Sunday, July 7, 2013

Indy 2013: So much more than just a road trip!

So I have sat down to write this blog a couple of times, I have started it in my head even more. Naturally I am deciding to do it while I should probably working on my test which is due tomorrow or my make up assignment from missing class during the trip. I'm not really sure where to start, what is really important and how in detail to go.

Let me start by saying I had been considering going on the trip for about a month before Joey asked if I was interested in going. When he did ask me my natural reaction was to say no. Those of you who know me know I am hardly an adult. I have avoided being one as much as possible, so going on this trip would be brining me way to close to actually being one. As I started to really think about it the more I felt lead to go.

For over a year I had been praying every night for my path to be shown to me. I have been looking for a place to fit in within the work force. For something I would really want to do for the rest of my life. I had began to feel like I was being called to work with kids, high school or middle school age. Although, I wasn't really sure if that was something I really wanted to do. I decided to use the mission trip as a way to see if working with that age group was really something I wanted.

To say the trip was life changing may be going a bit too far and sound a little clique, but it definitely was way more amazing than I could have imagined it to be. I honestly wasn't crazy excited about going, I was pretty blah about it. Hence the fact that at 7pm on the night we were scheduled to leave three hours later I still wasn't packed. But within a couple hours and several different conversations with our students I realized why I was suppose to be there.

Let me take a minute and just say that I am beyond proud and honored to know the students at City Life! They have changed they way I am looking at the future. If they are any indication of the people that are in this world we will be ok. They are some of the most giving, selfless, and hard working people I know!!! I learned so much from them, their personal stories and their actions while we were gone. I'm pretty sure I came away from this trip changed more by the students we took than the work we were doing. (I really hope that is ok!)

This trip quickly become about more than just painting a few buildings, pulling weeds or organizing a thrift store. It was about giving hope and inspiration to not only the people who would be using those ministries but for myself and for the students. On the last night in Indy I'm sitting in the debrief with the students listening to them speak about what the week had meant to them, it was then that it hit me, this is what I am suppose to be doing. I am suppose to be working with this age group.

I have no idea what this is going to look like. Will I get a job some where and work full time with the age group? Or am I being called to just be a leader on our student team? Well for now I'm taking the steps to do both. I have begin applying for jobs within the school district as well as a few non profit organizations, and I am currently in a "probation" period with the student team to make sure I want to be a leader. What I do know is that I want to be part of their walks with our Lord and Savior, I want to go to their games and watch them play/cheer, I want to develop a relationship with them where they feel comfortable to come to me when they have an issue, and I want to see what they will make of themselves and how they will change the world. Because believe me these kids are going to do some AMAZING things!!!

I want to take a moment and just ask those of you who are reading this to say a prayer for me as I continue to follow this path I feel God is laying in front of me but also please pray for these students. They are not only the future of our church, they are the future of our city, our country and our world!