This trip really is over. I got my preach on this morning. I’ve never had the opportunity to communicate with people that I have so little in common with. I felt lost. I didn’t know where to start. I’ve never been homeless, done drugs, been addicted to anything, so helpless, or dejected. How was I going to connect. God checked me and told me that without Him, I could have been all of those things. I preached what was on my heart. And I felt like God spoke to me more than anything. After it was over, I went in the office shut the door and cried. I have never felt God more than in that church this morning. There was a lady on the front row who was obviously strung out on some kind of drug, she was flailing all over the place, and could have been a distraction, but she wasn’t.
We fly home tonight and I hope that everyone has gotten something out of this week. God was with us. Here are a few things I have learned:
**God cares about EVERYONE
**I can eat 6 In-N-Out patty’s in one sitting
**Snaps is the name of the game
**People who are the worst off believe in God
**Where there are girls there will be drama
**The TL would be a tough place to live
**I love the city
**It takes a special person to do inner city work
**Parking Garages are expensive
**It is possible to walk OVER San Francisco
**Homeless people are still people
**A lot of people pee on the streets in the TL
**The TL stands for the Tenderloin
**If a picture is worth 1,000 words then a smell must be worth 15,000
**Public Transportation is awesome
**God loves San Francisco, I know because He was there with us.
Our trip is coming to an end. We just have one more day to go. Good. I’m tired and worn out. My mind is hurting and my soul needs rest. Being in the TL for the last few days have had an effect on me. But today we relax. It’s down time day. Last night we had a campfire on the beach in Santa Cruz. It was wonderful. The stars were out, you could hear the ocean roaring behind us, and all seemed right. We started our nightly devotions by the campfire we built on the beach and it wasn’t 10 minutes after we got the fires going really good, we were blinded by bright headlights, and flashing red and blue light headed straight for us. The park ranger told us it was time to leave. The beach was closed. CLOSED? How does a beach close? I’m not sure, but we were kicked off the beach. We finished our devotions back at the camp we were staying at.
Speaking of camp, last night we got to sleep in real beds. The first night all week we didn’t have to sleep on the floor, or go across the street to take showers. It was a blessing. Thank you KB and Camp Glenwood for the hook up!
After a rockin breakfast we headed to the beach and to the Boardwalk for some hang out time. By the time we drove around a bit…OK now is the time I get to talk about the sweet car that we rented, a Toyota Prius. I’ve never driven a Hybrid, so figuring out how to start the car was a bit of a challenge. I finally got it. We drove it down to Santa Cruz and got 43 mpg. How awesome is that? Where was I…oh, yeah we parked at the wharf and it was time to eat. So we hit up The Dolphin at the end of the wharf for the ever famous Clam Chowder in a Bread Bowl. YUM. We got our food and sat down at some tables in front of the Restaurant. A few minutes later a man from the restaurant came outside and told us that the tables we were sitting at were reserved for the people who ordered their food inside, and since we ordered at the “To Go” window we couldn’t sit there. WHAT? It’s the same restaurant, and no one was even sitting there. You have got to be kidding me! So we have only been in Santa Cruz for a couple of hours and have been kicked out of two places. Oh well. We hung out at Boardwalk, some went swimming in the Ocean, we rode The Giant Dipper, and then drove back to the TL via highway 1. It really was an amazing day of relaxation.
Now it’s time for sleep, and just wait for tomorrow. Which I’m a little nervous about, since I get the opportunity to speak. Good night from San Francisco.
