a very significant weekend

I am so refreshed after this weekend. I made a trip home and all I did was hang out with my family and do two very important things with my church.

The first, on Saturday, was to go out into the woods of Virginia with the confirmation class (about 13 youth between the ages of 12 and 16) and complete a high ropes challenge course.






This was truly incredible for me. I am SERIOUSLY afraid of heights, and this was no exception. The teens inspired me because they were nervous at first, but they all went ahead of me and they made themselves let go and climb trees and trust the harnesses and give into the forty-foot freefall at the end so they could swing through the forest. When it was my turn, I knew I was in trouble, but that I had to do it since the kids all did. I began to have trouble breathing and I thought I was going to cry, but another leader Lloyd came up on the course and walked with me through it. And I did it all. I finished it. I am so glad I did. Even though I had to clutch the trees for dear life and close my eyes at time, I kept moving and almost even got used to the heights. My pastor was there and she did it too. She incorporated it all into her sermon the next day about trusting someone to lead us and making those leaps that seem impossible. And it was true. It was easy to encourage the kids from the ground to push through:
"That harness can hold three cars worth of weight!"
"You are so brave!"
"No one has ever been hurt doing this course. You are safe! You won't fall! You can do it!!!!"
But then....
you are sitting up on that platform as tall as the tallest tree and dangling your legs tentatively over the edge and being hooked to a wire that is going to drag your body down almost to the ground before it swings you. You feel like you weigh 400 pounds and like the beating of your own heart is enough force to make you topple from this edge. But you don't topple. You have to jump. You have to give into the fall. I was the last to go. I had encouraged the kids and then it was my turn. Dottie said after her sermon that she thought of me the whole time she preached because she wanted me to get the message that ministry is like that; like a terrifying freefall with a big payoff.
I think all of life is like that right now. And its hard to keep going. I lose my breath sometimes. I don't want to keep going. I want to stay where I am and clutch the nearest unmovable thing, but I can't. Not if I want that big payoff.
So yeah. That was amazing.

And then Sunday, I got to be a godmother of a beautiful, joyful little boy named Kyrie.




He is five years old. He loves trucks and trips to the park. His family is from Cameroon. And he chose me to be a godmother at his baptism. God knows why. But I was honored and humbled by that. Life really is funny.....