BUMP from the Eyes of a 15 Year Old

Hello!

I'm Elizabeth, and I'm not the person who usually writes this blog, so I thought you should know that.  I'm fifteen, going to be a sophomore, and I have been a part of the Hershey Free Church for eleven years.  I really didn't know what I was getting into when I signed up for this trip.  Honestly, I didn't have expectations for anything.  I just thought I'd roll with what's going on and so far it's working.

The first full day we spent here was Monday, and my group, the Pretzel Rods, went to Pastor Will Turner's area.  He's going to be started a church called Point Breeze, I think.  I remember the name because I thought of summer when I first read/heard it.  The majority of the group went to a Day Care place a couple of blocks from Pastor Will's house.  For two hours straight, we pulled weeds and swept up.  And I don't mean those little weeds in your mom's garden that legitimately cooperate with your gentle tugging on them...no...these weeds were the kind you have to yell at and use all of your muscles (and a shovel too) to pull only halfway out.  Then, you get some of your buddies to cheer you on while you're looking like an idiot and trying to pull the weed.  And then maybe the weed will come out.  Anyway.  It was very much an eventful first day.  We got some delicious cheesesteaks that only Philly can make well and headed back to the Grace Church in Feltonville.

Everyone grouped up for the children's day camp we are running with Grace Church.  There are five groups: crafts, music, sports, drama, and drums.  Because I play the piano, I belong to the music group.  I had to write a sort of testimony relating to the theme: God's got everything under control.  I spent some time in Joshua 1 and found some notes I had taken previously.  It was great to look back on.  I noticed that in that chapter alone God says "be strong and courageous" four times.  Why do we not listen to Him then?  We're just dust in the bigger picture and we worry about things like money and who's hanging out with who.  Anyway, I think I wrote out my testimony well.

The next day, Tuesday, my group stayed at Feltonville.  The girls got a good bargain: we painted styrofoam for the day camp.  The guys got to do some sort of manly thing that I'm not very well informed about.  Then, our first day of day camp began.

We did not start off strong.  Probably, you expected me to say I was surprised because it was packed the first day.  But it wasn't.  Each group had five kids or less; my group had one.  Also, it started pouring halfway through the camp.  Honestly, it was a bit disheartening.  But that's okay because God works according to His plan, not ours.  Fortunately, everyone received amazing news.  A little girl named Malea accepted Christ!  My friend Kayla was crying tears of joy, and everyone was extremely happy.  Even though not many children attended, much was accomplished that day.

Wednesday.  My group went to University City to pick up trash and MAN was it hot!  My family group split up into teams of three or four.  Somehow, there turned out to be two group of just guys and two groups of just girls.  I thought to myself as we began, This is going to be a long day.  And then my friend Meghan found a bag of food infested with maggots, which I thought only confirmed my previous expectations.  Again, God decided to shake things up.  A very nice man approached the mini-group I was with and started basically preaching to us--he was very encouraging.  I will remember what he said for years to come: "You're here picking up trash outside, but that's not the point.  If that's all you came here to do, you're wasting your time.  It's about cleaning up the trash inside."  What a wise fellow.  About a block away later, we handed a flyer to a nice old woman, with whom we talked about everything from what's wrong with society to her experiences helping out the neighborhood.  Again, I walked away feeling encouraged.

Afterwards, the Pretzel Rods went out for pizza.  I got very hyper from the (roughly) 42 ounces of Diet Pepsi I drank.  So if my perception and observations are a bit skewed, you now know why.  We drove to a men's homeless shelter that is run by Christians.  The girls put together cutlery sets and the guys cut soap.  It was great to be working together as Christians in that way.  Then, we served the men dinner.  I have to tell you, I was a bit nervous because it's the city.  Expectations are overrated and anything can happen.  Anything.  However, I was happily surprised.  Many of them said thank you, and I was not majorly creeped out.  Yay!  I really felt used by God when I was working there.

