Me, Tiffany & Kristi on Rock Star night!
Rock Stars!
Ha Ha! Brady Didrickson, he had to wear the wig this night and loved it!
Will & Kristi :o)
:o) Love it!
This week has been a long one. Not only are we just really running on low energy, but we have had a pretty rough group of kids. Head leaders had to deal with EVERYTHING this past week. There was a large amount of drugs taken from kids this month along with a lot of gang activity. We were waiting for any minute a fight to break out. It was kind of scary to see the kids dressed in all black and blue and look across the field to see the kids all in red. They had their little "Whistle Code" and had a few run ins with each other, but thankfully all fights were held off.
Head leaders had their work cut out for them this week with the late night sneaking out and the high amount of guys and girls trying to sneak off together. However, it is awesome because these are the kinds of kids that we want here at camp. If this was a camp full of Christians, we would not have a job to do. This is an outreach organization and I feel like head leaders, program, the speaker and all summer staff and work crew truly did an awesome job trying to reach out to these kids. Whether they accepted Christ or not this week, they heard about him and how HE wants to know them and be a part of their lives and loves them unconditionally. That is a big step either way.
It was really cool to see how a lot of the "Thug" kids really loved Jeremy. They would go out of their way to find him and give him a hand shake with a chest bump. It is so good for them to see someone who grew up with a similar up bringing as them, make it out of the ongoing routine of drugs and violence to a life filled with happiness, hope, love, and most of all FAITH! You could tell that those kids looked at Jeremy like he was something different and that they were interested in a life like that.
For that reason alone, I have really been thinking more about Jeremy starting an Urban area in Albuquerque. He has gone through a training called Latino Student Staff and is now certified to be an area director for that kind of an area. I have always been nervous though about it because I don't see myself relating to kids who are really involved in drugs and gangs but I feel like they kind of get jipped sometimes. So we have been praying about what God would like for us to do with that. If he was to start an Urban Area, he can be an area director in Albuquerque. If not, there really isn't much work for him left in NM because there are already area directors in ABQ and Jon Guerra is trying to get Rio Rancho started. I definitely don't want to leave Albuquerque, so this may be our only option and one that I am slowly starting to be ok with.
It is a challenge to work with rough kids, but if it weren't challenging, we would not be doing Gods work to the fullest. We can not only minister to the easy kids, we have to put ourselves in uncomfortable situations in order to be able to reach everyone, everywhere as well as grow in Christ ourselves.
MY prayer this week is that EVERYONE who reads this or hears about what we are doing, will go out and allow themselves to be stretched and maybe even feel a little uncomfortable, but tell someone else about the LOVE of Jesus Christ. Its not always easy, its not supposed to be. But we need to do it! Its what we are called to do.
LOVE YOU ALL SO SO MUCH!
