Missions:Edgewater

Last week 29 middle schoolers and 6 adults spent the week on our Middle School mission trip. The past two years have taken us to New Orleans,LA and Waveland, MS doing Hurricane Katrina clean-up. This year we really thought it was important that our students see the need right in their own back yard; so we stayed at our church and served local ministries and organizations right here!!

One of the first things we had to do was something called Servant Evangelism. Each team was given $30 and told to go bless or serve someone with it. Below is a picture of my 5 middle school students on my team, or my crew as I called them. They decided to buy donuts and flowers with our money and take them around to the local fire stations, police station, City Hall and more!
Here we all, minus one boy who is hidden in the back, all riding in the van!

Our last Servant Evangelism stop was at a local Assisted Living Facility where we met Odeal, a 97-year-old woman who acted about 50! The kids fell in love as she shared her story of leaving New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, her tales of owning a dress shop in Brooklyn that got robbed and many more! They loved her so much we went back another day just to say hi!

Here they are sitting on the floor with the resident dog while listening to Odeal tell her stories.

We spent 2 days painting at a local runaway home, a morning weeding an elderly widow's yard and another morning cleaning all the shelves at our local food bank. The kids worked hard and with only a few complaints.

On Thursday we were given another challenge: this one was called the Parable of the Talents. If you are familiar with the Bible at all you may have heard of this parable Jesus told. Basically we were given $50 and told to multiply it and then use it for someone/someplace else. My crew decided they knew enough business owners that they would simply ask them for money and then that we would spend that money on supplies for the Humane Society.

We they turned their $50 to $355!!!

We had a blast buying all the supplies!!!

We had even more fun dropping them off!!! As we were unloading a stray cat walked right up to us so the kids were thrilled that they got to rescue a cat!! We were even allowed to go in and visit the animals, I balled- after all it had not even been a week since my Fluffer Nutters died, sniff, sniff. My crew was so sweet to me!

One of the neat things about working with youth is meeting all kinds of students. Every once in awhile you meet one you just fall in love with instantly and then they grow on you more and more. The young man below is one of those students. His heart is something in books; God's got plans for this young man and I am excited to see what they are!

We play a game called Mafia on all our trips, usually Matt, Kev and I get voted out pretty quick. It's a great game, full of lying and deceit, here's a group playing. I know aren't we the best: serving the community while playing lying games!!! *smile*

I just love this picture of my dear friend.

We had a student who had just graduated from high school come every night at 7pm to lead worship songs. Later in the week my Justin had the opportunity to lead a song at the Assisted Living Facility his team visited and well as lead some kids in a song during our annual Missions Talent Show (sorry no pics are allowed at the talent show- hey attendance has it's privileges)

Packing up is always an adventure in itself!

My new friend and bedmate, Christie- too bad she's headed off to college this year!

Part of my crew.

Lastly we had to do a clean up on the vans we were driving in. This is a shot you get when middle schoolers run the camera.
We had a good week and nothing got broken until the last hour when we were waiting for parents to arrive.

So, I we survived another middle school mission week. I was really stretched on this trip, more than any other. I really was taken another step in my walk with the Lord. One of the truths I learned was this:

Mistakes will happen. Some will be a direct result on my actions and decisions, some will be the result of others action/decisions. Still some have no origin to blame. Either way I must trust the Lord with both.

Loving students age 11-14,

-Michelle