Yesterday, which was Thursday, the Pretzel Rods went back to Pastor Will's area.  First, we all did a bit of what is called "prayer walking."  We handed out flyers for the church plant, Point Breeze, and talked to a few people.  Then, we went out for lunch.  I looked at salad like food sent from heaven after five days of cheesesteaks, which are good but in no way replace good old-fashioned rabbit food.  Afterwards, we all painted a tee shirt for tomorrow (Saturday), when Point Breeze officially begins.  For an hour or two, everyone cleaned up the site for the church.  My friend Kaitlyn and I scraped and painted a bench and ourselves, too.  Everyone else picked up tree-sized branches and threw them into a dumpster.  All in all, it was fun and eventful.

It was the last day of day camp, too.  I couldn't believe we were only there for three days, yet God used us to touch so many lives, and I didn't want to quit.  The kids were disappointed too.  Music turned out to be mostly fooling around with the keyboard, guitar, drum thingy, and ukulele.  We ended with a wonderful round of duck-duck-goose and a lot of horseplay.  My night finished with some girl bonding time, which was wonderful.

Today, all three groups became tourists.  We visited Independence Hall, the Liberty Bell, the mint, and some sort of church that has been around since the seventeenth century.  The majority of the group's flexibility in plans, sweetness, and servant-like attitude went down the drain, too.  I don't know why everyone else was in a mood funk, but I know why I was.  Pastor Craig told me to call my mom in between the time we went to Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell.  I knew EXACTLY what was up.  I'd been expecting some sort of call all week.

My great-grandfather died at three in the morning.  At first, I felt fine and I small-talked with my mom since I haven't had contact with her since Sunday.  But a little while after I handed the phone to my brother and told a few people, I started feeling it.  Everyone gets deep when they grieve; it's just who we are.  What is life?  We're just going to die in the end.  He must have felt so alone.  Why are we wasting our time sight-seeing when we could be changing people's lives?  For about ten minutes, I walked around quietly, thinking.  My friend Becca noticed after a bit and asked me what was wrong.  Basically, I fell into her arms and started sobbing.  It was weird how many people actually care when you get down to it.  I could really feel everyone trying to help me feel better.  Several people asked me if I was okay and told me they're here to talk.  Many assured me he's in heaven and doing better now.  I can't say I felt amazing, but I was definitely encouraged.

Around lunch-time, everyone cleaned up their act and apologized.  I started to loosen up and actually have fun.  We drove home, with everyone tired, and afterwards, a group of us went to the gas station to get snacks.  I sat down here and wrote.

I haven't a clue what I'm going to be taking away from this trip, but I can tell you at least one thing.  I feel loved.  There are so many people around whom I didn't even know cared about me so much.  I love my youth group family and I am loving this week.  We have one-and-a-half days left, and I don't regret a thing.  God is teaching me much and "I'm lovin' it."

Love,
Elizabeth

Hard Work Yields "Heart" Work!

Relationship building is an outcome of BUMP. Team members strengthen relationships with each other and with the church they serve. The church served builds more relationships with the neighborhood they serve. And when God makes His presence known to individuals, saving relationships grow!

Be blessed as the Hershey team shares their labors, their fun and their growth on Day 5 of the BUMP week. Pray for the launch of Redemption Church in South Philly, Grace Lutheran Church and the Sunday Breakfast Rescue Mission.

People Are People!

You know God is at work when walls between people come down and eyes see the way God sees. The Day 4 Update reveals growth in the Hershey youth attending: "...students share a lot about how they are seeing people through eyes that are not as judgmental....People are people and we all need the same thing. It is so nice to see God work. I mean literally see it."

Father God  - Give us eyes to see and ears to hear wherever we are.

Amen!

Servant Hearts Serving BUMP

After flexibility, one of the best things a BUMP participant can learn is what a servant heart REALLY looks like. 

"I wish you could be here and see what I am seeing in your kids. This is why Pastor David and I are in student ministry. When we see growth happen, students coming of out their shells and God is being served in community, we can't help but be encouraged and satisfied," says leader Craig Maart.

What a blessing to see students put this in action! Read more from "LifeWithCraig"

Day #2--Flexibility in Action

As is typical for a BUMP week, things totally did not go according to plan today. As is also typical for a BUMP week, usually it's part of God's plan and he shows you some awesome things along the way.

