Mission Trip reflections

Although your weeklong mission trip is over, God is still moving in you and through you! I’d like you to think about how this experience has changed you.

How has it changed…

your understanding of God?

your understanding of yourself and how God sees you?

your view of the world?

What have you learned…

about serving?

about following Jesus?

In thinking specifically about your ministry in Washington DC…

What/who made the biggest impact on you?

What surprised you about ministry?

What thought(s) or question(s) have stuck with you since you’ve been back?

How do you think God will use this trip to shape your future (where you live, where you spend your money and on what, how you treat people, your career)?

Now that you’ve been back for several weeks…

What have you enjoyed the most?


What things have most gotten on your nerves?


What do you anticipate others’ responses will be to changes in you?

How are you personally going to continue on this journey?


I urge you to keep serving here in Michigan! Our church has many, many opportunities for you to continue working toward helping others. Here are a few that are coming up soon:

Intergenerational mission project at Wayne County Family Center on Saturday, July 28. Picnic dinner and games with the homeless families that live in this shelter.

VBS at Geneva starting August 13! Help guide children, make snacks, sing songs and more!  

Thursday

Our last day of work…We started the day hopeful that we could continue serving the community of Washington DC, but also sad that it was our last day. We have had such an amazing time here. We saw God every day. Our youth are an amazing group of individuals. They showed leadership skills, servant's attitudes and a desire to do their best all week. I am always so proud and pleased with the group of young people that I bring here. 

Today, we were at the same sites as yesterday - Debbie’s group cleaned the inside of two seniors' homes today. Not a very fun job to say the least, some of the rooms were kinda bad… However, they actually met a descendant of John Wilkes Booth! Dan’s group helped to make the Parks for People building beautiful as he finished up some landscaping (it was hot today!) Nancy’s group worked with the Alzheimer’s patients at Clusters, playing games, watching travelogues and doing art therapy with them.

This evening we had a cookout and relaxed in the park before club. Jessica and Caitlin have a wonderful story to share with you on Sunday about something that happened this evening at the cookout. Don't miss it!

A Thursday night Youthworks’ tradition is a foot washing ritual. As usual. this is one of the highlights of the trip. It gets quite emotional when we wash each other’s feet and pray for each other. A Geneva tradition is for the youth to wash the Youthworks’ staff’s feet.  There is so much love in the room during this ritual, it’s too much to try to explain. You really need to experience it yourself (talk to one of us about joining the youth on next year’s mission trip!)

We look forward to taking showers and seeing you all Sunday! I ask for prayers for safe travel as we head home after making a visit to one of the Smithsonian Museums before we hit the road.

Thank you again for your prayers and support,

Nancy, Dan and Debbie

Wednesday

New work sights today! Debbie’s group worked with an organization called Age-in-Place.  This organization helps seniors who need assistance with various things around their home. They worked in a garden, scraped and repainted a patio, then helped create care packages at the center itself. Dan’s group worked at the building where Nancy’s group was earlier this week. They continued to help renovate the building, working both outside and inside. Nancy’s group spent the day at a place called Clusters, an adult day care center. Many of the people had some form of dementia but we were able to interact with them playing games and just talking. One man was 100 years old! (see picture)

Tonight we attended a mid-week urban youth service. While this type of service was very different from what we’re used to the kids really seemed to get a lot out of the message. Ask them about it when you see them!

The Youthworks staff has been great this week. Christina, the site director is so flu of joy- she's always smiling! Shawn, our program coordinator has wonderful rapport with the kids, and delivers  great messages each night at club. (we've also enjoyed having him 'lead the way' in our car each night when we go out for our evening activities.) Akelia is a terrific service coordinator and also shows us the love of Jesus with her exuberance! Sarah, the other service coordinator arrived just days before we did. She's been a terrific inspiration to all of us with her empathy and caring.

Only one more day of work…. It’s really hard to believe we’ve done so much in so little time, but we still feel like we could do so much more…

We can’t wait to share our stories with you on Sunday.

Thank you again for praying for us. We definitely feel it here. 

Debbie, Dan and Nancy

Tuesday!

We had our second day at the same places we worked on Monday. Dan’s group (Madelyn, Steven and William) spent their morning at the women’s shelter hanging out with the women there and cleaning the building and the afternoon at the men’s homeless shelter. Debbie’s group (Caitlin  and Jessica) spent their morning with the day care center working with the kids and their afternoon spending time with adults with cerebral palsy. Nancy’s group (Beth and Amanda) continued renovations at the Parks for People office. Tomorrow we all go to new work sites for the last two days.

 

This evening, after dinner, we went to the Capitol building. We spent some time outside praying and then had the chance to go inside and watch from the gallery and watch some members of the House of Representatives in session. From what we could gather they were deliberating an amendment to something. We all thought it was pretty cool. We have a really amazing story to tell that happened tonight, but you’ll have to wait to hear it on Sunday.

I’m always so impressed by our youth when I’m with them on mission trips. They are always so insightful during our church group discussion times, jump right in when work needs to be done, and make a point of talking with youth from other churches. I always look forward to seeing God’s love pouring out of these students. I have not been disappointed this week. I especially enjoy seeing the spiritual growth that is taking place here. It’s really been a wonderful experience so far.

It seems that, although we are all very tired , this week is going by super fast. We spend so much time preparing for this trip, months of fundraising, and thinking about coming and now it’s almost half over!

Your prayers continue to bless our journey!

Your brother and sisters in Christ, 

Dan, Debbie and Nancy