Hello men, women, and children!
So it’s been about two months since my last update, and a
lot of things have happened in that time.
We spent a few days in Boston, we went to Ohio for about a week and a
half, and there were a few staff changes that took place as well.
BOSTON
Pretty much right after the bombings in Boston happened,
most of us here at the base really felt like we were supposed to go there for
multiple reasons. One being to show
support to the YWAM base there. There are
about 5 or 6 different YWAM bases in the Northeast within driving distance of
each other, unfortunately we’ve all become so individualized that we don’t take
time to do ministry with one another or build relationship with each
other. We here at the Metro New York
base felt like it was a no brainer to go there. Another reason to go was to
just join in with the ministries that the base had already in place, as well do
prayer stations, which is one of our ministries here. The first day we got there, Wednesday May 8,
we went to Harvard square, to talk to people and pray with people. A few of us had really good conversations
with a few people, but for the most part, people weren’t interested in talking. The following day, we had a spiritual tour of
the city, well were supposed to, but due to the the fact that it was raining,
we ended up going to the State building, and having a mini teaching there about
the history of not only Boston and Massachusetts, but of our Country as a whole
as well. It was rather interesting. And then
on Friday, we joined the YWAM Boston staff, YWAM Kona, YWAM Harrisburg, at
Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH. Most
of the YWAM bases in the northeast strongly believe that the Ivy League schools
are the starting grounds for revival here in America. And what they do, is go school
to school, holding these, for lack of a better term, revivals on the campus’. One of the guys on staff at YWAM Boston is a
DJ, so he does his thing to get people to come, and then once people have
gathered, they go into a few student testimonies, and then a worship set with
recording band, United Pursuit. They usually get around 300-600 students at
these things. At Dartmouth, they had
almost 400 students show up! Of that number, I’m not sure how many came to Christ.
But knowing that 400 students heard the gospel that night is awesome! Over all,
it was a fantastic trip.
OHIO
We left for Ohio on Thursday May 23, and were there for
about a week and a half, maybe a little less.
The reason we went was to help an extended staff person with something
that she had founded a few years back known as Project C. O. O. L. (Community
Outreach Of Love). And what it is, is Extreme Makeover Home edition, on steroids. Instead of taking a single house for a week,
they take an entire neighborhood for a day, and completely transform it. This
year, there were 140 homes worked on, and about 1,800 volunteers. We arrived on
Thursday evening, ate dinner, and then pretty much went to bed. We were all
spent from the trip. On Friday, the guys
went with Jim Aman, he’s been a volunteer with the project from the start, and
a Home Coordinator. This year, he was in
charge of the warehouse where all the supplies went. But on Friday the guys helped him with a
personal need. He owns a piece of
property that has a house and a pond on it. And he’s opened the house/pond up to
the church he’s been a part of for different activities. On Sunday, the 26th,
they were having a fishing derby for the people of the church to bring non-Christian
friends to that wouldn’t necessarily go to church. So on Friday, the guys went
with him to the pond and cleaned it up a bit.
Two guys weed wacked around the perimeter of the pond, I got to ride a
tractor, and mow the lawn on the property, and one other guy was able to help
Jim’s wife, Denise, clean some furniture and get the patio area ready as well. The girls went with Cindy, the founder of
Project C. O. O. L., to the headquarters for the organization, and made signs. Signs
showing where the warehouse was cause it was tucked away down a side street,
signs showing how to get to different parking areas, and signs for the kids
program that was going to happen at a park on the following Saturday’s
afternoon. On Saturday, we went for a prayer drive around the neighborhood that
we would be working in the following weekend.
It was such an awesome time of prayer and meeting people. We saw a few Home Coordinators out prepping
the homes that they would be working on, and had a chance to meet and talk with
them a bit. We were just about done,
when we turned down one last street to pray and get the story of some of the
houses there, when we came upon this couple working on their house. We stopped to talk to them assuming that they
were part of Project C. O. O. L. and they were getting ready for the main
project. We came to find out that they were just doing a bit of cleanup on their
own, and even though they had initially signed the waiver, they had changed their
mind about having their house worked on.
