A brief reflection of 2013.

It’s always fun to sit down and take some time and reflect on the past year of your life, seeing where God has brought you has an awesome way of getting you excited about where He’s going to take you next. It doesn’t matter if 2013 was the hardest and most difficult year of your life or the easiest and most exciting, because if you love God, it was for your good, according to His purpose, for your sanctification, and He is going to finish what He started (Romans 8:28, Ephesians 1:11, 1st Thessalonians 4:3, Philippians 1:6).

A very easy way for me to reflect on 2013 is to take the goals I (more expansively) set out for the year in a blog back in January and see how they played out. This past year I only laid out five, and I’ll be tackling them in reverse order. 

5. Make some sort of consistent habit of exercising and eating just a little bit healthier.

This one was a roller coaster ride of a goal. Some months I was working out 5 times a week, eating extremely healthy and had reached a fairly healthy weight, others I was drinking 3 sodas a day, didn’t even know what a vegetable was, and got a little chunky. The funny thing is I was pretty content in both directions of life. Overall I would say I probably failed at this one. 

4. To read 25 books. 

This one I am so excited to be able to say I nailed! I actually was able to finish 32 books this year, 11 of which were rereads. 

1-4 The entire Lord of the Rings Series including The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien (The Hobbit was a reread)

5-9 The first five books of The Lost Years of Merlin series - T.A. Barron (The first 2 were rereads)
10-16 All seven Harry Potter Books - J.K. Rowling (All rereads)
17. A Severe Mercy - Sheldon Vanueken
18. The Mortification of Sin – John Owen
19. Holiness – J.C Ryle (Reread)
20. Doing Things Right in the Matters of the Heart – John Ensor
21. Passion and Purity – Elizabeth Elliot
22. Sex, Dating, and Relationships – Gerald Heistand and Jay Thomas
23. What He Must Be (if he wants to marry my daughter) - Voddie Baucham
24. Leading With Love – Alexander Strauch
25. In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day – Mark Batterson
26. Every Good Endeavour: Connecting Your Work to God’s Work – Timothy Keller
27. So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love
28. Christians Get Depressed Too – David Murray
29. Finally Free: Fighting For Purity with the Power of Grace – Health Lambert
30. Crazy Busy – Kevin Deyoung
31. The Book Thief – Markus Zusak
32. Walking with God through Pain and Suffering – Timothy Keller

3. Lord willing, by years end to find a job, ANY job. I don’t care if it’s at a fast food place while I look elsewhere, just something to start working and paying off loans.

Looking back I can’t help but laugh and smile at this goal I set up for myself. If you had told me I’d be where I am now back in January I would have said you were crazy. God is just so good. Not only did God provide a job, He provided two! The first one (though the second one I got) is being an office lackey for a construction company here in Manassas. I do data entry, filing and the like. While not the most exciting position, I do actually enjoy it for 2 reasons. The first is I got it through a guy at my church and by working for him it has provided for multiple conversations with him and thus the ability to get to know a man I normally wouldn’t have even bothered talking to. Secondly, most of the time, I get to listen to my iPod for hours on end each day, and being the music fan that I am, it’s a perfect situation.

The second position I have is being a Child Care Specialist at Jill’s House, a respite center for children with special needs. And this is literally the best job ever. It only took 2 summers for me to completely fall in love with the idea of working with children with special needs and now I’m (for at least a time) doing it for a living! In college people would ask me what I wanted to do and I would always respond ‘I have no idea but all I know is I’d like to be able to love God and love people.’ What’s really awesome is that loving God and loving people is the very reason of Jill’s House existence. We get to love God by loving on a demographic that is very often neglected and viewed by much of the world as less than human. 

Not only do I love what I do, but I love the people I work with too. Seriously the staff at Jill’s House is just incredible. There are so many great examples (young and old!) of Godly living that it’s almost impossible not to grow if you’re even paying the slightest bit of attention. So while this job is certainly the most spiritually, mentally, and physically exhausting job I have ever worked, there’s not one thing I’d rather exhaust myself for. 

