Mission Trip Day 2: Work begins!

Just a little clarification as to why I felt like a bucket of cold water hit me when we arrived.
There's no privacy.
Sleeping area is on concrete floor (I do have an air mattress, but some do not).
Two bathrooms on our floor with about 35 ladies to share it with.
Showers are off site community showers with 45 minutes to shower, change, etc... with only 4 working showers. We will be in shifts of smaller groups, but...yeah not looking forward to that.
Breakfast is at 7AM sharp and bed time 11PM sharp. The bedtime is fine with me except our schedule is so packed it's hard to find anytime to just think!

So, this is indeed stepping out of your comfort zone! It should be an interesting week!
I do think that there's a gold mine of valuable lessons to be learned and I look forward to it.

Here's today's break down.

Breakfast:
Some of our youth group boys had to do breakfast prep at 6:45 AM.
They actually only had to prep for lunch since breakfast was just cereal today.
See my FB for pics.

Devotions:

As I mentioned I just finished a week of all girls camp.

Our theme this year was about coming out of hiding from God ourselves and other. It was a challenge to be loved by God, to love, and do good.
Devotions this morning were on Jeremiah 6:13-14
It seems like this week will be a reinforcement of girls week lessons.

Work Crews:
Covenant is an emergency day shelter, transitional housing and resource center
West Virginia is considered the Meth lab capital of the USA, so the poverty rate is high.
I really liked this place and wished I could spend all day just picking their brains. They had some real exciting programs for homeless men and women.
Our actual work for them ended up being painting at one of their housing units.
I didn't know ahead of time we were painting or I wouldn't have worn the shirt I did. Bummer, now I'm covered in paint.
Surprise after surprise.
Oh well.
We then headed to a nursing home, but we were late and they didn't seem to be prepared for us. 

We ended up playing Bingo with some of the residents.
I enjoyed laughing with the ladies at my table, but it was a slow afternoon and I am tired so it was a little hard.
Raychel and Megan sat with another group of ladies after Raychel and I painted their nails. When our time was done there we headed off to those awesome community showers around 3:00PM
That was not a highlight for me. Too many little unknown things. Too awkward for me.
I'm just too tired :(

Free Time:
This was great. I had a chance to just relax.
I just laid in my bed and edited this blog and checked facebook.

Dinner:
Yummy tonight!
We had Alfredo.
Only my group had dinner clean-up, so I didn't get seconds of the yummy food.
Clean up went fast.
Ashley and Jonathon had a surprise for Mike and I.
They got us very yummy cupcakes and everyone signed a card wishing us a happy anniversary.

Worship:
Sang my favorite song. How He Loves
Our youth group participated and shared with everyone highlights from their day.

Church Time:
This is the time we gather just with our own youth group and talk. Everyone had great things to share about their different work sites today.
Most of our youth worked with kids today.
Each of them had good things to say about their experience.
We closed in prayer and each one of them prayed aloud, which I know is a big step for some of them.
I'm proud of how open they have been.

Goodnight!