“Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness before men, to be seen by them…When you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets as the hypocrites do, they have received their reward in full…But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” -Matthew 6:1-4

This week the EM staff and team from Fleming Island, Florida are learning about what it means to be humble as we serve together. This morning during team devotions, I stumbled across one of my favorite portions in Matthew. Chapter six talks about how we can keep our hearts in check as we serve people around us. Although I try to keep pure motivations when I’m serving, too often I focus on myself. It’s a strangely easy trap to get caught in during mission trips, a time when we are supposed to be focused on others.

Sometimes when I’m serving I think about how uncomfortable I am, or how tired I am. Even worse, I think about how my actions are making me look—Are others impressed by my efforts? Do they think I’m spiritual enough? Will people remember my name at the end of the week? Will I get credit for doing the little things? And when I start asking these selfish questions I have to remind myself, serving isn’t supposed to be about me.

The verse in Matthew 6:1-4 snapped me back into place this morning. As a servant, I must be humble. In fact, I shouldn’t even let my left hand know what my right hand is doing! Going on a mission trip or serving on a mission team is not about me.

Today I’ve made an intentional step toward humility. When I’m doing things merely to make myself look good, when I’m serving others so that I get a warm feeling inside—I stop. Because the truth about serving is, I should be invisible. When I step out of the spotlight, others can see God’s work more clearly.

Atlanta, GA

Heather D. Moline

July 2010

Stepping out of the Spotlight

Note: Experience Mission is sending our many more great trips to Atlanta and many more great communities throughout the summer of 2011 and are now posting trips for 2011! Check out our website for more information at www.experiencemission.org.

“Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.” -Romans 12:9-10

Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church Group

Week one of work in Atlanta has officially begun. Throughout the week the large group from Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church in Houston, Texas has been running kid camps, digging trenches, and navigating the highways of south Atlanta with one goal—to build real relationships.

The students of Memorial Drive’s youth group are no strangers to hard work. Many of the students have served on mission trips both domestically and internationally, so the team came ready for a week of physically demanding work. Although they have tackled several tough, meaningful projects—painting and digging an irrigation trench at the Initiative for Affordable Housing’s newest worksite, most of their Atlanta projects have been an exercise in developing relationships.

Trevor, a summer intern at Memorial Drive, spent Monday morning playing Bingo and chatting with an elderly man at Hapeville Care Home. Although the conversation seemed difficult and forced at first, Trevor was persistent—he wanted to be a real friend to the wheelchair bound man with a fading memory. He succeeded.
One of the adult leaders, Mary, said that she was impacted by the kids at the Kroc Day Camp because of the way they responded to a Bible lesson. The kids seemed genuinely interested in the skit and story that the team presented—grasping pieces of truth from the simple Bible message. When the afternoon ended, the team was sent off with a round of hugs from the campers. Another success.

Despite the successes of the team, they admit that doing relational ministry is difficult because you don’t always get to see the results. In fact, sometimes it might feel like you’re failing. Unlike a building or painting project, you don’t always get to see the difference you’ve made in the life of another person. You might walk away from a kids’ camp or a nursing home wondering if you made a lasting impact. But one thing the EM staff and Memorial Drive team has learned this week is that building relationships is rewarding work. At the end of the day, loving people and reflecting Christ into their lives is what matters most.

Atlanta, GA

Heather D. Moline

June 2010

Note: Experience Mission is sending out many more great trips to Atlanta and many more great communities throughout the summer of 2011! Check out our website for more information at www.experiencemission.org.

