and then there was a EYC building...

It's amazing to me how quickly life can progress, It's been a year since I moved here. I can hardly remember my first Sunday at Church of Our Saviour because it was so chaotic, it seemed like a million names, faces, and things to remember. I remember a few things...

Kahtra Kayton's necklace (two Christian fish swimming together) which later turned out to mean alot to me since it is the symbol of my community Bible study, the thing that holds my week (and sometimes life and faith) together.

I remember I wore a stripped blue skirt with a red shirt and brown cardigan.

I remember I was SCARED and so glad that Jay was with me the whole time.

The next week was our church picnic which we just had AGAIN this Sunday (the big ONE YEAR mark for my ministry here). At our last church picnic I had the kids meet early to fill water balloons, I struggled to remember their faces, their schools, their names.

And here I am
one
year
later
and their names roll off of my tounge without a thought. I even know them well enough to scold them when they try to hide from playing games. I think they find it funny when I scold them but I'll do it anyway. And in the distance as I gathered the kids, the families, the newbies, I saw this building that we had been working on all weekend. Our new youth space.

I thought I knew what I was getting into when I took this job, but like most adventures, I had no clue. I had no clue that a year from my start we would be moving into a HUGE warehouse just for youth. I had no idea that Jay and my dinner conversations would center around how so-and-so are doing this week at college or who was in what Fall sports. I had no idea that my life would function like this. I didn't know what jumping into this really meant, I didn't know that my phone would get so many text messages in a year, many of them starting with "don't be mad" or "I know it's late but..."

I didn't know I could fall deeper in love with Christ, or that his spirit could live through me so practically daily. I never knew the prayers I would pray to myself while sitting at breakfast with awesome kids or while sitting in my office with someone in pain.

I had no clue that this is what youth ministry would look like. I think if I did, I may not have taken the job because from the outside it looks crazy, but from the inside it feels right.

There are many youth ministers out there right now who would give up almost anything for the amazing space we are moving into this month. I am beyond blessed by this building, but I know that those walls will only shelter us from weather and that what lies within them is bigger, better, and far more powerful. A community of Christ lovers... and I have no clue what is next.