Today is the third day I have been back from my summer away from Colorado. When I think back upon it, I can't help but be struck by everywhere I went in three months. San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis... It really is funny to me that I just picked up, left everything here and went off and did that. It wasn't easy.
The first part of the summer I was racked with a sense of fun at being in San Francisco and Seattle but I missed home. I missed Megan, I missed my band, I missed my family... I was without a doubt homesick. There was something else burning inside me. It was the culmination of years and years of cynicism, brought on most succulently by feelings of disappointment in my local church body. Feelings of fakeness and feelings of wanting to leave Christianity and religion behind. Yet, I was getting ready to spend my summer in St. Louis "serving God." Strange place to be, huh? The last week of May I traveled to Minneapolis to do training for my summer working for YouthWorks! The week was exhausting, intense and ended with me taking a full day off to do nothing but pray, think and come to the realization that I really didn't believe in the power of Christ or God anymore. Sure they were far off spiritual entities, but as for being moving, salient, real being that impacted my life... it wasn't there. I was finally honest with myself... I didn't give a shit. Yet, something still lingered, triggered by a friend who said what I needed to hear, even if I fought it with everything in my being. I was given the choice to stay and continue to St. Louis or at my own expense, leave Minneapolis and head back to Colorado. Those of you who know me, know that I continued to St. Louis.
Those first weeks were a blur of 50-75 people coming in and out, me organizing them into work crews, contacting and setting up "ministry sites" at non-profits in north St. Louis, doing skits, giving a morning devotion and feeling like the biggest fake in the whole of the Earth. I remember one day in particular going outside, sitting down while the youth did their devotions and thinking to myself, as I stared blankly... "I can't do this if I'm going to feel like this." It was going to be a long, hard, lonely summer...
Then I noticed something. I noticed that people's lives were being changed. At first, it was nothing more than being excited that two of the youth got the reason we partnered with a site (after I spent a good 15 minutes telling them why, never feeling like it got through). Then they got it. They understood. We were there to help and be the hands and feet to this organization. God began to move in me again, even if I didn't notice. I saw this same reaction from here on out, continued to get worn out, continued to tell all the participants, "no matter how small and insignificant the work, you are doing a great thing. You are loving these people, serving them and loving and serving Christ." As unreal and phony I felt saying these words the first few weeks, I was completely modeling them. I was giving 110% of myself to the participants every week and I didn't know why outside of, "it's my job."
In a fit of cynicism I connected with the words from a song, "God save us from your chosen ones." I felt as if my belief had brought me nothing but pain, inner torment, and confusion. I felt it was fake. So the words of this song spoke to me until the end of the song when the lyrics changed, "You'll be the reason the hopeless celebrate/He takes us from our violent shame." This is what I was seeing, everyday. People coming from all over the country to serve a community destroyed by poverty and darkness. I saw children run up to strangers and hug them for nothing else then the fact that they were to play with them; there to love them. I heard about an 8 year old boy who talked to a girl about his brother being shot and killed the night before, I saw the joy that was etched on a woman who couldn't remember my name when we brought her food and talked and prayed with her. A child ran up to her mom, excited about something she got from one of us, mom answering, "I'm sure they only gave that to you because they feel sorry for you." These children, these people, beaten down by society, beaten down by darkness, painting signs over the interstate saying "End Eminent Domain Abuse," these people who might have never, ever felt unconditional love... and I saw that love expressed. Every week, people were changed. The youth, the adults, the people of St. Louis... myself. It wasn't about me anymore. I wasn't about me and my homesickness, about me and my cynicism, about me and my ideas... it was about the youth, the community of St. Louis, about changing lives, about love, and most importantly... about Christ. Suddenly, the words I spoke in my devotion to the youth every Wed. morning didn't feel so fake. They didn't feel so phony. They were real.
And this is where I rested in the rest of the summer. I have only begun the process of... processing. :P I feel as if, like my staff member Shan said, I feel that my summer in St. Louis is a starting point. To where I am going I am not sure, but I am excited and nervous about it. One thing is sure though, as awesome as the summer was, I am very glad to be home. I will see those of you I haven't seen yet soon.