Team Atlanta just finished our first week of mission trip teams! The week prior to this, Landon, Kat, and I had been inundated with information about the upcoming summer including, housing and food details, the different sites we would be working at, and the Salvation Army. We were overwhelmed with all of the things that we learned, but it was so important that we went over everything before the teams arrived. A short lecture about the Salvation Army really allowed us to see and be able to participate in their vision. For me personally, the only thing I really associated the Salvation Army with was the different thrift stores, disaster relief, and the people collecting money at Christmas time. I had no idea the extent of their mission.
 The Salvation Army first began in 1865 by a man named William Booth. It consists of churches all around the world, and each church is called a Corps. The Corps we are working with specifically this summer is called the Kroc Center. This is named after Mr. and Mrs. Kroc who are the owners of McDonalds. They donated a bunch of money to the Salvation Army, and this money goes towards building community center churches like the Kroc Center all over the United States! They view their church as the hands and feet extended toward the community opposed to it just being the actual congregation. They believe that before you can meet a person’s spiritual need, you have to meet their physical need. They would not be able to do many of the ministries that we’re participating in this summer without all the amazing church groups that come here to serve! We are so blessed this summer to be working alongside such an amazing group of people, who really are sold out to serving and honoring Jesus Christ.
 Our peaceful and well-planned Monday soon turned into a time to put into practice the many things our team has been learning. Three different churches from Indiana, Kansas, and Florida pulled into our beloved Kroc Center at varying times throughout the afternoon on Monday. We had to be flexible and switch a few things around, but God was still in control in spite of all of our mistakes. We welcomed our mission trip teams in with a delicious dinner of hamburgers followed by a short orientation. By the end of the day, we were all very thankful that the teams had arrived safely and excited about starting our week out.
 Throughout the week, our teams were able to be involved in six or seven different sites. The Florida team worked on a foreclosed home with Kat. The Kansas team was also able to do some work at Sol Luna apartment complex. The Indiana group was able do some painting at Capital View Apartments. The Kansas and Indiana teams were involved with two different day camps at the Kroc Center Corps and also at the Jonesboro Corps. The Florida and Kansas teams were able to weed and plant flowers at Hapeville Manor nursing home, as well as, visiting with the residents and Carlton. We also were able to run two different kid’s clubs. One of the kid’s clubs was located at Capital View apartments complex. The Florida and Kansas teams both had the chance to share their love with the kids there. The other kid’s club was located at Colony South, which is a predominantly Hispanic trailor park. The Indiana group had the opportunity to stay all week here and really invest in the children’s lives.
 The first day of a mission trip is always the most interesting because everyone is learning to be flexible and getting oriented with what it will be like for the rest of the week. Not only was it the first day for our teams at the sites, it was also Team Atlanta’s first day with the different kids clubs, outreach locations, and construction projects. It was difficult at first to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but by the end of the week, everyone had a hard time saying good-bye. God was really able to use our weaknesses to do His glory.

-Danielle
June 20, 2009

Note: Experience Mission is sending our many more great trips to Atlanta and many more great communities throughout the summer of 2009 and are now posting trips for 2010! Check out our website for more information at www.experiencemission.org.

By Mo Scarpelli

Twins Arnet and Noel Le used to see their friend Trizznie Van every day in the neighborhood. He remembers her watching them play basketball, he remembers her playing Uno and checkers, and he remembers her sitting out on the steps leading up to his apartment building.

Two years ago, though, he formed a memory he wishes never happened – he saw her body wheeled away from her house in a body bag.

“It really shocked me,” said 16-year-old Arnet Le, who glimpsed Trizznie’s feet as she was taken out of her house a final time by the paramedics. “She’d talk about wanting to kill herself when she was angry, but I didn’t think she had the guts to really do it.”

Not more than a week after graduating from Gideons Elementary, the 14-year-old girl allegedly rigged two belts to a closet rod in her room in Capital View Apartments and hung herself.
The tragedy barely made the newspaper in a city of more than half a million people, especially coming from the Pittsburgh Community, a neighborhood where residents hear gunshots several nights a week.
But it devastated a core of people in the local neighborhood, too – the Salvation Army Lakewood Corps, to be precise.

“For her to turn up dead really shocked us into action,” said Captain Platt, director of the Lakewood Corps. “After Trizznie was buried, it really began to affect us that she was one of our kids. We decided we didn’t want to do outreach for outreach’s sake there – she gave us focus and mission for the kids.”
Captain Platt remembers first hearing the news. He grabbed a one of his cadets and drove to CVA, an area visited every so often by the Corps.

Platt, whose own daughter is only a couple of days from Trizzie’s age, shakenly walked up to the young girl’s house, ready to console and assist her family and neighbors.

“Some of the kids were outside talking, just hours after it happened,” Platt said. “And I realized, here I am trying to compose myself and these kids standing outside are already in the gossiping.”

To Platt, the scene was a clear example of how at-risk youth develop a defense mode that’s hard to break down.

“One of the chief survival mechanisms is knowing how to shut down any sense of pain,” said Platt. “It cripples you if you empathize or sympathize with all the pain you see here because you’ll see so much of it that you wouldn’t be able to function.”

Platt realized then the need for the Corps’ presence at CVA, where children may lose a sense of compassion amid violence and pain.

But the Corps as a whole realized the need for South Atlanta at-risk youth in general.

