Life as a Jungle-Gym

I survived.

As soon as we got there and Mike went to register us (leaving me with the kids) I found myself hoisted into the air by our guys. It really wasn't that bad other than they set me down on my head. Actually the weekend was not completely as oriented around hurting me as I thought it might be. To be honest I did get hurt pretty bad the first night, but disappointingly enough it was my own fault. We were doing a scavenger hunt around the camp in the dark and our group was running to find the first clue. We had to go up this road that led up the mountain, so I wasn't too worried about it being dark because I could see the road and figured I wouldn't have to watch out for anything. So I was showing my prowess at running and I pulled ahead of the group a little ways. Mind you, I was running at pretty much full capacity up this hill with the kids when all of a sudden I find myself writhing in pain on the ground. Apparently they wanted to keep cars from driving up this path so they put a low lying chain across the pavement. I did not see it at all, so when it caught me right under the kneecaps and I landed knee first on the pavement it came as a total shock. I honestly didn't want to get up for a good 3 or 4 minutes it hurt so badly. All this happened within the first 4 hours of the weekend, so I was in mild pain the rest of the time there.

Of course this didn't deter them from trying to beat on me the rest of the weekend. I tried my best to test the pacifist ideal by not fighting back at all (which really, all they're looking for is a reaction), and I think that really helped keep it to a minimum. At one point during Club (where they have music, skits, and the speaker) they started a quasi-mosh pit during one of the praise songs. Before I knew what was happening I was surrounded by our group and they were all grabbing onto me. "On three, jump" they told me, so I thought "ok, this shouldn't be too bad." To be fair, it didn't end up being that "bad" but it was one of the scarier moments of the weekend when I found myself about 15 feet in the air not sure how I was supposed to land without killing someone or myself. (Don't get me wrong, these kids are not the spawn of Satan like I'm making them out to be. That's just how they have fun, and I spent the weekend learning how to live in their world.)

As a whole, although I survived, the weekend was somewhat frustrating for me. It was frustrating in the sense that I see a lot of potential in all of our kids, but that potential just seemed like it was in hiding the whole weekend. I grew up in a youth program tradition that was very oriented around student leadership. I was one of those student leaders. I wrestled with being a positive role model. I thought about what it meant to be a servant leader and sacrifice part of myself to make sure others were having good experiences. I just didn't see that at all this weekend. I spent most of my time with the guys, so I can't really speak for the girls, but the guys that I sensed could be great leaders seemed to just float through the weekend without even pushing themselves let alone pushing others to take seriously the message that was presented. The ones I could see being excellent leaders who could influence the tone of the entire group either a) spent all their time using their influence to become the center of attention and distract everyone else from anything worthwhile or b) spent all their time hiding behind the group "a" kids without taking the risk of stepping up.

It was just really frustrating because I've come to realize that there is an element to youth ministry that not even the best youth ministers can force on the group because it has to come from within the group itself. I think one of the most important jobs of the youth minister has to be empowering young people to be leaders among their peers. Mike has a "Student Leadership Team" set up, but I guess it's still in it's beginning stages. It's just so frustrating knowing that I can only take my influence and my example and my teachings so far.

The other frustrating part of the weekend was simply that I just didn't know what to say to the kids at some points. Now it wasn't that they were asking hard questions (well, that was sometimes part of it) but rather that I was just completely unprepared for what was coming out of their mouths. On the one hand I had part of the group saying things that I'm pretty sure a drunken sailor would think were inappropriate. I would tell them to stop, I would try to change the topic, I would try to explain the reasoning behind why they shouldn't talk that way, but nothing seemed to phase them. I wasn't sure what should be done in terms of discipline and Mike seemed just as frustrated but slightly more worn down by their vulgar talk.

People have asked me a couple times since I've been in Pittsburgh if I feel "called" to Urban Ministry. Up until this past weekend I've always responded with a non-committal I-don't-feel-strongly-either-way response. Now I'm not so sure. It's not that I don't have the patience, or the intellect to work with city kids, I'm just not sure I know how to reach them. I know I can't let one frustrating weekend get me down because in the end it was a fairly good time. I'm sick of thinking about it, though, so I will hopefully talk more about it with Mike on Wednesday. Until then I will just immerse myself in the story of Nehemiah and hope God speaks through me on Wednesday in ways that make sense to the kids.