“Food Bank Delivery! Food Bank Delivery!” was screamed through the mail drop on the front door of the church we were sleeping in this morning. I looked at the time and saw that it was 7:15am, we still had 15 minutes to sleep. My mind was yelling “Go Away Drunk Guy!” I glanced outside to see what in the Heck this man who was shouting at us was talking about. Dawn, our fearless leader didn’t mention anything was supposed to happed this morning, so I figured that he must have the wrong building or was just going to drop off some food for the church. After all this is Hot Dog Church. But when I looked outside, I saw a big truck that said “Food Bank” on the side, and much to my surprise there was a line that had formed sometime during the night that stretched down the block and around the corner. This was for real, something was going to happen NOW. I quickly woke the rest of the group, and moved all of our sleeping bags in to the office. There was a bit of confusion, as the delivery guy was on the job for the first day, and the people coming in to set up didn’t speak much English. The line mostly consisted of people from Asian decent. We finally got it figured out, and we all pitched in to help. Sure we were all still in our pajamas, but it didn’t matter. It was actually fun. Dawn joined us a bit later and said that the pastor who usually took care of the food distribution was out of town and that she totally forgot about it. It was just an oversight, and that was fine. We were allowed to be servants, and everyone jumped right in and served with a grateful heart. It was good to see our team pull together like that. When we were thrown a curve ball, we stepped into it, and hit a home run.
Kimo. A child who came to VBS for the first time today. The day started with Kimo by him being dropped off yelling and screaming. When I say yelling and screaming, I mean YELLING and SCREAMING! I had to hold him down until he threw up, he finally calmed down. It was amazing, and not in the good way. Throughout the day, I had to hold Kimo down 3 other times just to get him to calm down. It was tough. We made it through the day. Now we are going to unwind a bit by walking around San Francisco.
For the past couple of weeks, I have been learning about the Myers Briggs Personality profile. The first letter determines if one is an Introvert or an Extrovert. I am an introvert. So right now, I just need a little down time by myself, so that I can recharge my batteries. So, we are off to walk around the city. I’ll write more tonight, when I’m refreshed.
We got in late last night so I didn’t get the chance to write. But yesterday was full of exciting excitement. My friends Richard and Susan who live about an hour from here came down to hang out with us, and to help us with VBS. It’s been almost 8 years since I have seen them, so it was good to catch us a little bit. VBS went great yesterday, the energy was high, the snack was good and I think that the kids really like it. I hope that today goes just as well. Some of our students are doing a great job at connecting with some of the kids here. It’s awesome to see our students getting out of their comfort zones and doing ministry.
I saw a few things yesterday that really bothered me. I’m still trying to get my brain to figure out what in the heck is going on. I saw a man selling drugs on the corner of the street, which isn’t out of the ordinary here. Hot Dog Church is located on the corner of Turk and Jones streets, and is considered the “pills corner”. Every corner pushes a different drug. We are on the Pills corner, up the street a few blocks is the Heroin corner, the Crack corner, and so on. When dealers try to sell drugs here on the pills corner, they will just say the name of the pill that they have to sell. For example: I would be walking down the street and a man passing by me would say “OC’s, OC’s?” as he walked by. That would be my clue that he is selling Oxycontin. The man that I saw yesterday selling OC’s was walking down the street with his little daughter, she was probably 6 or 7 years old. It broke my heart. Why did she have to be exposed to that lifestyle? Will it ever stop? Does she have a chance to break the chain? I also saw a woman pushing a grocery cart last night with a baby sleeping inside. Again my heart broke. Why?
Last night we had church here. About 30 people showed up. Danny and James led worship, and did a great job. After the service I got the chance to talk with a man who came to the service. Man did he have some stories. He has been off Meth for 10 days. He told me that he felt like God had a higher purpose for him. I agreed, and I told him that God goes before us to make a way. He agreed, and then told me that he once rescued a woman from being mugged with a hammer. And some other pretty incredible stories. I’m looking forward to Sunday when we will get the chance to sit down with some of the church people and hear their stories.
On a lighter note. Karen, Kellie’s sister came in last night, and will be staying with us for a couple of days to help out. She drove her van so that we can get to Santa Cruz on Friday for some down time. Richard and Susan also brought their vehicle yesterday. Before Richard and Susan headed home, we all went out to get a bite to eat, and we piled in two vehicles. Karen’s mini-van and Richard’s Suburban. Since Karen is staying, she didn’t want to leave her van in the T.L. so after our meal she took her van to a parking garage a few blocks over. Then we ALL piled into the Suburban. All 13 of us. It was a great time.
