My Newest Job

There is a certain peace that comes with doing what you know you were made to do.  Your body may be tired and achy, but your spirit just soars so high it’s like it can touch God.

That is how I felt tonight.  I have started running the Kid’s Club for SON Ministries’ ESOL classes.  Basically, I hang out with anywhere from 50 to 70 kids whose parents are in class learning English.  It is such a cool place to see God moving. 

I filled in for my predecessor last year.  She had fallen and broken her arm playing soccer with some of the kids.  Kim, the woman in charge of SON, called me to see if I could come be the substitute.  I fell in love with those kids.  Most of them are rough around the edges, and they are definitely not church kids, and that is why I love them. 

My first day as the official gym leader I spent fifteen minutes playing catch with a boy who spoke next to no English.  That didn’t stop us from giggling and having a blast.  He would point over my shoulder, as though there was something I needed to look at.  When I would “fall for it” he would just burst into fits of laughter.  It was a beautiful moment. 

Tonight we had a group of the Columbus Young Professionals come in to play games with the kids.  One of the gentlemen brought a backpack with paper in it.  He taught some of the kids origami.  I talked to him briefly afterwards.  He said he had planned on leaving an hour earlier than he actually left.  He still had a job to go to after he left from ESOL.  He seemed a little flustered, but I don’t know that he saw the joy that extra hour brought to the kids.  I had one boy who would not leave when his mom wanted him to, because he just wanting to talk with me about the origami art that the CYP member had made. 

My first night I had the opportunity to speak with a volunteer who had just started that night as well.  She said she had wanted more volunteer opportunities, and this seemed perfect since she was the daughter of immigrants.  She said that the ESOL program, including Kid’s Club, would have been so nice to have had twenty years ago when they moved here and were trying to learn English.  When I connected with her on Thursday she really seemed to be enjoying her time with the kids.  That is huge. 

It is incredible to me the way some of the students matured in the last year.  There is a particular set of twins, a boy and a girl, who were constantly at each other’s throat last year.  So far I have only had to break up one spat between them, knock on wood, and the girl was one of the first students to ask if I needed help with anything on Thursday.

It is so neat to see how God is at work in these students and volunteers.  It is a different atmosphere than I am totally used to, though.  Unlike Impact, at Kid’s Club God is more covert, yet I see him moving so apparently that it brings my heart such joy. 

