Isolation

It is about that time again. I love doing things where I do not know anyone else prior to a trip, event, etc. Part of the reason for this is because I love meeting new people and that awkward first meeting (that is why new students each week is perfect for me). This can be a really good thing, but I also have really negative reasons for my desire to go into something unknown. I have a fear of rejection that consists of assuming that people will reject me once they truly know me and begin to see my flaws. The Lord has been working hard on my heart over the last year and I know He does not want me to continue to flee. Still I am beginning to feel the temptation to flee from my staff who is beginning to get to know me in a way where my flaws are on my sleeves, and they have the choice then to accept or to reject. The easy fix, in my mind, is to isolate myself and know I can flee from the situation in 2 weeks. I know that is not what the Lord wants, though, so please be praying for a strong finish in this race with the people the Lord has placed me to work alongside.

Miracle Child

This week I worked with a crew building a deck. At Buba O'Malley's, whose house burned completely down and are now living in a trailer. The daughter, Danielle, was diagnosed with
Osteoporosis when she was born. The docters told her she would never walk, talk, go to school, or have children. Danielle is now walking, talking, and graduating in two years with a degree in
Accounting and will be going for her masters after that.

When she was 17 she became pregnant, and the doctors told her that either she or the baby would not survive because of her disability. She spent two weeks in the hospital after the delivery and will never be able to have another baby, but Brelynn is now 2 yrs old and so beautiful! At two, she already says she wants to be an animal doctor. She is so smart, fun, and friendly. My job was very rewarding this week!

Danielle's mom, as they live with her parents, started

to cry when she saw the beautiful deck my crew built this week. She was so touched

to see her daughter, Danielle, be able to walk down the stairs by herself for the very first time in her life!

Confidence in Christ

It is interesting that the one of the best things I can do, specifically the girls, is just model my confidence I have in Christ. I get really tempted some weeks to feel bad when some of the students do not like me, but I realize feeding into that temptation would not help them because we all, especially in high school, struggle with finding our confidence in other people. I have been striving to find my sole confidence in Christ and then show that confidence as a model for these girls desperately seeking acceptance from areas that are fleeting. So confidence and knowing my worth because of my Father has been so key.

3 Hours Later...

Last week, some of us on the team went to a true Southern Baptist Church, Grace Temple. We were literally the only Caucasian people in the medium to smaller sized church. The service went from 10:15am till about 1pm and people continued to trickle in throughout the entire service. They started the service with about four people standing in the front with cordless mikes. The woman on the far left was the lead singer while the others sang backup. These three or four songs at the beginning were more meant to sing with the backup singers as the lead sounded great but sang as the Spirit lead and her heart desired. After these songs, the Pastor got up to do the welcome, having the newbies stand up and introduce themselves, and then announcements. To my surprise, instead of moving on with the message, we went back into worship songs. This time the songs were a little easier to sing along with and everybody was swayin and clappin. After another half an hour or so, teh message started. He was preaching on if you are going to be a Christian, you need to live like a Christian, different from the world and let your actions and mouth reflect your relationship with Christ. He also really pushed the fact that as a church they need leaders to really step up if they want to take the promises that God has given them and the new location that they are wanting to move into shortly. The great thing about the hour long message was that whenever Pastor Francis got really passionate with what he was saying, he would begin to dance a little bit up there and the keys would chime in with him (if he was really going the drums would come in a little bit too!). This of course encouraged the mmmhmmm's and the Amens, which only encouraged his little jig more! After the message, he stated that he really wanted to get us out of there so that people would come back at 5 for a meeting. Before we were dismissed though, there is a time of open mike for any testimonies to be shared. A lady went up and shared how she was so blessed and proud of her church family in how they surrounded her recently when her mom died and she called the funeral a homecoming. The other woman that went up there gave a mini message about the bad effects of gossip on individuals and on the division of the church body. She then laid out all her dirty laundry before all the congregation about her previous drinking problems and how that had effected her parenting. She called herself a bad mother and shared more stuff about herself, past as well as present. She claimed that now you can talk about her and it doesn't matter cause she knows Christ has redeemed her. Talk about confidence in Christ!! I really enjoyed, it is just too bad that we just don't have three hours to give every week since we have groups coming in the afternoon. I like the church I am at anyway, but it was a neat experience.

Big Week

This was a very big week for us. There were about 85 people here, ten work site crews, feeding over 100, and all hands on deck! We were blessed with great leaders and wonderful students seeking after the Lord. The Lord had to minister to my heart from emotional things a lot this week, so many nights I spent on my knees or down on my face crying before the Lord. I have learned so much about forgiveness this week. The Lord has been so good. I also had the best Southern meal I have had during this summer. I had some homemade jambalaya, some pickled potatoes salad, cheesy chicken spaghetti, meatballs, and of course sweet tea! I was so satisfied!!