2. To graduate from The Master’s college, and make the most of my final semester.

So much has happened in the 2nd half of 2013 I almost forgot that this was the year I graduated from college! I cannot believe it has been over 6 months since that part of my life came to a close. While I’m not sure I can say I made the most of my final semester, I do know it was one the most complete semesters I ever had, at least relationally. It was one of the only semesters that my heart came out in one peace, and I did not waste time irrationally chasing girls for the sake of a relationship. And while one of the most important DTR’s I have ever had did occur during that semester, it was the first time I went about it the right way, stating intentions and not being completely devastated when it didn’t turn out the way I had hoped. I also was able to further develop the friendships I wanted and really invest in the guys God placed around me, which turned out to be such a blessing. God really did use those 3 years at Master’s to grow and develop me as a man, and some of that developing came out in my final semester. 

1. To fall more and more in love with my savior Jesus Christ and as J.C Ryle puts it, to grow in grace.

From my final semester of college, an awesome summer at Soaring Over Seven, my wonderful church home, the reaction I had when my dad had a brief scare and was taken the hospital, to the two jobs and amazing friends He has provided, 2013 was one of the first years where it was really evident for me to see the hand of God in my life. How can I look back on all that has come to pass this year and not be even more convinced of these two facts of life: The God of the Bible is real and His Word is true. 

Looking back and seeing what Christ has done in my life and the lives of those around me this year makes me so excited about all that is going to happen in 2014. Maybe this will be the year I meet my wife, maybe it will the year I move out of my parent’s house and get an apartment, maybe I can get on full time at Jill’s House, or maybe this will be the hardest year I will ever go through and my faith will be shaken. Who knows what is going to happen, but to repeat myself from the start of this blog and add a present tense to it: It doesn’t matter if 2014 will be the hardest and most difficult year of your life or the easiest and most exciting, because if you love God, it will be for your good, according to His purpose, for your sanctification, and He is going to finish what He started (Romans 8:28, Ephesians 1:11, 1st Thessalonians 4:3, Philippians 1:6). 

Happy New Years and once again thanks for taking the time to read!

Today was a very long day indeed.

It was just about a week and a half ago that I finished reading Tim Keller’s Walking With God Through Pain and Suffering. Today God put my new found understanding of suffering to the test and brought on somewhat of a scare.

It started out as a normal Sunday morning, I woke later than planned but was able to make my way to church just fine. In the middle of service, just after receiving communion, I received a text message. Normally I wouldn’t check my phone but it caught me off guard buzzing on the open seat next to me because there’s typically no service in the school building we hold our service at and normally I wouldn’t even receive said text in the first place until I was heading out to my car. I notice it’s from my mom, go ahead and open it and it reads, “Looks like I’m taking Dad to the hospital. Will call you later.” Now I think the average person’s response (and probably the right one) if they were in the same situation, would be to quietly get up out of their seat and make their way outside to try and find out more. I mean the service was almost over anyways, there was only a short time of prayer and a few more hymns left. But something told me to stay, and I immediately thought to myself, you know, there is no better time to receive news like this than when you’re in the midst of worshiping the one true God. So I stayed seated, tried my best to orient my heart and mind towards heaven and finished out the service. I even stayed after the service to help pack up the church (like I said we meet in the basement of a school and were packing up earlier than normal as due to inclement weather we weren’t going to have Sunday school). While interacting with those around me I answered the typical question of how are you with ‘doing well’, even when my mind was scattered and elsewhere. 

When I finally made my way out of the building, I contacted my mom to try and find out what was going on. I learned that earlier in the morning, my father had began complaining of a tightness of chest, a sudden sore throat and others around him had noticed his skin was becoming very pale. With all of that, the decision was made to dial 911 and get him to a hospital as soon as possible. At that point I asked if she wanted me to come to be with them, but because they had not received any results from the tests that had been done and the inclement weather, my mom commanded that I go home instead. In immediate outburst, I cried out “My dad’s in the hospital and you’re telling me to go home?” After I hung up the phone, I sat in the car unsure of what to do. I then asked myself, I wonder what’s more honoring to my parents, to listen and obey my mother’s request and go home, or act in defiance and come to the aid of my father going through this trial. 