This is where my heart is right now.  I love it.  

~~~

If you are interested in volunteering with SON Ministries go here.

Buffalo, NY

A couple weeks ago I went up to Buffalo, NY with 17 other people from my church (3 other adults, and 14 high school students) for an urban mission trip.  I haven’t really been able to write about it before this because it has taken me this long to recover and process what all happened that week we were there.  I’m still not entirely sure what all went down, but it was too incredible of an experience to hold off sharing about it any longer.  

We had spent the ten weeks leading up to the trip preparing ourselves and the students for what we were about to do.  There was some introduction needed for our fantastic suburban kids who had never really experienced any sort of urban anything.  We tried our best to keep any culture shock to a minimum, and give them the tools needed to make this trip about more than just hanging out with friends.  The thing about our team was that it was like pulling teeth to get them to talk during those ten weeks.  There was another team who went up the week before us, and they seemed to have gotten the talkative students.  

Fast forward to the van ride up to Buffalo; after we had driven for like two-ish hours we stopped for dinner.  After the kids were done eating they were playing Frisbee in a mostly empty parking lot.  As they were playing a group of guys came up and asked to play.  Our kids didn’t even think about it, but just tossed them the Frisbee and made room in the circle.  It was cool to see.  

Once we were all loaded up and on our way, our van started telling stories.  I mean, they were making up stories as a group to keep themselves entertained.  Jacqui and I were having a theological debate when next thing I hear is “Kate, start the next story!”  Thus, Javier the Iguana set out on his quest to find the perfect guacamole recipe.  I loved looking back and not seeing everyone plugged into their iPods, but interacting with each other and getting to know each other.  

The theme of togetherness continued through the trip.  Whenever there was down time the 14 high schoolers would spend their time hangout, all together.  There weren’t really factions or cliques.  It was just all of them together all the time. When I looked around at the high schoolers who were there, they really should not have worked together as well as they did.  I loved it.  

Since getting back, they have still tried to stay in contact with each other.  On Good Friday, the group who had off school went to lunch and saw the Hunger Games.  After that we proceeded to go get coffee and have a Nerf war (aka reenacting the movie) in the park near the coffee shop.  They were together from 11am to 6pm that day, and it wasn’t long enough for them.  They were already planning what they would do next time.  

The way they click reminds me of my housemate in the ministry house back at Witt.  It’s a group that shouldn’t work, but because they have Christ and love in common they just do.  I love it so much.  I get so excited when I think about it.  I really feel like God is going to use them to make some changes in our youth group/church/city.  I’m pumped. 

For the sake of not boring everyone with all the details all at once, I’m going to stop for now.  I’ll write more later about what all we did in Buffalo and other cool things like that. 

Overwhelmed With Life (Again)

Sometimes I become so overwhelmed with everything in my life that I start to feel like I am going to crawl out of my own skin.  Tonight is one of those nights.  My skin is crawling, my mind is racing, and I am fighting back tears because all at the same time everything is wrong and nothing is wrong.  I have no homework to worry about, and I am so so thankful for that.  That doesn't mean my stress is less, so is good [+] and some bad [-].

[+/- ] YK starts later today.  I have to get my siblings up and out the door by 7:00am, aka the butt-crack of dawn.  We have to be at church at 7:45, and lets be honest, we will never leave on time.  That is why I am giving us 45 minutes to get out the door, so we can be on time and maybe even get coffee before hand.  I am worried we won't be up on time.

[-] Dad is having surgery tomorrow.  He has been having a heart arrhythmia, in other words his heart is misfiring.  It is not beating all at one time, but kind of staggering the beat which is really really bad.  Because of that, he is having a procedure down that cauterized the misfiring nerves to make the heart go back to normal.  It is a relatively common procedure, but it is not easy.  It involves the surgeon cutting a hole in dad's heart to get to the nerves.  I am worried.  I don't want anything to happen to him. 

[-]  Poppie and Grandma Holt probably won't be around much more.  Poppie went into the hospital on Thursday for pneumonia and heart problems.  He came home Saturday and is doing well.  However, Grandma went into the hospital after having a stroke the same day Poppie came home.  Dad says that we will most likely lose Grandma within the next six months, and Poppie will go quickly after that.  They cannot function without one another.  It's like The Notebook.  He will not survive without her, and visa versa.

[-]  Dad says he won't be able to handle losing his parents.  That is understandable, but he pretty much said he will probably take it out on me, Sarah and Alex.  He would never be violent, that is not who my father is, but he did say I will probably need to grow thicker skin.  I can't.  I can't always take the brunt of everything, and that is what he wants me to do.  I can only handle so much before I start to shut down, or I explode back at him.  Neither of those ever end well. 

[+]  Work  is going so well.  I love to go and spend copious hours with the high school and middle school students.  I really think this is what I should be doing for the next couple of years at least.  We will see though. 

Tonight I am just feeling like I need someone who can take care of me.  I am feeling the weight of everything crushing me.  I have to take care of everyone, and no one is there for me.  I am the one who seems to be trying the hardest to keep the house relatively presentable.  I am the one who has been running a million errands.  I am the one looking after my siblings.  I have to be strong for everyone, and I don't feel like I have the opportunity to be the vulnerable one.  I just suck it up, but I can't handle that forever.  I need someone who will take care of me.  I don't want to complain this much, I am just incredibly overwhelmed and need a break.  Problem is, I am not going to get one for at least two weeks, if not more. 

I just need sleep.  And alone time.  And a strong drink.  Maybe not the last one, but the first two for sure.

First Day of "Work"

Today was my first official day of work with the Youth Group at church.  It went so well!  I think I'm going to love this job.  My sister and I went to The Gathering, our High School ministry.  We started out by just hanging out, then we sang some worship songs.  Joe Long and Katie Borden were leading up front.  They are both super talented.  Joe even wrote a new worship song for us to learn.  It was beautiful.  The words were based on Psalm 150, which reads.

Praise the LORD.
Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty heavens.
Praise him for his acts of power;
praise him for his surpassing greatness.
Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet,
praise him with the harp and lyre,
praise him with timbrel and dancing,
praise him with the strings and pipe,
praise him with the clash of cymbals,
praise him with resounding cymbals.
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD.
Praise the LORD.

The song was amazing and this may be a new favorite verse of mine.  The song connected to the theme of the summer so well.  This summer we are talking about worship.  Doug had Tyler, the other intern, and me each share a quick testimony thing about what we see worship as.  Once Tyler and I were done, Doug had the kids break up into groups and discuss what worship is.  We went through all sorts of questions from what is worship, to what do we worship and how do we get back on track when we start to worship things that are not God.  It was a fabulous conversation, and Tyler seemed to have a lot to say, so I let him take point in our group.  He really seems to have a heart for God, which is great to see.  After breaking out into groups, we had Popsicle and played games and hung out. 

After pretty much everyone was gone, Chris and Alex asked if we all wanted to go grab food and hang out more.  So, after many distractions, some Teach Me How to Dougie and whatever else we ended up at White Castle.  So, Chris, Alex, Sarah, Tori, Doug and I went to White Castle.  Tori had to leave early, but the guys, Sarah and I ended up staying until 11:30pm.  We talked about all sorts of stuff.  It was great.

To make a long story short, I think I am going to like this job.  The kids are cool, the staff members are wonderful, and the volunteers rock!

Right now I am listening to so old one80 sermons from freshman year at Witt.  Its the Reset series.  So great, and totally what I needed to hear today. 

I think this summer is one of healing for me and God.  I think we are going to be friends again.  I am starting to want to read my Bible, and pray and journal.  I am wanting to spend time with God.  I love this feeling, and I have missed it so much.  I am tired of feeling at odds with God, that is the worst place to be because no matter what you are going to lose.  You can't beat the creator of everything.  It's just not possible.  This is going to be a big summer for me, and I can't even describe the excitement I feel when I think about it.