tired….but blessed

Catching up from the last two days.  Sunday’s worship at Western Hills was very special.  They had planned a special youth service and their youth pastor, Matt Shephard preached.  That last name “Shephard” might be familiar to some of the people who have been around Mag for awhile.  Matt’s dad, Ron Shephard was our youth pastor years ago and Matt was actually born while Ron and Patty were at CBC/Mag.  Matt remembers his parents telling him that on the night he was born the waiting room was filled with youth from Mag.  Karen Adams and Tara Falsetti, chaperones on our trip, were actually in the youth group at the time.   the congregation was very appreciative of our leading worship.  The afternoon was spent in preparation for our team assigments for Monday.

The planning and preparation really paid off today as all teams had very successful mornings.  There were about 80 children at Day 1 of VBS at Calvary Hill.  20 children attended the Kid’s Club at the Rescue Mission.  The tech team began with upgrading a couple of websites and set up a data base for Page Street Center.  The evangelism team went to the Haight and engaged several people in conversations.  The labor team cleared out several storage areas for construction to start at Calvary Hill.  The day was concluded with two concerts at Ghirardelli Square.  I’ll be honest….I am still amazed at how many people stop when they see our kids perform.  People take pictures and I think we may be in scrapbooking collections around the world.  People not only stop, but they stand around and listen for a long time.  Some find a place to sit and stay for the entire 45 minutes.  We had very large crowds today and we could tell that there were many Christians in the audience.  The kids say that you can just tell on their faces that they are connecting with the music…being blessed by it.  There were also many tourists and many from other countries.  We did get to engage several in conversations.  One gentleman said to me, “Oh, they’re so Baptist.”  I thought he might be ready to make some sarcastic comment, but then he proceeded to say, “I’m Catholic and we have so few families…it is great to see so many young people showing their faith.”  Well, that’s the kind of comment we love and the kind of expression that keep us going when we are tired and weary.

Thank you for continuing to pray for us…..we feel it.

Advertisement