By God’s grace, in attempt to respect my mother’s wishes, I chose the former and made my way home. As I pulled up to the house, I sat there debating my decision for a good five minutes. It was then that this song came up on my Ipod. The tears came streaming down. Regardless of what was happening, if my Dad were going to enter into glory or recover just fine, God was right there with both of us, and His love would not fail either way. I finally had the strength to get out of the car and begin the waiting game. 

I spent the next two hours anxiously sitting on the couch letting my mind wander to extremes calling my mom every half an hour looking for any information I could. And when that amounted to nothing, I finally accepted my fate and began to calm myself down. I then used the time to do my daily devotions, seeking the Lord through His word and bringing my heart before Him in prayer, and now I find myself writing this blog. 

During my devotion time I was reminded of who God is, His purposes, the brevity of life, the fact that He is our refuge and strength, and that He will be with us through it all. We never know when God is going to call us home, but we do know that in the little time He has given us we are called to spend it for His glory. We also know that suffering is a normal part of this life because of the sinful state of this world, but the fact of the matter is that God uses it according to His purposes and for the good of those who love Him. In the ultimate act of suffering, Jesus Christ came down from heaven and died on the cross, taking the punishment for our sin and experiencing separation from the Father. All of this was done so that through His resurrection we can now die to ourselves and find new life in Him. 

Currently my Dad is spending the night at a Kaiser Permanente getting some blood tests done and will have more done later tonight so the doctors will be able to compare the results. Tomorrow he will see a cardiologist and also undergo a stress test, which will most likely lead to some lifestyle changes. But as of right now, no one is under the impression it is immediately life threatening, so praise God for that. 

Thankfully this time around it was just a scare. Although with that being said, just hours after all of this has occurred, I can already see how God is using this in my own personal walk with Him and I hope that it can be an encouragement to yours as well. Also, I am thankful for and encouraged by all of you who have been praying for my family on this hectic day, it is truly a wonderful blessing to see and know that so many people are supporting us. And as always, thanks for reading!

So who is marriage for anyway?

If you’ve been anywhere around facebook lately, you’ve run into some form of the infamous ‘Marriage Isn’t For You’ article, either the article itself, or the various responses, one depicting an abusive relationship taking the articles policies to the extreme, and most recently one arguing that marriage is ultimately for God. And while in the long run, I would tend to agree with the last article, I would like to propose something: maybe, just maybe, marriage is multifaceted. Maybe marriage is for you, your spouse, others (something that hasn’t been brought up), AND God, all at the same time.

So let’s begin with the idea that marriage can be and actually is for you. This is something I think both the original and response article get wrong. There are at least two ways it’s for you, marriage is something for you to enjoy and it’s for your sanctification. Proverbs 5:18-19 states “Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth, a lovely deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight; be intoxicated always in her love.” While in context, these verses are about avoiding the seductive adulteress painted in the first half of chapter five and turning to your wife instead, they make a very important point, your spouse and therefore marriage is something for you to rejoice in and be intoxicated by. Next, marriage is also for your sanctification. A great article about that, which discusses this aspect in the context of staggering divorce rates and marrying the ‘wrong’ person, can be read here. Ultimately we know that the will of God for our lives is our sanctification (1st Thessalonians 4:3). Well, if getting married is a part of your life, then it’s part of your sanctification. Marriage brings out both the best and worst of each person that takes part in it, and it is the worst in us that God often uses marriage to exploit and then begin to cleanse. In Genesis God stated that “it is not good that man should be alone, I will make him a helper fit for him” (emphasis mine), God presented Adam with a wife for his sake! 

But this verse also gets us to the second point that marriage is also for your spouse. Relationships are a two way street, and in the same way that marriage is something for you to enjoy and for your sanctification, it’s also for your spouse to enjoy and be sanctified through. Marriage requires you in the most intense way to love another as you love yourself, and count that person more important than yourself. In marriage we are presenting ourselves as a gift to be given to and enjoyed by the other. As the original article in question so keenly points out, Sin (the article uses selfishness) contorts our thinking to ask the question “What can I get from this person?” but love asks, “What can I give?” On the other hand, like the response stating marriage is about God points out, “Marriage is not only about making your spouse happy, it’s about making them holy.” This is how it’s for their sanctification as well. Not only does marriage exploit our own sins, but it exploits theirs as well, and we need to lovingly point them out and point them to Christ. 

