just an fyi

i woke up thursday morning, at about 7am, needing to be out of the room and at a meeting by 7:15, i was lookin in the mirror and decided to trim my bangs, (side note, why are they called bangs? if you know then please impart your wisdom)

any who, so i grabbed my scissors and with out really thinkin about it i trimmed my hair. cut off a good six inches from my bangs, shaped them around my face a bit. not too shabby i must say now i did trim them with dry hair, so later that day when my hair was wet i completed the trim by snippin the last of the straggling hairs. it was fun.

that last one was sorta depressing...my b

that last one was a lil harsh. but it is how i feel sometimes. i mean, i asked God to break me this summer. and truth be told, im very grateful for this. He is showing me so much, its overwelming at times, but its a good overwelming.
God called us to carry each others burdens. thats just what i will do. besides, i think i see Him, or are more aware of when He is moving and working and just i see more of Him when He breaks me.
im excited for what else is to come. just please continue to pray for these students.

thanks!

why?

I may end up answering this as i type this but its just really effecting me alot in my heart.
I see these kids come to camp everyweek, most from broken homes. and their youth pastors will sometimes give us a specifics to pray for. or maybe we get a chance to counsel one and the kid themselves share with us what is going on. but they straight up break my heart.
What in the world goes on in the minds of the parents of these youth?
i mean seriously! Do they not realize how much they are HURTING their CHILDREN with their decisions and actions, and the things that they say to them? Its like parents these days are really selfish. never thinking of the effect that what they do will have on their children! their own flesh and blood are being torn apart by the people that are supposed to be there for them. that are supposed to love them and show them your love and guard them.
How do you reach the parents!?!?!? Adults are such FOOLS sometimes!!! I wish that i could go home with the kids and smack the parents across the face and just say "WAKE UP!!!"
i know that its usually due to a cycle of "well my parents hurt me, so im gonna hurt my kids and i dont care cause i had to go through it so they do to" GET OVER YOURSELF!!!! END THE CYCLE!!! How did it feel when they hurt you?!?! when will it end!!!
it just makes me so aware of how much they too, meaning the parents, need Jesus! need to hear HIM calling THEIR names!
i sat at alter call and listened to this young girl just cry as she was sharing with me what is going on with her family, the way they treat her just SICKENS me! and these kids, they have to go home to that! they have to go home to their parents fighting, or telling them they are worthless, or smacking them around, or ignoring them.
They say that they love their children, but what about how they treat their kids actually shows the kids that they love them?!?

Lord, I ask that you would reach down into these parents hearts, that you would CONVICT them of what they are doing! that they would fall to their knees, to their FACES before you and beg for your forgiveness. These kids need you. they need to feel your love, and their parents need you to smack them across the face and turn their lives over to you so that they can show their children YOU!
Lord, i pray that each individual that makes decisions at camp to follow you, i pray that they would look to you for the love that they are not recieving from their parents. i pray that they would look to you to help them overcome it all. i pray to You asking that they would not give up! and that the cycle would end with them! so that the next generation wont have to see this pain, wont have to feel this hurt.

I realize i must sound really harsh, but if you only knew some of their stories, or saw the hurt in their eyes, you would understand. i know i cant go home with them, so all i can do right now where i am at is pray for them. Pray that they would look to God to help them OVERCOME everything that has been tearing them down

not always peachy at first

just a quick five minute post that will need backup stories and such later. i wont lie, last week's camp which started on saturday and ended wednesday seemed like the most difficult week all summer. i was drained. during the worship services i just felt this heaviness on me weighing me down. i couldnt focus and i felt like i was beeing fake as i was singing. what i think my head was wanting to be praise to God felt like nothing more the words in a song. my heart was missing from the picture. i couldnt take it anymore on sunday night and just closed my mouth and listened to what was around me. trying to focus on clearing my head and makeing sure i was able to push the buttons at the right time was a really difficult thing that night. (oh yeah for those who dont know, my core job on staff this year is powerpoint, i know all of you from the youth group must be laughing at that, knowing how ADD i was during youth group...hehe) any who. but God was working on my heart, and while i did eat the FUNK AGAIN i still love the kids in my group, and God was teaching me and stretching me, but i know now it was to prepare me for the week im in now. so we ended that week on wednesday morning and started the next camp (our biggest all summer, 625 ppl) that night. My team has 29 ppl in it. and it was a difficult first night. for the first time out of all the teams ive had, this team made me cry. they were cruel. there are two boys that are the ringleaders of the evilness, somehow it had gotten out that i have eaten the FUNK 6 times, and well they were not letting me up on it, i would have been ok if it had been one or two jokes but they took it overboard and wouldnt stop telling me how i was a horrible leader and that we were gonna eat the FUNK because i stink at life, (to summarize it for you). just being staight up disrespectful well today is day three of that camp, and yesterday was a lil better, i kinda snapped at them in a loving and authoritative way...my b. but it worked, we shall see how today goes, ill update you later. but ne who i was still a lil upset all day, i had gotten over most of it, but then our director, while we were praying for the camp before worship, he stopped us and said "i dont know why, but God is telling me to say a lil something to each of you" he then proceeded to go around the circle and say what he thought about us, just really encouraging time. and i dont know, God used that to lift my spirits, and i think im no longer mad at those boys for being jerk faces. and i just went out to roll call with my old self back, crazy and energetic and i may have scared my group a little, they were laughing at me thats for sure. but its something that they are all doin together as a team and im super excited for today actually, because even as im typing this and am able to process whats happened the last couple days through typing it out to you, God is showing me where he was in each moment of my last couple days and its makeing me really excited for what he has in store for today!
love you all, and thank you for keeping us in your prayers, i want you to know that you are all in my prayers as well! Idonesia peeps, let me know the updates, from fundraising and everything so i can know how to be praying for you. love you all!
peace and chicken grease!