Captain Platt and a Lakewood Soldier, Jason Pope, approached CVA owner ** Leathers about creating a time and place to spend with the complex’s kids. He excitedly showed them a furnished basement already complete with books, games and a television. The area had been previously used for summer camp, adult English as a Second Language classes, and several other events during the year.
In just three months, the Lakewood Corps set up a full program with a Bible study, crafts, and free time with the kids.

Children’s ministry didn’t stop where Trizznie used to live, though.

Once the CVA program was up and running, Platt turned to another area the Corps visited often, but hadn’t quite dived into fully.

“My wife and I had been riding by Jonesboro [Colony Park] for three years and every time we did, we’d point to the community and say, ‘We need to be here,’” said Platt.

The Colony Park trailer park sits on Jonesboro road, across from a rundown liquor store and a welding factory. Most of the about 500 residents are Latino, and few adults speak fluid English.
Almost all the trailers in the park house at least three children. On sunny days, some come out to play on streets ridden with broken beer bottles and trash.

Platt and Pope wanted to form a constant presence in Jonesboro, but they lacked resources and helpers to show up four afternoons a week.

That’s when 24-year-old Daynas Viera, a recent graduate from Taccoa Falls College, found Captain Platt. She told him she felt called to minister specifically in Lakewood.

“It would scare the paints off some people to come here and minister permanently,” said Platt. “But Daynas did it. And as a Spanish-speaker, with her heart for kids, she was a perfect fit for Jonesboro.”
Daynas asked Platt what she could help with and his reply was, “Make friends.” After a Three Kings Day celebration for Colony Park families in January, that’s exactly what she and several other Salvation Army volunteers did in Jonesboro.

Now, more than thirty Jonesboro kids show up for the day’s activities.
Experience Mission volunteers also chip in each day for the summer. They lead games, scribble chalk drawings, and role-play Bible stories for the kids, but more importantly, they just maintain a positive presence for the Salvation Army.

“Trust is the most expensive commodity,” said Platt. “You could give Christmas dinners to a whole community, but that wouldn’t gain the trust. You need to have faithful accountability, people need to see you from time to time.”

Experience Intern Matt Crouch knows this – the first several weeks he spent in Jonesboro, some mothers would hardly crack their doors open for him when he asked if their kids would come out and play.

Now, after six weeks, mothers chat and joke with him in Spanish and then smile as he walks away, hand in tiny hand with their young ones, to where the Salvation Army hold activities.

“The parents have been burned a little more,” said Platt. “They hold their cards a little closer. If you lived in a jungle, you’d be suspicious of every little thing you saw, heard, or ate. When the Salvation Army shows up, what they really want to know is, ‘Are these people my friends?’”
Gregoria Sanchez, a 28-year-old mother of three, has been living in Colony Park for four years and speaks almost no English. She usually sticks around the house, but she is grateful that her kids don’t have to anymore.

“If they didn’t come, the kids would not go out, I would keep them here and they would play in a small room,” says Sanchez. “They are excited to go to the activities, and I trust they will stay out of trouble there.”

Sanchez’s main concern is that her kids stay in school. In such a tight-knit community, the children are influenced mostly by the teens around them – and the Salvation Army has noticed that many Colony Park teens drop out.

“If you are well educated, you will stay away from drugs and drinking,” says Sanchez, whose parents attended only primary school in Mexico. “I want my children to be well-educated.”
Platt knows many parents of at-risk youth in South Atlanta like Sanchez that would give anything for their kids to have better, but simply don’t have the resources.

“Every day I see a place where we need to be,” said Platt. “The fields are white, we want to be out there.”

As the Corps tries to maintain a constant presence in both Jonesboro and Pittsburgh, street ministry proves to be hard work for both Salvation Army workers and Experience Mission volunteers alike.

“The important thing to remember is that when Experience Mission partners with us, they become the Salvation Army,” said Captain Platt. “They are the face of the Corps, that’s how the neighborhoods see it. And it’s been a blessing, because we could make a lot of things happen without money, but not without people.”

**To learn more about what Experience Mission is doing, visit our website at www.experiencemission.org.

Find a Urban Mission Trip in Atlanta or another city in the USA:
www.experiencemission.org

Christian Youth Mission Trip
Walking through the Jonesboro Trailer Park in Atlanta this summer, Jason Pope of the Salvation Army saw something that in most communities would be considered fairly shocking: As a black lab with no apparent owner wandered along, several teenagers drove up, stopped to shoot the animal with a BB gun, and then drove away.

Sadly, the incident was one of many reflecting a general environment of chaos and instability in the dilapidated, impoverished community comprised mostly of struggling immigrants.