Third, marriage is for others. Let us not forget that one of the major purposes of marriage is to be fruitful and multiply, aka, have children. So in one sense marriage is for them, but let’s look at another aspect. At the end of Ephesians 5, which lays out how wives and husbands should interact and how they ultimately become one flesh, Paul says something astounding, “This mystery is profound and I am saying it refers to Christ and the Church.” A godly marriage is ultimately a picture of Christ and His Church, and it is a picture that is meant to be seen by others. When the wife lovingly submits and respects the husband, and the husband sacrificially loves his wife as himself, nourishing and cherishing her, together they not only set an example for other couples, but they will ultimately point others to Christ (the final point), even single people. A godly marriage is a shadow of how Christ loves His people, and it is a shadow through which His love can be seen and experienced. 

And finally, marriage is ultimately for God. Not only is marriage a picture that points to Christ and His Church as I pointed out above, but like the response article points out, it is also for His glory. In fact, all of life is ultimately for the glory of God, and it is something we as Christians should strive to live for. “So whether you eat or drink, whatever you do, do all for the glory of God. 1st Corinthians 10:31” I’m fairly certain that ‘whatever you do’ includes getting married. 

In a brief and very incomplete way, I hope I was able to show that marriage is not so easy to pin down. The Christian can gladly affirm an article saying it’s for your spouse, because it is! But not only for your spouse, it is for yourself, others, and ultimately God. And as always, thanks for reading!

Exciting News!

I am really excited to announce to the world that I have finally come to find some employment! I will be working as a part time Child Care Specialist at a place called Jill's House, which is a respite center for children with special needs tied very close with Mclean Bible Church. The position of Child Care Specialist is very similar to what I did at the camp I worked at the past two summers, just way more involved and a lot more paperwork, haha. Ideally this will eventually turn into a full time position, as they have a one year internship program I'm really interested in, but in the mean time I will be seeking out a second part time job, though I am extremely grateful that God has provided this first position. Below you can read an excerpt of an email I sent to Mary who is the director of the camp I worked for and the Child/Youth Services Coordinator of the Tyson's Campus Access ministry. She was the one who hired me two summers ago to work at Soaring Over Seven. This excerpt is basically a brief telling of the story of how God moved in my heart over the past two years towards possibly working in the special needs field and while some of the thoughts are repeated from earlier blogs, it's something I thought worth sharing again.

"A year and a half ago if someone would have told me I was going to be working in a field for children with special needs I would have said they were crazy. And if I'm honest with myself, I only applied for and took the job at S.O.S. that first summer because I desperately needed a summer job and was willing to do just about anything. But that summer completely changed my world. It opened my eyes to a demographic that desperately needs the love of Christ but is often passed over and dismissed. And it also provided me with a new perspective to the Gospel of Christ, as the love we were able to show these kids, who more often than not can't show love in return, at least in a way we would recognize, is very much like the love Christ has shown those He called to be His. And then on top of that, even after a rough and tiring day, no matter if a child yelled at, hit or bit you, to be forced to come back the next day and love them all the same as if none of that ever happened, was yet another picture of God's love for us. Not only were we incapable of loving Him before He called us, but He continues to love us the same even on the days where we run away from and rebel against Him in our sin.

So after the summer of 2012, I knew I just had to come back the next year. I even told my parents the second I got home from school that I wasn't even going to think about finding a full time job until I got to do S.O.S again. For the first time in my life, I had found something that I was excited to get up and exhaust myself for. Being a Group Coordinator this time around definitely had its fair share of challenges, and at times I definitely felt spread thin, as instead of pouring myself into one child, it was now 15. But thanks be to God He provided the grace to make it through and definitely reinforced those lessons I had learned from the first summer. On top of that though, He also did something I was not expecting at all this summer. He used camp to provide me with a wonderful group of friends through my coworkers, right after I had just said goodbye to a good amount of friends as I left school and was unsure what friendships would look like for me now that I was back home. 

