Ever have a week where everything seems to go bad all at once? That was this week for me... basically I was disappointed, angry, felt alone, and overall just down in the dumps. I really wasn't in the mood to do ministry at all. Even though I didn't feel like doing anything, I still had places to be and things to do. Yesterday, I woke up in a terrible mood and I really didn't want to do anything. When it came time for me to go to football chapel, I really didn't feel like my heart was in the right place to do ministry. However, I chose to go because we would really be pushing to get the guys to go on a Student Venture retreat this month, and I needed to connect with them on it. I showed up at the school, and when Brad came down there were only two football players with him. Apparently almost the whole team decided to skip out on weight lifting, so our chapel size went from an average of 8 to just 2 guys.
We decided to go to the local pizza place, grab a pizza, and just hang out. Once we get to the pizza place, we order and right afterwards, I look over and see a group of 3 skater guys from the high school hanging out in the corner. I have had connections with some of these guys at the youth center before, but I didn't know them that well. The pizza place's owner's son is friends with them, so they hang out there a lot. Honestly, the skaters have been in our prayers for months. We have really been praying for an opportunity to reach out to them. I go over to them, say hello and start talking to them. They are playing a game called "Temple Run" on their iPods, so I sit down and check it out. As I remember that we are really there for football chapel, Brad comes over and gives me our ministry credit card and says to buy the guys a pizza and to just chill with them. I order, sit back down and we hang out and mess around with the game some more (I was terrible at it!) Once the pizza comes, I ask them if they mind if I bless the food. They say sure, so we pray. After I prayed, one of the guys just looks at me for a second and says, "I don't think I've ever seen a person bless their food before." He then asked me if I had always prayed for my food, and wondered how I got started. I then explained to him that praying for my food isn't something that I have always done. I told him that when I was in high school, I became a Christian and as I grew in my faith I felt like I should give God thanks for the food He provides for me. He then wondered why or how I decided to become a Christian. (Let me just say, I hope he didn't notice my eyes widen and my jaw dropping, I was like... did this kid just ask me to share my testimony? Awesome!!!!) So, I told him my testimony, that I grew up in church, but found it overall boring and didn't care much for being there. As I got older, I went to a Christian summer camp, and I felt like I was really missing something in my life. God then made it clear to me that I was missing a relationship with Him through Jesus and that only that could fulfill the missing gap in my life. This start to the conversation led to questions such as... What's the difference between Christianity and other religions? Is there really a God? Who was Jesus? Was Jesus God or man? Why did Jesus come? What's the difference between a Christian and a non-Christian? Is everyone sinful? Etc... Basically we went through the Gospel and various other religious topics. I even pulled up scripture on my phone app, and they read the Bible verses to each other. They were totally into it! These guys were hungry and I don't mean just for pizza! We then talked about everything from drug abuse to the end of the world! One guy said, "I've been to church and stuff before, but I feel like I got more out of this then all the times going there because we actually discussed it openly." When it was time for me to go, I said, "I really enjoyed hanging out with you guys talking about this stuff, how would you guys like to do something like this once a week, meet up here, and talk about this kind of stuff?" They were totally up for it! I gave them my number, and they texted me theirs, and I told them I would give them a call next week!
Ok, now lets look back... I was really down in the dumps and didn't even want to go to football chapel! Had I not gone, I would have totally missed this opportunity! And after meeting with those guys I was totally content, I had a skip in my step and knew I had just seen God work! I saw God move and answer prayers we had been praying about for months! Sure, my problems were still there, but God definitely brought the sun out on my cloudy day! Thank you God!