“It’s hard to describe it exactly, but it would remind you of being in a two-thirds world country and seeing poverty when you’re there,” Pope said. “There are no boundaries for the kids in that community. Another kid walks up with a dead squirrel, playing with it like it’s a puppet, trying to get it to climb up trees, and we try to explain to him that he shouldn’t do that, that he could get sick.”

“When there’s no hope there, they just make stuff up,” Pope said.

Like other teams working in new urban communities across the country this year, the Experience Mission Summer Staff Intern team assigned to Atlanta had to adopt an approach of patience, consistency and sensitivity to try to reach the children.

Most kids in the struggling community were generally defiant and uncontrollable and had grown up surrounded by outside influences that glorified gang culture, intern Matt Crouch said, adding that one gang in particular had a heavy influence on the community.

“These guys growing up are seeing that’s the way to get the money, that’s the way to be cool,” he said. “So they’re 10, 11 years old and they’re trying to be part of the gang.”

Crouch said he and fellow interns were the regular objects of curse-laden tirades or obscene gestures as they returned to the community day after day to forge new inroads. At one point, Crouch was even bitten by one boy.

“He just wasn’t happy that he got out in four square. He was just going crazy, and I had to hold him back from hitting another kid, so he decided to bite my arm,” Crouch said. “I just had teeth marks and bruises for a week.”

But they didn’t let that incident or the constant deriding they received from many children dissuade them, and instead showed up every day and walked through the community to talk with families there. Crouch speaks Spanish—something that allowed him to communicate more personably with the dozens of Mexican families living there.

It was slow going, but Crouch said he found that if was able to win over the confidence of one family member, it most often translated into an open door with the entire family.

He said it was startling to see some poverty stricken families working to instill healthy discipline in their kids while others approached parenting with a sort of abandon. More active parents, he said, were constantly worried about the negative impact of the rebellious, uncontrolled children.

“It was amazing just to see the different sides of the spectrum and how they can exist so close in one community, and how they can affect each other.”

Results worth the effort
Slowly, Crouch said, holding Kids’ Club in the community every day and having the same three interns show up consistently started to send a trickle of structure through the group they were working with. That had been the hope from the beginning.

“One of our great challenges was to build at least some set of boundaries so they could feel safe and have some kind of discipline throughout the summer,” Pope said, adding that the only place they had to hold Kid’s Club, in an open field, didn’t necessarily help add to the sense of order.

Still, Pope said community members noted the improved demeanor of the 25-30 children who regularly participated in the Kid’s Club. He said their language could be used as one barometer of their progress, and recalled one day when a particularly prolific young boy went a whole day without cursing. One of the interns complimented him.

“I asked him how that felt, and he said, ‘It feels good,’” Pope said.

He said major improvements like those were most visible in the last few weeks of the summer. Pope said that while mission teams have been to Jonesboro Trailer Park before, they typically came for one isolated week. Having a stable leadership team and a consistent flow of volunteers made a significant difference this year.

“They always knew they were going to have that consistency week after week and it wasn’t just a drive by deal,” he said.

By the end of the summer, what would have been a five-minute walk through the trailer park turned into an hour-long trek for Crouch—he was stopped for small chats at nearly every home he passed.

“That was what was so hard about leaving,” Crouch said. “It takes about that much time—I was there two months, every day—to finally be accepted, where people finally start trusting you significantly.”

All urban locations initially tough
EM Executive Director Chris Clum said it was similarly difficult to make headway in other stateside urban communities, but that like in Atlanta, volunteer teams ended up spearheading the establishment of new, potentially life-changing bonds.

“Early on, we struggled in the urban communities,” Clum said. “It was a bear the first half of the summer. But the relationships we formed with our partners…it was extremely rewarding to the teams. We were able to make some pretty strong inroads, and it made a significant impact.”

In Portland, Maine and Fort Wayne, Ind., volunteers had the opportunity to work with predominately Muslim refugees—something of a unique experience for a stateside mission trip.

“There were many opportunities to talk about Christ with the Muslims, and it was done in a very appropriate way, so we’re always pleased about that,” Clum said.
Experience Mission is offering Summer 2009 trips to Atlanta, Portland, Fort Wayne, Baltimore and other urban locations. Learn more at www.experiencemission.org or call the EM office at 360-732-0986.

Urban Mission Trips ::  Atlanta Mission Trips :: Experience Mission :: www.ExperienceMission.org
The following blog was originally written for Krista Jensen’s Facebook friends.