All in all, God used Soaring Over Seven and the last three months of serving at breakout/breakaway to really open up my heart for those with special needs, and also my heart for the lost, as those who are not in Christ have a far greater spiritual need than any physical need in this world. These past two summers He really began to imprint the idea that maybe this was a field of work I would like to go into. And with this opportunity I have at Jill's House, I now have the ability to take steps in that direction!"

Thank you all who have been praying for me in my search for employment, it has been a long and slow process over the past 3 months, but God definitely had His purpose for it all. Please continue to be praying that I find a second part time job and if it is His will, that down the road this opportunity will possibly turn into a full time one.

Oh hey, I'm 23.

Unemployed, single, and living with my parents… not quite where I thought I was going to be at this point in my life. Especially when I look around and see a good number of friends, the same age as me, married/in a serious relationship, or at the very least working a full time job and living on their own (and sometimes grad school is thrown on top of one or all of the previously listed states). It’s very easy to see those people and then become discouraged by the circumstances I find myself in.

But thanks be to God that I can rest in the fact that God has me exactly where I am supposed to be. The second half of Psalm 139:16 says “in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. (ESV)” Every moment of my life has been directed by Him and they are all according to His will, for my good, and for the purpose of sanctification (Ephesians 1:11, Romans 8:28, 1st Thessalonians 4:3). Let me reiterate: every trial, every triumph, every failure, every single thing that happens, is according to will of God, for our good, and for our sanctification. God has also promised to provide all that we need telling us not to be anxious about those things, and so a job (and maybe a wife?) will come in His perfect timing.

That being said, a good portion of why I am in the state I am, is due to my own sinfulness. I mean a good reason as to why the job hunt has been going so poorly is because I have been extremely lazy when it comes to the search. The acts of even filling out applications, formatting my resume, working on cover letters, or even sending out emails to express interest/ask for help/advice have been mental battles that I’ve far too often lost. Part of it is that I have no idea what field of work I’d like to go into and so I tell myself that I’ll attack the market once I figure that out, but if I’m honest with myself, the truth is I’ve been scared, pessimistic, and altogether selfish. Scared that I’ll step into the wrong job, scared to actually move on from and let go of the college lifestyle, scared to take chances, scared of change. I’ve been pessimistic by getting down on myself when a lead doesn’t come through, and allowing my self to feel down because a lot of my friends are gone for school, or the ones that are here all have jobs so it’s hard to see them all that often. To describe it in one word though, it comes down to the fact that I’ve been selfish. I have chosen more often then not to allow myself to wallow in self-pity, fall into idleness and run to my sin for comfort instead of running to Christ.

Thankfully, these are all things that by the grace of God are correctible, and it starts with preaching the Gospel to myself daily. I need to remind myself of the truths I spoke about in my second paragraph. I need to remind myself that I am a sinner who by the grace of God, has been purchased by the blood of Christ. On top of that He has also provided multiple means of grace that allow me to draw near to Him, and through the Holy Spirit He helps me to do so! And finally, I need to remind myself of the support that God has given me in my friends, family, and church. There are whole waves of people praying for me and to know that is so encouraging to my heart, especially when I let it dwell on that fact.

God has given me 23 wonderful years of life, and as I begin to look more at Him and less at myself, I cannot wait to see where He brings me in the 24th. As always, thanks for reading, and as I share about my life I hope and pray it is an encouragement to yours!

Aiming for Thankfulness

Well, this is a little bit of a weird week in my life. Right now as I type, we are right in the middle of “Week of Welcome” back at Master’s and last week was the Servant Leadership Staff retreat. This is also the last week at home for a good number of my friends that are in the area as they prepare to head off to their respective schools. While I do have a handful of friends still here, I recently watched one of my better ones drop all he had to go and serve in Malawi for a year as a math teacher at a Christian school there. With all of that going on, some of which I was a part of just a year ago, it has been a little rough as I sit here in the midst of the ever-depressing post-grad job search. But instead of this being a “Woe is me, I don’t have a job and most of my friends have left me, what am I to do” post that I could easily turn this into, I am going to take the time and list out some of the things that I can thank my God for. The major reason I am writing this is to attempt and change my mindset about the circumstances around me, as I know my tendency is to become far too depressed when life isn’t exactly going my way. My hope and prayer is to point my heart and mind upwards to the things of Christ, and maybe encourage others as we continue on with this thing called life reminding them that even if all hell is breaking loose (which it’s not for me don’t worry), there is still so much to be thankful for.