Just small bumps

This week wasn't as stressful as the last one. The only bumps I had to get over this week were giving my second meditation at Youth Group and going to the High School retreat this weekend. My talk on Esther went pretty well. I keep going over so I am desperately trying to cut down my talks, but I'm not sure how to fit everything in that I want to say. It was really cool this last week to see the kids really paying attention to and getting involved in the story when I was telling it. To be fair, Esther is a pretty gripping story and I do my best to be a good story-teller and not pause or stop or mumble, but it was almost like I was looking out at a crowd watching a movie that they were totally into. Afterwards one of the high school girls sought me out to let me know that she really enjoys my talks so far. I guess she thinks they're interesting and likes that I try to break it down into different points. That was really a great moment for me. It really kind of makes me feel better about the whole going into ministry decision. When I was really young I wanted to be a writer and I always thought it was because I was a dork and read all the time, but I think now that it may have been because I love to tell stories.

Right now I'm just hanging out at the church until we leave for the weekend. All week long the rest of the staff has been telling me that they are going to be praying for me. I'm worried, but I'm not all that worried. Mike tried to tell me that my new name was "Jungle-gym" because the kids were going to be all over me (mind you, these are high-schoolers which is a little weird) but I just keep telling him that they're going to get bored when they realize they actually can take me down in under 3 seconds. Hopefully some of my more laid-back personality will rub off on these kids. If not, then hopefully I'll at least get a wicked cool looking scar from all the abuse I'm going to take.

There are times when I really miss Bluffton (ok, so that happens more often than not), but it is experiences like this weekend that make me realize that being in Pittsburgh is a once in a lifetime opportunity...unless they decide to throw money at me and bring me on full time. Mike keeps trying to convince me to come back for summer camp staff, but it would be a significant pay cut from my last two summers, plus I've invested so much of my sweat, blood, and tears into my own camp that it would be a shame to give it up. Who knows what God has in store though. One day at a time, though.

Pray for me this weekend.

Over the mountain

It's been awhile since I've updated, but that's because I feel like I've been trying to climb a mountain of stresses for the past week. This past Wednesday was my first go at giving the meditation for Youth Group. I ended up doing pretty much what I wanted to/have written about previously except I am not going to try to involve the Student Leadership Team. That would have been cool, but I'm not sure there would have been enough commitment from the kids. Plus, I thought that I was supposed to be speaking for 30 minutes, but after I got done with the first one he tells me that I was supposed to keep it around 20. Hey, if the Spirit moves me to ramble for ten more minutes, what's the problem. Anyway, the first talk went really well. The week leading up to it was really hard simply because I wanted to do well so badly that it was seriously all I could think about. I would lay in bed at night just going over how I was going to do this, or how I would say that, or where this part would come in better. It was actually a little unnerving. I spent a lot of time changing, rearranging, adding to, and cutting parts of the meditation right up until I gave it. I think it paid off, though. I was a little nervous about having the High School kids first because they are less apt to pay attention, but they were actually a better audience than the Middle School kids. They responded to my questions, laughed at my jokes, and best of all seemed contemplative when I was being serious. The only comments that Mike had to give me afterward were that it was a little too long, and I said the same thing a few too many times. Other than that, I think he was impressed. Now there's only three more to go.

Once I got that part of my mountain out of my head, I had to face yet another presentation the next day in class. The thing is, I couldn't focus on anything but Moses and the burning bush for the entire last week, so anything about this presentation just got pushed back. I got back from Youth Group on Wednesday night at about 9 and turned a few printed off articles, and a few powerpoint slides I had forced myself to start into a half hour (well, it ended up being too long) presentation by 1 o'clock the next morning. In the end, I thought I did a pretty good job. The assignment was to talk about a dilemma that the organization where we are interning has faced/will face. I chose to talk about what it means to be an intentionally cross-cultural church. I have always been intrigued by this part of Eastminster's vision statement. I wanted my presentation to be anything but usual, so I did my best to shake things up. I even made the class sing some gospel which went over better than I thought it would. I think the presentation lacked real "solutions" to the "dilemma", but I also concluded that there are no easy one-size-fits-all solutions to racial reconciliation within the church. I said at the end, that being intentional has to take on a case-by-case scenario because every congregation is different. A quote I found that I liked talked about how when we present the gospel to other people in their "heart language" we come to realize that our construct of reality is too small, our version of the gospel is incomplete. We cannot experience the fullness of God without understanding the fullness of other people's experiences.