By Krista Jensen

Atlanta, GA - Summer Mission Trips
Most of you may know the opportunity that was given to me this summer but for those of you who do not, I was given a job as a student intern with a mission organization called Experience Mission with the title of Outreach Coordinator. Little did I know about the tremendous amount of responsibility that would be placed on my shoulders.

I was placed in the south side of Atlanta, GA with three other amazing interns, Adrienne, Lyndee and Matt, where we would embark on a journey of struggles and triumphs. I love these people to death and they have become such a great part of my life! Our task this summer was to take the leadership role of a short-term mission trip and coordinate each team that would come to Atlanta every week. Youth groups traveled far and wide from South Dakota, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and South Carolina and joined us for a week that would change their lives. For most of the teams coming from small rural towns, Atlanta was a big cultural shock for them and even those teams from inner cities themselves their eyes were open to a whole new life that they didn’t even know existed.

It’s amazing the poverty you can find in your own city, being fully aware that it exists but just never seeing it face to face. Why can we go to the depths of poverty, gangs, violence, drugs and prostitution in an unfamiliar city, but when it comes to our own it’s an untouchable place?

While we were in Atlanta, we partnered with the Salvation Army Lakewood Corps with whom we had most of our service and outreach ministries. These ministries consisted of painting the outside of an apartment complex in the scorching Atlanta heat, and two locations for Kids Clubs in the afternoon. Aside from the Salvation Army, we also had ministry locations with the Initiative for Affordable Housing where a nature trail was being made as well as other small construction projects, and a few times in the summer we spent time building relationships with the clients at the 24/7 Gateway Homeless services center and volunteered behind the scenes help at the Atlanta Community Food Bank.

Needless to say, us interns had our work cut out for us this summer. But we knew that we would not be only, not only did we have the teams that came in, but we had a huge support at the Lakewood Corps church but specifically Jason Pope and Daynes Viera were our biggest and greatest support. They were not only awesome, amazing people with a heart and a vision for their community and so much fun to work with but they instantly became our closest friends and family. I thank God so much for the relationships that we were able to build with each other and with the congregation at Atlanta Lakewood. Another huge blessing that i can say for all of us would be Ms. Lynn our amazing, comical cook who made dinner for us all summer.

With that just being a basic intro, many people have asked me “so, how was Atlanta” and usually I just give the short, “it was amazing, best summer of my life” not because I don’t have much to say but that if i were to tell everyone exactly how it was, i would be talking for years! Writing this is a good way of reflection for me but it also benefits ya’ll who read it as well!

God taught me endless amounts of things this summer, about my life and about him as well. I know that i will continually be learning from things that has happened this summer. Even things that i thought i had learned a while ago, God would just use situations and people as a reminder.

I would like to share this verse of scripture. It is one that many of you probably have heard before–Matthew 25:35-40:

“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’”

I am a firm believer of this passage, you can serve God in a lot of ways but i believe that to truly serve the face of God you need to be serving the “least of these.” We need to look outside of our self-recognition and see these people as children of God, loved by God despite their circumstances. In the Bible, it is told that Jesus hung around the poor, unclean, liars, cheaters and prostitutes so shouldn’t we do the same? We are created by God, loved by God, chosen by God to be like him to others and demonstrate his love so what does it mean when we choose to not do that? Ultimately it shows that those “lower than us”(described by the world) are not deserving of that love. And who are we to determine who is deserving of Christ’s love, for it is a gift given to us by the one who wants everyone to know.

Matthew 16:24-26 says:

“Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?”

Just like this passage says, we must deny ourselves, and deny our comfort and opinions of the world and although we might lose status in the world it would be much better than losing our soul. For if Christ is the one that we live for and love than we must go to the depths, go to the unseen and “unclean” and show them that their is no difference between you and I, show them that even though the world says that we’re different, that is not what I, in Christ believe.

You wouldn’t believe the amount of homeless people that we met this summer who was blown away by the fact that we would touch them, shake their hands, touch their shoulder, even hug them. Because they were dirty, hadn’t showered in however many days and seen as a disgrace to society.

My heart was broken even more for God’s people this summer, and it’s my heart’s utmost desire that more Christians would see the least and lost as God’s people too. And wouldn’t care about losing their life in order to gain something greater.

See, I told you that I could talk for years, and this is just one thing God has laid on my heart his summer. This summer, I laughed, cried, danced, was challenged, broken and faced down on the floor before God.

If you want anymore stories, feel free to talk to me.

To God be the Glory for all the things he has done!