First off, I am thankful to have a God that is faithful and one in whom I can rest and cast all of my anxiety on. I don’t have to worry about the future because the future is His. Everything that He has ordained to occur in this transitional phase (and all of life for that matter) is for my good, and for the business of making me more like His son. A job will come in His perfect timing, He knows what I need and right now, that’s not it.

Second, I am thankful for my church at Holy Trinity. It is such a wonderful family to be a part of. Every week I am challenged/encouraged by the incredible preaching of the word and the corporate prayer, and most weeks get to experience the wonderful blessing of Holy Communion. On Sunday nights the young adult ministry is yet another blessing in my life, especially because there are so many “older” adults who come with their families just to spend time with and invest in us.

Third, I’m thankful for the three years I got to spend at Master’s. It was a wonderful time of preparation where I was stretched and challenged in many ways. I now can look back on my time there and smile. Because of that time my walk with the Lord grew in ways I didn’t know possible, and the friendships I gained there are invaluable. And while it is sad that I’m not on my way back out there, I know God used that time to prepare me for whatever He has in store for me here and now. So instead of longing for the past, I am craving for God to use those experiences to shape my future.

Fourth, I’m thankful for Soaring Over Seven/Friendship Club. Not only was it such a blessing to work with and love on these kids with special needs again, but also God used the experience to provide me with some awesome friends, which was a big scare for me going into post graduate life. Like seriously, I now know some of the coolest people ever, and many of them have been great encouragement to my soul as I make this transition and look for a job. I am also excited that because of being back in town, I now have the ability to serve at Access’s respite events, which are basically small versions of camp on Friday nights/Saturday mornings. A side blessing of doing that is it serves as something that gets me out of the house.

Fifth, I’m thankful for my awesome parents. They have been very understanding of this transitional phase, and are a wonderful source of encouragement and love as I look for a job. They have done a wonderful job at balancing between pressuring me to look for a job and giving me the space I need to come to conclusions myself, while at the same time being there if I have any questions or concerns.

This post could go on for pages, as there is an endless amount of things I can thank my God for, but I’ll go ahead and stop there. Thank you so much for taking the time to read and I hope this was as much an encouragement to you who read as it was to my heart while I wrote it all out. I’ll leave you with a quote that has been challenging me lately and definitely relates to the post. 

"Maybe we should stop asking God to get us out of difficult circumstances and start asking Him what He wants us to get out of those difficult circumstances." Mark Batterson. 

Soaring Over Seven Summer Camp: Week 2

Day Five, 7/8/13:

Having the weekend to get away and do something different for a few days was much needed rest to the soul. I was able to get some much needed sleep, reflect some on my first week of camp, read a good amount, help a friend move, spend some extra time in the word and prayer, get replenished through the faithful preaching of The Word and the taking of Holy Communion at church, go on a fun date with my lovely mother, and continue digging into 1st Peter with my young adult bible study. As the weariness of the first week of camp began to melt away, the excitement in my heart rose as week two came to a start.

To be honest I was a little nervous about today as both of the rooms I was over seeing were getting a new camper who had been out all of last week, and a new camper meant new dynamics. But it didn’t for one-second faze our awesome team of counselors. They came in raring to go and ready to take on any new challenges thrown their way and it was encouraging to see. 

In the morning I was able to honor one of my counselors in front of everyone with what I titled the “calm cool and collected award.” This counselor has been such an encouragement to me, either as he patiently deals with a child, or quietly informs me of a situation that occurred, nothing seems to catch him off guard. It’s cool to see because he is not that outspoken of a person, he more leads behind the scenes and by example, which is a humble reminder that leadership is not simply the guy giving orders in front of everyone. 