Eagle Eyrie, Lynchburge VA

im three hours from home at the location that our church came to last year. its weird with out yall here. i miss stafford, exspecially this week. its weird.... ne who, so i prayed for an energetic team because i havent had one yet this year. Energetic is exactly what i got. its pretty sweet! the only thing is that now that i have a team that is ADD and me being ADD and thier only leader i need to now brainstorm on how im gonna make it a possitive and productive energetic! but energy is SO much better the BLEH! so AMEN TO JESUS!!! specifics on prayer, alot of small churches this week and then a ginormous one. like out of 250 campers 111 of them are one church, so i hope that the other churches dont feel overpowered. there are also some youth groups that are goin through some stuff. not many details for you on that, just pray for them.
please pray for our staff, there is still some sickness goin around, i actually caught a smidge of a cold a little while back, but im getting over it, i just still dont fully have my voice back. our worship leader is sick. like throut messed up and no energy, just kinda drained and not doing good. just pray for healing in our staffers.
k thats all for now.
love you all! leave me comments, its basically the only way i get to communicate with you!!!! phone calls are view and far between,


oh yeah, this weeks camp marks the first of 3 in a row that are non stop, we have no breaks between them, we end this one on friday drive 10 hrs, to set up and start camp the next day(saturday) then end a camp on wednesday and start a new one that some day....
it will be crazy!


k LATER

in case you were wondering...

in case you were wondering if either me or michele have eaten the funk yet, here is where i will answer those questions for you.

we have been paired up with a partner for both of our camps so far cause they were both smaller groups.
Michele's team has come in second place both times. always leading in first till the last minute. the week she lost her first place status by 500 points. thats equivilent to the amount of points given to say about ONE verse!

me on the other hand, i came in 6 out of 8 last week and
if you havent guessed it yet. this week i ate the funk. i came in 8 out of 8. and in case you were wondering, that makes it the 5th time that i have eaten the funk in my life. it was crazy cause i had been feeling a bit prideful, or too focused on winning or something like that, so i prayed that God would strip me of my pride, well. i think praying to be stripped of pride is like praying for patience. its not an easy thing to learn, so i just had to laugh about it. im gonna try to strategize for next week on how i can work things better, maybe be a little more focused and organized. which should be fun considering that we are goin to Laguna in Pannama City Florida and will have a camp of like 415 ppl, which means we are goin from having a team of 10-14 kids with 2 leaders, to a camp of 25-30 kids all by ourselves. IM REALLY EXCITED!! you would think that bigger groups are harder to take care of, but really, they are easier, in my opinion at least....

please pray!

this is the second week, we saw some amazing things happen at our first camp, but this is our second camp and its nuts the things God has been doing!
today is wednesday, we started camp on monday, thats when they all arrived, and we have 6 youth groups here. pray for those youth groups please! pray for these kids.
one thing we have realized is that our staff is a PRAYING staff! no joke! last night for instance, before worship all of us spread around the auditorium praying over all the seats. praying at the alter. praying at the DOOR WAY. praying for specific Kids and specific churchs. then worship began. and it was NUTS! i love it! about three or four of our girls went out side and walked around the auditorium and sat in front of the doors praying. praying in the NAME of JESUS CHRIST that Satan and any other demonic presence would not be able to enter the building. praying that the hearts of the kids and sponsors and such would just be BROKEN! Walls TORN DOWN and that lives would be changed! and man i wish i really had the words to describe last night to you! it was amazing! Gods presence was SO evident in that room! at alter call, to make a decision or just to talk with someone, 75% of the room was at the alter! it was nuts, just to give you another idea of this, i have 14 kids on my team. and NINE of them went forward! 3 of them being specific ones that i had been praying for, that the rest of the staff had been praying for!
CAN I GET AN AMEN!!! God is SO AMAZING! wats even better is that theres still two more days of camp! 2 more! theres so many other little stories connected with this one night plus everything that happened last week.
it was just SPECTACULAR!!!!!!!
please keep these kids in your prayers.
the names of the churches here are:
Summerville BC
FBC CenterPoint
South Side BC
Mt. Olive BC*
Beauregard BC
Big Ridge BC

please keep these in your prayers!
thank you!