Pray for us. We have a couple more days of intense ministry here in the T.L. before some down time. I know that some of the students as well as a few leaders are beginning to get overwhelmed. Taking it all in is quite a task, especially when this is a world apart from where we come from. God is working. I will not be the same.
After our walk last night, no one had any trouble sleeping. We are looking forward to an awesome God filled day.
Wow. What an amazing day. Our whole reason for being here is VBS. Today we had our first day of four days running VBS. I think that it went well. Most of us don’t have an incredible amount of experience running a VBS, but we all just jumped in and ran with it. It was a little disappointing that more students didn’t show up, but hey, we are still here for a purpose. Dawn our resident mission director told us that Children are a pretty low priority in the TL. The moms would rather leave their kids in their SRO (Single Room Occupancy), than to have to drop them off and pick them up at church. It’s a pretty sad situation. We are hoping for more students tomorrow. God Knows. Our devotion tonight came from 1 Samuel 2 where Hannah was giving thanks to the Lord for giving her Samuel. Basically she said that “God Knows.” When things don’t seem to go your way, God Knows.
This afternoon after VBS we got the chance to walk down by Pier 39, Fisherman’s Wharf, and Ghirardelli Square. We also ate at In-N-Out. I think I gained 6 or 7 lbs. by just eating one meal there. Well I did get a bit carried away; I had 2 burgers with a total of 6 patties, fries, and a drink. YUM! I’m going to try to get back there before we leave. Ghirardelli Square had a dessert shop there, so we collectively ate the biggest dessert that they had. $24.95 bought us 8 scoops of Ghirardelli specialty Ice Cream with bananas, cherry’s, and other delicious goodies involved. It was consumed within minutes. It truly was delicious, and I don’t even like Ice Cream that much.
We are expanding our relationships here. I’m truly getting to know these people who are here on this journey together. I believe that we will continue to grow closer together as we share life with each other this week. Part of that happened tonight when we decided that it might be a good idea to walk back to the Church instead of take the trolley like we had on our trip toward the wharf area. I don’t know how much you know about San Francisco, but there are a lot of hills around here. We conquered them together. As we walked we saw some pretty cool things we wouldn’t have gotten to see if we would have taken the trolley. We walked down Lombard Street, passed Nob Hill, and saw the big beautiful house slowly turn into rundown government housing. We recognized that we were back in the TL by the smell of urine on the sidewalk, and the increase of homeless traffic. This is a mission field, if I have ever seen one.
Good night from San Francisco.
Good Morning Beautiful. Last night was tough. We slept on the floor in the church. We were blessed to have sleeping bags and we even had some inflatable pool floats to act as air mattresses. I didn’t sleep as well as I thought that I would, having been up most of yesterday, but oh well. One time during the night I noticed a very, VERY strong smoke smell that almost made me think that one of the students sleeping next to me just needed to smoke so they light up. But that wasn’t the case. I looked out the door and saw a man standing close to the door. The church is street level, and we can see right out of the front door. More importantly, we can hear most everything that is happening right outside, on the streets of the Tenderloin. Throughout the night I heard a lot of screaming and the occasional car speeding by. As I type the street sweeper is making his way down Turk Ave. Well, everyone is starting to wake up now. We have a full day ahead of us. Jesus be with us.
We’ve been going for 21 hours so far today. It’s been quite the day. On our way from the BART to the church we stepped over a man who was passed out laying on the sidewalk. This is going to be a super interesting week. I immediately knew that we were going to witness things that we have been immune too.
