Thursday June 19th, 2008
Praise God! I write this message in such awe of the things that have happened at Bridge of Hope through the blessings and presence of an amazing youth group from Mustang, OK. Our first night of VBS was more than we ever dreamed and was a huge success! I believe we “jacked the swagger of the King!”(ask your teens and leaders about that one)
But I would be getting way ahead if I jumped right into an outstanding evening! A trip to the Arch started their Thursday. A St. Louis icon and a breathtaking view from the top. From the pics you can see that that our Mississippi is flooded onto the landing but they were still able to go up in the Arch. Parking was tricky but they pressed on and 5 minutes later in a TINY elevator they arrived at the top.
Of course, there hasn’t been a day yet where there wasn’t hard manual labor involved.(and they still like us?) Try 20 yards of mulch. Thanks to Hansen’s Tree Service they came down to the city in a dump truck and poured the load right there in the street and at a price that was probably the cost of their diesel fuel only. What a blessing! So that is what they did for 4 to 5 hours straight. Dug out the bed, removed the dirt, shoveled wheelbarrel after wheelbarrel of mulch. The yard is beginning to look like a park! During all this, I must tell you that people in the neighborhood stop and look. They are taking notice and it is fantastic. I write this message trembling because it is bigger than us and God is in it!!! It is about relationships and the Mustang teens and leaders have done just that with our neighbors.
Vacation Bible School was awesome! We had 47 children from the neighborhood and our daughter Emma! 97 total with wokers! Our opening songs and bible story was so good and the kids were engaged and listening. Then games, snacks, PLAY TIME WITH TEENAGERS(they loved that), and a closing ceremony with trivia about the night and hip hop concert. Being in youth ministry here in St. Louis for 8 years prior to the current position we had a lot a hip hop concerts for teens. So how relavent is this music even to the youth of today. Titus and Chi’ke are dear friends and preachers of the Word in their songs. We danced and sang and the kids thought they met someone famous. It was really fun. What great role model for these youth people.
We ended the night with moving our new friends, Jimmy, Kai, and their son Jaylen across town. Jimmy loves the Lord and recently got a full time job and things are turning around for his family. But unfortunatley has to move out of his present house. It was a humbling experience. His entire contents fit in half the horse trailor. If we were being honest our bedrooms alone probably would not fit in the horse trailor. Perspective. Who has it better? We are learning so much and being challenged in so many ways.
We can hardly wait to see what will happen night two of VBS! Pray Pray Pray!
No comments yet.
RSS feed for comments on this post.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
