PD 08 Support Letter

Below, is a copy of a letter I'll be sending to some friends this week. Please let me know if you'd be interested in partnering financially or if you'd like to be a prayer supporter. Thanks so much to you guys who have supported me so often in the past!

Hi Friends!

I’ve got some summer plans that I’d like to share with you. As you may know, I’ve spent most of my summers for the past several years as a counselor for middle school youth in Project Destiny—a summer camp in Boston’s Chinatown. I have joined the team once again—this year under the title of Executive Director. It’s a joy, every summer, to see dozens of 11-14 year olds (hyper, emo, cool, goofy, shy, etc.) learn new skills, experience new adventures, and have their lives impacted by their encounter with the gospel in word and action. I’m as excited this year as I have ever been to be a part of God’s work in the lives of campers and counselors alike through PD.

My role this summer, as the camp director, will be to train, supervise, and shepherd a 24-person staff team as we plan and execute 5 weeks of camp programming and 2.5 weeks of pre-camp prep and post-camp debriefing. I’ll also design, oversee, and run camper and staff spiritual development components by writing and sharing devotionals on a daily basis while preaching to campers twice a week. (Please pray for that last part!!!)

It will be a very different role than I am used to. It sounds like a lot! Honestly, I think it will be a big stretch for me and I don’t think, by any means, that I have the ability to do all the parts of my role. Thankfully, I’ll have two trusty assistant directors, the support of past directors (like the force apparitions in Star Wars!), and I trust that God will accomplish his purposes whether I do well or I struggle. It’s not human hands, after all, that builds an eternal kingdom; it is the foundation of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit.

Please pray for me. Starting June 22, I will move out of my apartment of three years (in preparation for beginning seminary in the fall!) and moving into a dorm in Emerson where I’ll live with most of our staff team. I’ll be running training until the first day of camp on July 7. Then I’ll be running the day-to-day operations until August 9, when camp ends. Then we will debrief until August 13. Please pray that I’ll have the energy, love, compassion, wisdom, and humility to direct all of this. Perhaps, if you pray for one thing for me, pray that I would make time to pray every day (God has been teaching me big lessons about the centrality of prayer in missions and ministry).

Also, please pray that the Holy Spirit would do a mighty work in the hearts of our youths and counselors this summer—that kids would connect with our regular youth group and believe in Jesus while counselors get their hearts ignited to spend their lives on truly significant and eternal things.

I’m trying to raise some financial support as well to off-set my own costs (food, living, field trips,) and some camper costs too. If you would like to partner either in prayer, a monetary donation, or in some service-related way (cook dinner for our staff?) please let me know via e-mail or comment. Thanks so much!

Why B*** is a Bad Word

I met up with a friend recently for dinner and talk. As often happens, we got to the part of the conversation where we talk about how much we've been doing lately. You know how this goes: you start to feel guilty about not having been a better friend and then subtly-- although nobody really misses this-- you begin listing off the things you have been involved in:

"Work has been crazy lately. And I've been meeting up with the youth group kids a lot more. And every other Tuesday, I've got a meeting with X. I'm leading Y group every Wednesday for church. And Project Z has been ramping up, so it's taking up the rest of my spare time. I haven't even seen my roommates lately, and I've slept only 5 hours a night, and I've been B***!"

And before you know it, you're doing two things: 1) complaining about things that you're supposedly really passionate about doing, and 2) justifying yourself by your work load because either A) your work is more important than him or B) you are a slave to your work and don't have a choice, so you can't be blamed.

It didn't get to that point for me this last time. Just as I was about to say the word "busy, " I realized, at least this time, that "busy" was a bad word. It was nothing but an excuse to not take responsibility for my use of time and a way of protecting myself against feeling the weight of being a bad friend.

Have you been busy? Perhaps. Too busy to care for people and relationships? If that's true, then you've been making a huge waste of your time.

Five Weeks

I counted today-- because there was a school calendar mysteriously sitting on my desk, and because I am proctoring an MCAS today (which, for everyone's information, I have just hypocritically and horribly botched, after years of being the spokeman for correct MCAS procedures).

There are 5 weeks left.
5 weeks until there will be no more grading.
5 weeks left until there will be no more lessons to prep.
5 weeks left until I no longer climb up 8 flights of stairs, 3 times a day.
5 weeks left until my students can go home and unleash their pent up urges to explode.

It's also 5 more weeks until I pack up the accumulated relics of my four-year teaching practice.
5 more weeks until my association with JQUS ends.
5 weeks until I will no longer see the students who have been the focus of so many waking (and sleeping) thoughts over the past few years.
5 more weeks until my teaching career ends, like a train coasting to a stop at the end of a trans-continental track.

5 more weeks.

Canobie Lake Park!

Yesterday, our middle school youth group counselors and I took 6 students to Canobie Lake Park. We had a great time going on rides, like the X-treme, DaVinci's Dream, the Corkscrew, and the Yankee Cannonball. I've often wished I had more time to just hang out with the youth group kids. With applying to seminary, writing Friday night messages, planning Project Destiny, and grading papers, that kind of fun time with youth group kids is too rare. Two of our kids were from PDAS, our weekday after-school program. Four of our kids were not regular youth group attendees. Praise God for a fun day and a chance to build relationships with a handful of youths!

Serving Communion

I felt chills today while serving communion. BCEC serves communion on the first Sunday of each month. On those weeks, I usually take my communion first, after the sermon, and head to the back of the room with the bread to serve the rest of the congregation. When people come up, I'm supposed to address them, saying, "Victor, this is the Body of Christ broken for you." And then they move on to the cup, where Calvin is supposed to say, "Victor, this is the Blood of Christ shed for you."

Usually, it's a sort of mundane service to perform. I make it more exciting for myself by seeing how many names I can recall. As a matter of fact, I used to try to avoid it when the old pastor asked me to serve because I had a hard time remembering people's names on the spot.

But today, after about the 15th recipient, I started getting a sense of the enormity of what we were saying: "This is the Body of Christ broken for you! This is the Blood of Christ shed for you!" Look what you have done: you are a sinner so wretched that the Son of God had to die for you! Look how much you're worth: God sent his son to die for you!

And the one-two combination of Calvin and I greeting the recipients became a rolling chant, proclaiming the gospel over and over again while strains of "Amazing Grace" sang in the background. So, I remembered once again what an amazing thing it is to have your life saved by somebody who died doing it. What a privilege-- I was allowed to preach the gospel to about forty people today, one person at a time! Praise God for his reminders of what Grace is.