Check out upcoming Christian mission trips for youth groups!
www.experiencemission.org

Our week off from teams was begun by a little hang time with the team we had just worked with for four days. We took a trip to the Coke Factory and afterwards spent some time in Centennial Park across the street. I was very sad to see this team leave. In my first experience leading a trip like this, they were extremely optimistic and flexible as we all got used to the inner city environment. Veteran short-term missionaries themselves, they were able to give us great insight all the way along as we found routine during the first week. Four days is just enough time to feel comfortable with someone and become ready to go deeper, and unfortunately we won’t have much more than four days with any of our teams.

I spoke to Lisa Wise with Affordable Housing this morning, and she was so impressed with the work this team did, and is super excited for the next team coming on Sunday. All of the people we worked with last week had a positive experience and are looking forward to the rest of the summer.

On one of our days off, we went to Piedmont Park, which is close to the Lakewood Corps. Lyndee, Matt, and Jason played soccer with some friends they made in the park and then we had a little downtime before a man named Leonard came up and started talking to us. He was appalled when he found out that I had just sat there while the others played soccer and make me get up and throw the football with him so that I would be active J. I ended up getting a lesson on catching the football and spent 45 minutes chasing throw after throw. “Two hands!!” he kept yelling, “you GOTTA use two hands!” I WAS using two hands…every time…I just couldn’t catch, lol. The session ended with him asking me to help him and his family out a little financially. After hearing that some of his family members were fishing by the lake, I told him we would love to meet them and we all walked down to meet Elaine and Marissa, who were catching 4-inch bluegills for dinner. I asked him where they lived and he said they were over by another park down the road. Marissa is 10 years on and I believe Leonard and Elaine are her grandparents.

It was great that Jason was with us, as he was able to let them know about family centers the Salvation Army runs, similar to Gateway, where families could have some time to get on their feet. I don’t know if I’ll ever see Leonard again, but it was a blessing just to spend some time with him talking and tossing a football around.

Pray for that family, and the others like them who make their homes in parks around Atlanta.

We are gearing up for our next team coming in a few days. Tonight we’ll get to visit with Matt’s family who are driving down from North Carolina. Sunday begins six weeks straight of work with teams coming down. I’m so excited!

Adrienne

The last mission trip was very involved and very encouraging. We had our schedule down so well we had free time we didn’t know what to do with. An entire building at Capitol View Apartments got painted. A colony of rats was driven out of the dumpsters Sol Luna Apartments, while 50 more feet of trail was begun. The kids at Lakewood Corps enjoyed some time at camp. Kids at the CVA Kid’s Club became the teachers when they led a dance class for the team. There were moments at Jonesboro that resembled structure – minus the time that Matt got bit.

The kids at both the CVA and Jonesboro kid’s clubs have begun to put more trust in the leaders, as well as the teams that are coming. Some of the kids at CVA latched on to the team members that were there consistently and continued to ask about them into this next week of the summer. Jonesboro is still proving to be challenging, but extremely rewarding. One girl asked for a Bible so she would be able to study the stories they heard more. A little girl picked a fight with Lyndee and banned her from her porch, only to be smiling for pictures with her the next day.

We started a new site with the Initiative for Affordable Housing. Magnolia Circle is their senior center. We spent a few days mulching, picking up trash, digging trenches, and playing Shuffleboard, while the residents watched from the porches or pointed out places we missed with the wheel-barrows. Some of them actually came out to see what we were doing, and it was great to visit a bit. The manager at that site, Dee Dee, is an amazing woman with a heart for her work and for her tenants.

Relationships are being built all over Atlanta, including just off the interstate on our way to Lakewood. Lyndee and Krista began making a couple extra lunches in the mornings to give to people they saw on the street during the day as they drove around. One day we hadn’t given them away yet and we noticed a man that we had seen nearly every day at the intersection right before we get on the interstate. I ran out and gave him both lunches before I learned that his name is Jose Lopez. A few days later, Krista, Matt, and Lyndee took another man from the same intersection to dinner at Wendy’s. His name is Larry Crawford. We’ve continued to see them almost daily and they’ve even begun to recognize a couple of us when we drive by. We decided to take the next step, and they both will be joining us for dinner and the evening service at Lakewood on Wednesday night. We are so excited! We aren’t sure where these relationships are going.

Hopefully we can at least get them plugged into Lakewood. Larry has family that may be able to help him get back on his feet if he can get into contact with them, so we will be working to try to get a hold of them. I’m sure both of these men have great stories, and I’m excited to get to know them better!

God bless!

Adrienne