Jacksonville, Day 2

Well, today we began our trip in earnest, and it's been what I expected, if not exactly what I hoped for. Overall,this promises to be a rewarding trip, with much to think on and be excited by for weeks to come.

After breakfast and quiet time, we headed out to do street clean-up (trash, mowing, edging; etc.). It started out a tad rough because lots of the equipment we had on hand is.... well let's just call it temperamental. Fortunately, Les Unruh and Eric Ness are excellent field repairmen, and by the end of the morning had more equipment running than we needed. Our goal for the week is to fix up sections of 2 roads that run on either side of the 2nd mile ministry house. Even with the challenge of initially doing all the edging without aid of power tools, I think we're on target to get it all done. In the afternoon, we shifted gears and went to a local elementary school, where we cleaned up their stage, which had been getting used as storage for old books. I think we will continue to be there the rest of the week doing similar service projects.

It may not seem like much, but as Eric very wisely said, our aim really can't be for major breakthroughs. We're really just support staff who help provide credibility and opportunity for the 2nd mile staff who do the real and hard work of building relationships and trust long after we're gone. And it's important to remember that this Gospel ministry, but it is not the Gospel. The Gospel is the message of salvation through Christ, and we may never get to share that message. What we do is show redemption applied, that the promise of the Gospel is true, and that is an exciting opportunity.

The Challenge for me is that I love the deep conversation, the grand story of someone's life and how God is speaking to them, but so far we haven't really had those. We stand out as outsiders, and people are polite but not in general terribly friendly. They genuinely appreciate our presence and work, but we probably won't have those big conversations. I hope we do, but it's more important that we can stand out enough for Ruth or Marc or the rest of the staff to have those down the line.

Two guys that have really stood out for us have been Earnest and AJ. They are local guys who hang out with the gang here a lot, so we've had some chance to goof off and talk a bit. I'm hoping for more opportunity over the course of the week to know them more.

a Few random things I've enjoyed learning so far-

1. One of the interns here is the daughter of our district superintendent

2. I am not old, but playing frisbee with these guys, I am reminded that I am not as young as I like to think.

3. Rachel is now a quarter of a century old.

4. Eric cannot dance, but he plays a pretty good game of spades.