The day started off strong with breakfast and devotions. Everyone was pretty excited to go to their respective work projects for the day. We had one group stay in Feltonville, another group go to South Philly to help Pastor Will with his church plant, and the rest of us went to West Philly to help MCIC clean up the streets. Unfortunately, due to my new-ness to the smart phone universe and GPS, we got to the mission about 20 minutes late. It was a good moment for me though, because I felt stupid that I was 21 and couldn't make a GPS work. But it was a real lesson in patience for me and trusting that the delay was somehow part of God's plan. 

I'm still not sure how it was, by the way. I might never know. Good news though, everything carried on pretty normally. 

We got to MCIC and Pastor John Davis, Pastor Andre and Ms. Jamilla. They split us up into five teams and gave us five streets to clean, up and down. We only had three leaders with us, so we had two teams step up, pick a leader, and work together to get the job done in the time allowed. I don't think any of us finished completely the assigned areas due to our lateness and running out of trash bags, but my group especially had some cool conversations as we went. We met one guy, Marcus, who asked what we were doing and why. We told him about Grace Church and MCIC, and he said he'd come down and volunteer with MCIC one day cause he really liked what we were doing. We also had a block captain and some guys chilling out on their stoop express their very deep (and lengthy...) appreciation. It felt great that we were making a genuine, noticed difference in the community.

Afterwards we all made it back (and no one got lost!) safe and sound. It was then, of course, that I figured out my GPS (had to have been a reason. Had to.) We went to a nearby pizza place, which gave a very unexpected discount because they asked about what a bunch of Hershey kids and an intern were up to in Philly. When I explained, they told us we were doing good work for a good cause and gave us a nice discount. Again, God was providing for us.

So then we got back to the Church (on perfect time. No issues like the morning. Still don't know why...) and got ready straight away for Day Camp in the nearby park. It was a bit discouraging off the bat because we had 10-15 kids in a huge park with about 30 BUMPers, which was obviously a bit intimidating for the kids. A few of us went to pass out some more fliers, and as we were getting back it started pouring rain almost out off nowhere. I was incredibly blessed to be working with such flexible BUMPers. Everyone broke down the camp incredibly quickly and we walked back down to the church to finish off day camp there, since we still had about half the time to go. We lost about half our kids, I think we brought 8 back with us.

Obviously, we hadn't prepared at all to hold Day Camp in the church. The sanctuary and the basement were both filled with the BUMPers sleeping things, the fellowship hall wasn't in very good order, and there was almost no time to give directions of where to set things up and how to continue the day. Everyone came back, carved out a spot (very creatively, I might add. The music people didn't bother the storytellers at all.) We had a couple quiet kids, but they stayed fairly engaged and some of them were. And almost everyone I talked to, even if they only had one kids in their group at a time, came back with a cool story about how the kids asked questions, had fun, and how some of them even did a lot to help us carry things back to the church.

The personal highlight of my day was a little girl who I'd walked back from the park with made me a craft and gave it to me at the end of the night. I don't know why necessarily, but it had been kind of a rough day with all the running around and planning and it really made me stop and realize how good God is. He used this little girl to brighten my day in a really great way. It just felt awesome to have that kind of impact on a child.

I'd prayed the night before and earlier in the day for God to give us the right amount of kids, and he did. The BUMPers got their kinks worked out, we were able to be really flexible, and it honestly might have been harder to manage if we had more kids or rowdier kids. They honestly did a great job, and after dinner I'm looking forward to hearing their stories about how they feel the day went. So far, so great.

Peace and Love,
Josh, the BUMP intern

"LifeWithCraig" Reports on Life at Philly Ministry Day 1!

Hershey Week at Grace Church Philly is underway and leader Craig Maart is documenting the week on his blog, "LifeWithCraig." Read his first post , pray and rejoice with God's work in and through this group!

Welcome to BUMP Philadelphia July 7th Week!

BUMP welcomes Olivet EFC, Spring Lake, MI, and Cornerstone EFC, Annandale, VA, to Philadelphia, partnering with Grace Church of Philadelphia for their second week of ministry!

Partner with us by praying for these churches and their city!