This morning the youth helped the YMCA with trash clean up. Afterward, we met in the meeting room to make our lunch and hang out for a bit. Once the bus arrived we headed to the Victim's Advocacy Center. We had helped out there before and some of the jobs were the same, but they planned ahead, knew we were coming and were prepared for our larger group. The youth did a lot of things:
stained the fence, painted the rails and trim, did some weedy-wacking, did spring cleaning inside the center-sanitized rooms, toys, threw away toys, boxed up toys for storage, organized rooms, vacuumed, cleaned windows, fixed signage, did some landscaping, and did it all within 2 1/2 hours!
In fact they ran out of stain and were only able to complete the outside of the fence...and interestingly enough, I chose 'stained' as my blog title because of it's application to us as Christians. As mentioned earlier, the youth have been given a chance at campfire to share...and many have shared out of their brokenness. Many have shared the 'stains', guilt, and sin that they've been dealing with or ignoring. This has been a very powerful and uplifting experience for many of the youth-some are uncomfortable, but in a good way...they feel convicted and conflicted about whether or not they should share. For example...some of the youth leaders said that some of the youth have said this: 'I know I should say something/I need to say something, but I can't'. (or something to that affect). The bottom line is these youth are sharing their stains (Romans 3:23) and are learning about the freedom of community and the stains of Christ's blood shed for us all (Matthew 20:28)
Again, keep these young people in your prayers as they dig deeper into His Word, His Will and His Plan for their lives...
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