When we got to “Hot Dog Church” we were put right to work. It feels a bit surreal; we spent some time at the Tenderloin Recreation Youth Center, hanging out with kids who live in this community. There was a kid named Lawrence who was the sharpest young kid I’ve met in a long time. He introduced himself, and we told him our names. He remembered them, all of them. I can’t help but think of what this kid has been subjected to. What has he seen in his 8 years of life? Where has he been? What does he experience on a daily basis? A glimmer of hope in the Tenderloin district. I also saw a homeless man bleeding from the nose and mouth sitting on the side of the road, and another man gloating in his victory. Obviously the younger man beat up the homeless man. In his gloating as we were walking by, he spat at James, and showed us his grill, as to show off. I wanted to elbow him in his teeth. It made me sick. I know that Jesus loves both Lawrence and the man who beat up the homeless guy the same, but why? It just doesn’t seem right to me. A lot about this city just doesn’t seem right.
Pastor Eric, the pastor of Hot Dog Church told us that in the 4 years that he has been here he has seen improvement in the community, but not much. He said that when people get Saved, and totally love Jesus, they usually move out of the neighborhood. So they don’t get to see much fruit. This week, we won’t see much fruit. But I know that God is going to challenge us, he already has challenged me. I’m looking forward to what God has for us. I’m also really looking forward to sleeping a bit. Good Night from San Francisco.
I’m sitting on an airplane and I’m really, really thirsty. Kellie is sitting beside me feeding me Oreo’s, which isn’t helping much, but we haven’t eaten today yet, so I’ll take what I can get. Danny is on the other side of Kellie, and behind us 6 more people from our church. Nine of us total headed on a non-stop flight to San Francisco for a weeklong mission trip.
This morning started at 9am Augusta time…did I just say 9 I meant 4am, see I’m already delusional. Everyone got to the designated meeting place, which for any youth trip is the Church, awake and on time. The trip to Atlanta went smoother than expected, we hit very little traffic. Check in went better than I had anticipated, and we were headed through the security check point to grab a bite to eat…or at least we thought that was the plan. Our flight wasn’t to leave until 9:35am, and we checked all of our bags and had boarding cards in hand at 8:00am. More than an hour and a half to get through security, eat a chicken biscuit, and board the plane, no problem, I’ve done this hundreds of times. Not today. We were directed to follow the crowd to “All Gates.” Our line took us around baggage claim, outside, back inside, though baggage claim, around the telephones, by Atlanta Bread (which has a new logo, and we decided that they are trying to be more like Panera with their new look), around a corner, beside the Sunglass Hut, and into a Disney World holding pattern. While there, we walked round and round in circles and ended up in the same place we started, but for some reason we felt better about ourselves, Disney has a way of doing that to you. We finally found our way out and stood face to face with the “Ticket and ID Checker.” We felt like we were actually making ground, which was good because our time to board the plane was quickly approaching. As cattle are led, we too were led to the next station, pushing, moving, and even the occasional moo. Finally the time to get practically naked and walk through the very invasive all metal seeing x-ray machine. We made it. Collectively as a group we only lost a few things at the checkpoint; a water bottle and a jar of peanut butter. I know you are asking yourself, who carries peanut butter with them? The answer is, I don’t know, but they won’t let it thought the checkpoint, so it got confiscated. The time when we all made it though security was 9:15. We still had to board the train to our terminal and make it to our gate before 9:25, when they cut of boarding. No food for us. Oh well, at least we made it on our flight.
This trip promises to be an exciting one. I have a few hopes: I hope that everyone has a good time. I hope that true-life change happens. I hope that we come back different. I hope that we eat at In-N-Out Burger at least twice. I hope we make a Kingdom impact. I hope we are Jesus to the people of San Francisco. I hope that it isn’t too cold, because I only brought one sweatshirt. I hope that we as a team draw closer to each other. I hope that we don’t run out of money. I hope that we have an all-together RAD time. I hope that we see Jesus in the people of San Francisco. And I hope that this turbulence stops.