Well, once I got over that hurdle, I decided to take a good long nap because I felt like I deserved it. Friday was pretty stress free. Mike and I took a roadtrip to Sam's Club to pick up snacks for the After School program. Roadtrips are always fun. I'm so thankful that I've been placed at an internship where I can feel comfortable just hanging out with my supervisor. It definitely makes life easier. Once I got back on Friday afternoon it was time to start focusing on the next hurdle. I was asked to fill in for the normal piano player for the praise band on Sunday. I was really nervous in the back of my mind all week simply because the normal guy is amazing, and a lot of the songs we do are completely new styles for me. We got the song list on Wednesday and since then, any chance I got I was trying to make sure I was ready. Then the Saturday morning rehearsal came and it was probably one of the worst musical experiences of my life. From the very first song it just felt like I couldn't do anything right. Even when I felt like I was doing the right thing it just sounded bad to me. I was trying to follow the sheet music Nikki gave me which went right with the CD's I had practiced with, but she didn't tell me that she wasn't going to be following the music and I was just expected to watch her and play the right thing. There were some many times when I wasn't even sure which key we were supposed to be in. And every time we had to stop I just felt like I kept getting looks from everyone like "what are you doing?" I was completely frustrated at Nikki for just expecting me to know what was going on and at myself for not being good enough or not practicing enough even though I felt like I was. The way that rehearsal went, it felt like it sounded like I hadn't practiced at all. I was nearly crying I was so frustrated at one point. I was supposed to stay afterward to observe the Children's choir, but I just had to get out of there. Added on to this was the fact that my parents were on their way and I wanted to show them that I was doing something productive with my life in Pittsburgh and coming to see me fumble through some praise songs didn't really fit that image in my head.

My parents got here that afternoon and I got to forget about all that for awhile. I showed them around the city, we went out for the early bird special (ha!), we visited Mt. Washington to see the lights, and then they headed back to their hotel. I came back and finally found enough resolve to stop being mad and frustrated and start trying to do something about me not being ready to play piano on Sunday. I practiced on the out-of-tune piano in the middle of an entire roomful of screaming kids here for the weekend for about an hour and a half. I had a better idea of what Nikki wanted now, but I still felt like I wasn't actually ready. The next morning I got to the church extra early and practiced even more. As I was sitting there waiting to start the first song during the service, I just decided to give all of it up to God. I didn't care about what Nikki or my parents or the congregation or the band or even myself thought. I just wanted to give my best effort to praise God with everything I had. It was only after that that I felt at peace about the situation and I was able to really play well. Granted, not everything was perfect, but I was giving it my all.

All I had left to do after that was entertain my parents for a few more hours. It was really nice to have a piece of home here for awhile. Even though we didn't really do anything except talk and eat, I was glad they came. I always try to be as happy as I can be where I'm at, so I don't really get homesick, but it's good to know that home gets Mark-sick and needs to visit every once in awhile. Well, like all the presentation I seem to give, this post is entirely too long. I need to go saturate myself in the story of Queen Esther before Wednesday rolls around again.

Making a small difference

Hawa, a 35-year-old mother of three, lives in the Vituka area in the city of Dar es Salaam. She sells both used and new clothes in the Vituka trading center. She also operates a restaurant alongside the shop. She received training in business and entrepreneurship from the Youth Self Employment Foundation, which has helped her expand her business.

Hawa requests a loan of $750 to purchase new and used clothing to sell in her shop.

Today I became a microfinance lender. I first heard about this organization from the speaker at Laurelville last weekend, and ever since then I have just been really intrigued by the entire idea of microfinance. I probably don't actually understand it, but here's what I think I know: People in poor countries cannot get loans from banks because they are high risk, they don't have capital to prove they can pay it back, they've never been to a bank before, etc. What microfinance is, then, is people making small loans to these people with little to no interest. There is a great website, http://www.kiva.org that connects regular people like me with regular people like Hawa Mohamed who have applied, been interviewed, and just need some money to build their business. The great thing about the whole process, though, is that there is only like a 3% chance that I won't get my money back. If I had just donated to charity I wouldn't have any real idea of where the money goes and no chance of getting it back. This way allows me to be actively involved in where I am investing my money, and there is that 97% chance that I will get my money back and be able to either withdraw it, or reinvest in someone else.

Now that I feel like I've totally confused everyone and even maybe myself, I just want to say that even though I feel like I'm over my head in college debt, I believe that God still calls us to give back. Maybe my parents who read this will think that I'm just throwing my money around and completely cut me off and I'll have to live on the street, but really it's just twenty-five dollars. There is a banner hanging up in the Pittsburgh Project that has a slogan that reads "The age of youth was made for heroic service and not for pleasure." As youth, yes I still consider myself slightly a youth, we have all this energy and potential. I want to use everything I have to create the heroic service that is needed in this world. I want to use my hands to do things for those who can't, my heart to love people who think they aren't worthy, my head to speak truth into people's lives that they can't discern themselves, and all of my assests to provide for people who cannot do it themselves. (I realize I was really close to being sued by 4H for stealing their idea, but I'll keep my "health" to myself for now...for those of you who don't understand that, go live in the country for awhile.)

I also want to finish by saying that I don't want to say these things to seem self-righteous, but more so that I can show people what I think is a great chance to make a difference. Maybe I'm wrong, but for now I'll trust that God can and will use my gifts in one way or another.

peace,
mark