Starting to feel the Home Stretch

Although this summer has been incredible and we still have three more weeks left, I think the whole staff is starting to feel the longing for home once again. Marisa leaves us after this coming week to do a trip to Alaska, so we will all have to take on a little more, especially me, to pick up her usual wonderful responsibilities throughout the week. Please be praying for that. My Staff minus Azad:

Why do words still hurt?

After we send home a group on Saturdays, we grab our footnote bags where the students have sometimes sent us notes throughout the week. We read our notes, sharing some out loud to encourage one another and then we pray as a team for the group that just left. This morning I grabbed my bag and noticed a bunch of different scribbles on the outside of the bag surrounding various parts of my previous decoration. As I looked closer, I noticed the scribbles were covering up words of obscenity and overall not kind things. Ouch. Why do these words still hurt when they are high school students who I will most likely never see again? Why does it hurt when I know I find my true identity and worth in Christ and not in man? Maybe it is because it does still make me question my worth or for sure my actual impact here. In my head, I know the Lord has me here and is using me, and I also know that the student who wrote it is most likely really struggling with their own worth and acceptance and this act was out of that loneliness and confusion. All of these things my head understands, but my heart is having more trouble. I poured my love into those students, and it is returned with obscenity. Maybe I am getting a glimpse of what Christ felt at the cross. Please be praying for me that Christ would shine His love through me, and that come tomorrow I will be able to shine and pour love out once again to the 80 students coming. My spirit is so willing, but my flesh really just wants to cower and hide.

Material Things

Material thing are so fleeting, but what if it is all you have ever known? The newest bag will offer you extra glances while walking down the hall. The newest style shoes offer you a hundred compliments and jealous girls hanging around you. A shiny car offers you that extra attention from all the guys. And a million friends on Facebook will maybe get you voted prom queen. But eventually someone will get the newer bag and those glances will be directed else where, forgetting about your bag the day before. Someone else will come with a better pair of shoes leaving you with no compliments and the girls who were by your side yesterday are now by her side today. The shiny car will grow dim and the boys will have used you and left you. And a few years after high school all those facebook friends will have forgotten all about your crown and have moved on with their lives, most even forgetting your name. Where will you be left after all the things have faded and the people moved on? Jesus said it is harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom or heaven than a camel to enter through the eye or a needle. I don’t think Jesus said this because He hates money or wants to make life hard for us. I think He said it because He wants us to experience life to its fullest with actual joy, with friends who will love you to the core, with a husband who will love and serve you and not use you, and with acceptance from the One who will never forget your name or your crown! This week a lot of the students were very dependant on their material items, but I think the Lord has started moving in their hearts and is showing them what true joy looks like. I will continue praying for our group from Philly.

Missions

Missions can only really happen once you

have run out of your own ideas and understandings

have become so frustrated you are ready to give up

have become so tired you have no energy to try anymore

then the Lord can step in with His full understanding, complete patience, and unlimited strength and energy to actually change hearts and see mission through your hands that you are finally willing to surrender to be used fully by the His hands!

Following Miss Judy's House

This is Miss Judy's house over the last three weeks of work. We started out taking out the entire flooring including beams and then replacing it all. Then we took off all the siding on the house and the suffit in the porch.

Now this week is the siding!

Kitchen Fun

As a staff we have found that the best place to hang out is the kitchen and usually around dinner prep time. Everyone is really good about helping by picking up a knife and chopping some lettuce, stirring some beans, or taste testing ;) One night Azad decided to use his construction skills to build a house with the rice krispee treats for the night!

Lesson Learned or Learning...

Don’t you hate when you tell someone some really good wisdom and then have to learn the same lesson a week later. I usually say something like, “Lord, I already learned this lesson. Didn’t you hear me telling that other person about this? I don’t feel the need to learn this!” I told a good friend of mine last week that as a man he must put all his love out even though it may not be returned. This week was a hard week students wise. It was a really small group and half of them were related. They came from a small town and weren’t very susceptible to others, me. I did not feel like I really connected with the students or that they were even interested in getting to know me. They seemed pretty disrespectful and not interested in any programming we did. Some of this may have been because of the fact that their youth leaders both ended up not being able to come last minute because of the family death and so two leaders stepped in really quick. Maybe between the new dynamics to their group, the closeness of the group and town, and the fact that it rained like all week so I did not go on site a lot because of the small quarters of inside site work, all of these turned into little connection and bonds made for me this week. So I started to get kind of bitter and apathetic towards the group. I was putting less effort into getting to know them and having an attitude towards them. I then realized that I was doing the same thing that I was warning my friend against doing to the girl he was pursuing. Jesus did not call me down here this summer to only love the students that are respectful and who are easy to love but to love all including those hard to love and will give nothing in return. I needed to pray to get a heart change since mine was not right toward these students. It was too late to change my actions toward this week’s students, but I think it will change my perspective for the remainder weeks. I’m still learning!