This first day of a new week was a fantastic one. There was only one accident report reported between the 2 classrooms and it came in the last 20 minutes of the day. But way more awesome and important than that, my campers really seemed to be having fun. So many highlights occurred today, though there were two really big ones. One of them came during art, when a typical sibling who had finished his craft early went over to the corner of the room and joined with another camper who was playing a game. There were multiple instances of campers hanging out with and engaging with one another today and it really was so cool to see and really made my heart warm. The 2nd was being able to share with the parent of a more incident prone child that they had an absolutely wonderful day and nothing occurred, not only in a he didn’t do anything wrong kind of way, but also in a he had fun at the same time kind of way! This camper loves sidewalk chalk to the point where he spent the entire first half of the day out there and drew one of the coolest murals I have ever seen. 

I am so thankful this first day to the new week went so well, the Lord is definitely using it to fill my heart with joy and excitement and the preparation to face any challenges that occur. And don’t get me wrong, today did have it’s share of challenges, from a melt down or two, a lack of volunteers, a volunteer not fully engaging their camper, crazy events in the bathroom, etc etc, but it was seeing the joy on the campers faces that made them seem few and far between even though they actually occurred fairly often. So even on the days that make camp worthwhile, there is space to grow and crisis to step through, and it is only because the Lord brought me here again this summer that I have a chance to do so. 

Day Six, 7/9/13:

Once again, it was an amazing encouragement to see so many people come in early and pray over the camp, and it was especially nice to see that there were more guys than just myself this time around. Praying for others is yet another way to love them and I think they’re far more effective than we will ever really understand, and so to have the opportunity to do so with a group of people that have a similar heart for the camp is such a blessing. 

The day itself was pretty awesome as well. My counselors are getting in a really sweet rhythm all around, both in learning how to engage specific campers, and learning how to handle different situations. We also had a wonderful supply of volunteers, which really makes my job easier, since because of that we have the manpower to take various kids to different locations if needed and quickly avoid any oncoming crisis. Bowling went ten times smoother than I had imagined, and more importantly, the kids seemed to enjoy it for the most part.

Seeing these kids laugh and smile is just so, so great. It’s also extremely interesting figuring out what makes these kids tick. For example one child could talk your ear off about ceiling fans, while there’s another one who always has a different bionicle each day and is always building with legos either something for that bionicle to fight or to hide in. But two feet away from them is a child who could spend hours outside drawing with sidewalk chalk, and another one who will ride in the wagon until your arms fall off. By God’s grace I am definitely learning to love these kids for who they are and embrace the qualities that make them all so wonderful and unique.

Day Seven, 7/10/13, written about on 7/11/13

Day seven very quickly became one of the longer ones as almost every single camper from my room had a behavior outburst before the day ended, mostly in the afternoon. This led to many stressful and trying situations and by the time the day finally came to an end I was just grateful to make it through. On site days are already fairly tough, but especially in a classroom where the afternoon field trip is something that a good number of my kids use as a motivator and it is therefore “earned.”

The funny thing is the first half of the day made it seem like the whole thing was going to be amazing. For the first time in a seriously significant manner, the campers seemed to engage with each other, and not just the typical siblings. During our sports day, we had 3on3 soccer going where three typical siblings, 2 special needs kids and a volunteer all played together. At lunch much of the same occurred as we had a huge game of monkey in the middle taking place. Those two moments were definitely some of the more precious moments I have seen at camp this summer, and easily put the hectic moments that were about to come into perspective.

One of the major lessons I learned Wednesday was the importance of the camper to counselor/volunteer relationship. It is not enough to simply take any counselor/volunteer and put them together with a camper to achieve the highly coveted 1 to 1 ratio. You really do need to consider the personalities of said people, and when things are not meshing well, be prepared to make a switch. Just around lunchtime one of my campers began to express unhappiness about their buddy and instead of pulling the trigger and making a switch I talked to camper into giving their buddy another chance (to which he replied (and I wrongly ignored) “I’ve been giving them chances all day!”) and finish the day with them. This mistake led to some serious agitation by said camper and fueled one of the more major outbursts of the day, to the point where I had to call in a director and the camper had to be picked up there by his mother instead of in the class room. 

