My last blog was more of an overview of Ireland, so here’s a couple of my favorite stories from that month.
Every day looked different. We did some really easy stuff, like organizing. Organizing is easy. Organizing can be fun, especially when you ride a pallet jack through the warehouse pretending you’re jousting. Not that that happened, definitely not. Street evangelism on the other hand… street evangelism is scary. Which is precisely why I signed up for it, because it scared the crap out of me. There might be people out there who actually like talking to strangers. Maybe standing in the town square and walking up to people to invite them to church comes easy to you. Not me. I’m not like super wallflower shy, just a mildly introverted normal person. But I came on the race to do things that challenge me. My squadmates would go out for evangelism and come back with stories of awesome conversations or people getting saved. I was starting to get pumped for this. My turn finally came. I had the training. I’m ready with my opening line of “Can I ask you a question?”. Don’t worry, we follow with “What’s the greatest miracle God could do for you?”. So what do I do? I stand there. For two whole hours, I just stand there. Someone would walk by and I would think “Just talk to them, they look nice, they’re headed this way. Just do it Melissa. They’re right there! Oh they’ve past me. Okay, it’s okay. This next person, talk to them. You can do it. It’s just a person. Get a grip Melissa! There goes another opportunity. Never mind, here’s someone else.” And so on and so forth. This internal dialogue continued for the entire two hours. I didn’t talk to a single person. I returned to my team leader, dejected and disappointed. Larisa signed me up again, this time with her. A few days later, we stood on a corner with a solid plan worked out. For every two she talks to, I would talk to one. It worked, we got a momentum going. Did anyone get saved that afternoon? Nope. But we did get to pray for healing for several people, and show them that Jesus cares. We got to plant seeds. We got to encourage other believers. I got over myself enough to tell people that Jesus loved them. It was so worth it. Because what’s the worst that could happen???
For one week, our lives were consumed by Destiny Island, a kids summer program. There’s even a song we’d sing. It goes something like “Destiny!!! Where the games have slime and the songs don’t rhyme. Destiny!!! They’ve come from the USA to say that God loves you…” That song is burned into my memory. I. Can’t. Escape. Will. It. Ever. Stop?!? Sorry, am I being melodramatic? For the first few days, it looked like every other VBS. There was worship, games, crafts, contests, silly songs. Just a normal kids ministry. But then it took an unexpected turn. Just because they are kids doesn’t mean they can’t make an impact on the community as well. Each racer would get a handful of kids and we would go out into the streets. We passed out care packages to people’s homes. We went into town to hand out “sweeties” and asked to pray for people. I had the cutest five year old boy in my group. He was so excited/nervous/ready to pray for people. He asked anyone and everyone. I had him riding on my back as we would tell strangers that Jesus loved them very much. He was so innocent and heartfelt. He prayed for healing like it’s nobody’s business. I was flabbergasted. A five year old is showing more boldness and conviction than I have seen in most adults, or sometimes myself. A five year old is proclaiming the name of Jesus from the rooftops, or maybe it was just my shoulders.
Lastly, there’s Hutch. Hutch goes to the Vineyard. He’s met other WR squads before. When he found out how small the WR food budget is (big enough for Asia, too small for Western Europe), he took it upon himself to take care of us. He’ll take up donations so that whenever we roll into town, we are nothing short of blessed. We would protest that it was too much, but he would reply “The other countries gave you their best. We’re giving you our best.” It was amazing. I was treated to some things I couldn’t afford. I ate meat (that definitely wouldn’t have happened). I felt taken care of. It reminded me of when I visit my dad’s. I can protest, or say I don’t need it, but he’ll still take care of me. I made a passing comment to my teammate about how it felt like how my dad treats me. I casually asked if she agreed. She looked at me confused and said no. Her dad never did this kind of stuff. Like, ever. What I had taken for granted, she was experiencing for the first time. I love that people got to know what it feels like to have a dad give good gifts, just because he can. It made my day.
There are so many more stories I could share. But since I’m writing a blog instead of a novel, three will have do.