There was a bunch of personal problems that they had to work on, and
because of that, they didn’t want any help. But through talking to them, we
were able to build relationship with them, and they ended up changing their
minds again, and wanted work done on their house. Unfortunately by this time, it was too late
to get a home coordinator on the project, so we went back on Monday, Memorial
Day, to work, but I’ll get to that shortly.
Sunday was more or less a day off for us. The guys went church with a staff person who
lives in the area. We were able to go to
a Mennonite church. That was an experience.
The women still wore bonnets, but other than that, it seemed like a
normal church. After church, we went back to said staff person’s house, where
we enjoyed a traditional Amish breakfast of stewed crackers with soft
boiled/hard boiled eggs, baked oatmeal with homemade yogurt. And it was
delicious. Unfortunately we had to cut our visit short, due to the fishing derby
that was going on. Once we got to the
derby, we showed up a bit late, we joined in on the fun. I caught three small fish, all bluegills. The
most fish caught was 11. And the biggest fish caught was a 17” Large Mouth
Bass, coming in at 2.5 lbs! Once the derby was over, and cleaned up, we went
back to hang out with the girls, they were staying at a different location then
guys. On Monday, Memorial Day, we were able to go back to the family that we
had met on Saturday and work on their house a bit. When we talked to them on Saturday, they had
said that they wanted a fence for their dog, a concrete slab for their grill, a
screen door on the front of the house to make a mud room type thing, and to have
the garage painted. We were able to do
it all. The fence took a little work
though. In order to dig the proper holes, we needed to go through asphalt in
two places, and asphalt AND concrete in another. But we were able to get the
fence up. Two other guys were able to
get the screen door framed, and put in, and the garage got painted as
well. Now, the couple had to boys, a 10
year old and a 8 year old, and they were running around playing, and talking
doing their thing, and they were helping out a bit as well. No one really gave any thought to this, we just
figured they were being kids. Until the woman came over to us and said that her
oldest son never does this…he never talks in front of people because he’s
autistic. When we heard this we just
kinda looked at each other in shock. It was
rather awesome to see! Monday and Tuesday the guys and girls worked together to
get the last minute things that need to get done, done. We staked out a couple fields that were going
to be parking lots on Saturday and cleaned up the warehouse, getting ready for deliveries
on Wednesday. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, we were split up into two
different teams. One team worked in the
warehouse, with Jim, and the other team worked with another guy power washing
homes getting ready for Saturday. I was
on the warehouse team, with two other guys from YWAM, and then Jim. Wednesday was the day that we got all the deliveries
from a local hardware store. Once all the deliveries were there, we then had to
take inventory to make sure everything that we were supposed to have, was
there. And at the same time, start sorting the materials by address. So that
come Thursday when people came to start to pick up the supplies, it was easy to
find. Thursday, and Friday were pick up days.
They were the days that the home coordinators could come to the warehouse
to pick up the supplies that they had ordered. Saturday, June 1, was the actual
C. O. O. L. day. Us YWAMers helped wherever we were needed. Most of us started the day out by parking
cars at the fields, two of us at one field, and two of us at the other field. Once
we were done parking cars, we were split up to do different things. The two girls
were split up to help two different videographers. Me and one other guy were recruited
to help with deliveries that different homes needed. And the last guy just
walked around the neighborhood helping out wherever he could. Over all, it was a very tiring, but very
productive week and a half. We left the next day to come home, had Monday off
to rest and such, Tuesday was a work day, and then Wednesday started 3 days of
DTS staff training.
STAFF
Since my last update, a few things have changed the way the
staff is going to look come September.
As you may, or may not, know, my commitment is coming to an end
here. My last day is August 16th.
But we also have another couple who have been here about 2 and a half years or
so, leaving our base, to move to a base in Idaho. They believe that’s where God is calling them
next. In the time that they’ve been
here, they have founded our Frontier Missions department, reaching out to the unreached
people groups of the world. In leaving,
that left the position of director of the FM department vacant, so through a
lot of prayer and maybe a little bit of common sense, their son will take
position of FM department director.
Well…that’s what I’ve been up to the last couple of months
or so. If you have any questions, feel
free to email, call, text, or facebook me. Thank You all for continuing to
support me both financially, as well as prayerfully. I definitely appreciate
it!!
With the wind,
Mark