Day Eight, 7/11/13:

As today ended and we were walking back to the afternoon meeting my assistant coordinator looked over at me and said “It is days like this one that make camp worth it.” Today was yet another great day, even though we had fear of it being difficult because of the fact that it was our second day in a row on site. And it all began when we made a few changes to the pairings between counselor/volunteer and campers. With the typical siblings out having their very own special “sibs day” between the two rooms we only had 11 kids (there was also one other camper out for the day) and this made things a lot easier to manage. It also gave us coordinators the ability to be extremely flexible in our room choices, while trying to follow the schedule if campers were unhappy with anything there was enough space in the other rooms to take them elsewhere instead of being forced to try and negotiate with them.

Campers that had behavior outbursts yesterday in certain areas today made amazing progress and through some tough love were able to make some fantastic decisions and move on with the day. I even had a camper that because he and his buddy got along so well and had an awesome day playing together, that at the loss of a favorite toy, which any other day so far this camp would of turned into a major melt down moment, instead of that happening he calmly notified me asking us to look around for it. Though we have yet to find said toy, and I am sure some disappointment has been experienced, I really felt like this was a very big personal victory for the camper.

I think it is so crazy to see God work through us to make an impact on these children, and though some people of the world would see what we’re doing here at S.O.S as a waste of time, I really do find it to be a joy and a privilege to show up each day and watch God work. And not only is He using the staff and volunteers here to have an impact on these kids and their families, but He is working just as much in our own hearts through the impact that these kids are making on us. I know for a fact that everyone involved with Soaring Over Seven this summer will come out of it a different person, either more in love with their Lord and Savior or for those who aren’t Christian even beginning to open up to the truth because of the experiences they had this summer, or on the opposite side more hardened in the heart because instead of seeing the difficulties as a chance for growth, they complained the whole time and barely scathed by.


Day Nine: 7/12/13

It was so cool to see how much my campers enjoyed carnival day! From the big slide, to face painting, cosmic bowling, and the huge maze, almost every room seemed to be a hit, even one of the rooms that had the exact same design that it normally does but this time with a second moon bounce. The big maze room and cosmic bowling set up led to some particularly fun moments with the campers as in the background techno music was blasting to go with the dark rooms and light show. When it comes to my favorite moment of the day that came when I saw a community volunteer in my room, who started out the day not really interacting with her camper and just kind of walking along side him, playing chase with said camper and both laughing and smiling. It brings so much joy to life to see someone who maybe has never interacted with a child with special needs before really begin to enter that child’s world and have an impact. As a coordinator it’s a little bit of our job to try and facilitate that through things like the buddy pairings, laying out expectations of our volunteers, or encouraging them throughout the day, and so when you witness it happen, it’s just so awesome.

One of my favorite things about camp beyond the impact that through God’s grace we have on campers or campers have on us, which is an amazing thing in and of itself, is the friendships that are built by the coworkers. The bonds that we share in our love for Christ, our love for these kids, and the service of His church really do serve as an awesome catalyst into some pretty sweet and meaningful relationships. Over the last three weeks (one week of training and two weeks of camp) I have had an opportunity to begin to get to know some really awesome people, my co-coordinators across the hall, my assistant coordinator, our classroom counselors, and all those who come out and play basketball in the afternoons after camp to name a few, and I really do hope and pray that some of these friendships last past camp just as a handful did from last summer. 

Overall I would say this second week went extremely well, even with three consecutive on campus days. I would also say it would be hard to even begin to compare this week with the first, as both provided their own set of challenges and excitements. So much of this camp happens in compartments, from week to week, day to day, even station to station during each day, as each moment provides an opportunity to rely on God for the strength to make it through, to rely on God for the grace to forgive and move on, and to rely on God for the love of Christ to show these kids. You really do have to learn to take life a moment at a time, resting in the peace of Christ as He has already laid out the path that we will take during this camp. And though we fail often to fully put our trust in Him, that admittance of failure is yet another opportunity to turn to and experience His grace.