After spending a day getting to know the kids on Monday, today was a day to really start connecting with them and telling them more about Jesus. The day started when I went to the playground to hang out with the kids until worship time. Part of the time I sat and drew on the sidewalk with some girls and the rest of the time I played kickball with a bunch of the kids and the leaders. It was so fun to just joke around with the kids and display God’s love for them even in a simple game of kickball.
When we went into the chapel for worship, I found myself constantly scanning the pews for kids that were causing trouble or misbehaving. Sure enough, I saw one little girl trying to climb up on the stage while our leaders were singing the songs for the kids. I quickly zoomed up to the stage, scooped her up, and carried her back to my pew while she kicked and screamed the whole time. Her name was Kaleya. I finally got her to calm down and when I looked her right in the eyes, she got quiet all at once and just wrapped her arms around me and stayed still the rest of the time. I couldn’t believe that this screaming, crying, wild child found reason in me to stop making distracting noises and be still. It certainly wasn’t something I said, and she doesn’t know me well enough to respect me as an authority figure. I hope she could sense God’s love through me and know that I didn’t pull her off the stage to take away her fun, but because I was showing her love and I didn’t want another kid there not to understand the message that we were singing about because she was being a distraction. As soon as worship let out, she went right back to misbehaving, but at least for that short amount of time, she was still enough to hear what we were singing about.
After VBS, we started painting the Community Center today and boy was it hot! The place we painted was right across the street from the fire station we painted last year. It was really neat to see it a year later and know that I had helped make it look nicer and that it still looked nice. We got a lot done on the building for it being the first day. Even though it was hot, it was really fun to paint and hang out with the other students in the group and get to know them better. After painting, we drove back to the campsite to get ready for dinner. When we got back to the campsite, Rene noticed a bite on my foot that she thought looked pretty serious. John agreed, and he told me to take some Benadryl. I hoped that would make the swelling go down. We went to Maho Camp Grounds where our friend Scott Drennan lives and had dinner on the big porch there that overlooked one of the bays on the island. It was absolutely gorgeous. I remember taking a lot of pictures there last year, but this year, I just wanted to look at it memorize it because I knew a picture wouldn’t do it justice. After we had been there for a couple hours, I could tell the Benadryl was starting to kick in and I got really tired. My bite was starting to look better though, so Rene had me take one more before we left. Then, let’s just say by the time we got back to the campsite, I was so out of it that I could barely walk. I guess I react funny to Benadryl in that it makes me a little woozy. So by the time I got back to the campsite and sat through our group meeting, I was ready to go to sleep. Hopefully I will wake up in the morning and my bug bite will be gone so I won’t have to have any more Benadryl.
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