Bridgetown

A little before 3:00 this afternoon I pulled back into my apartment after spending thirty hours with an amazing group of teenagers (and a few pretty awesome leaders). We brought them – or maybe they just let us come along – on a quick trip to hang with some cool people who were homeless, and some cool people who were not homeless, in Portland.

Anytime that, within an hour of arriving at the church, there are several dozen sandwiches made and the response to someone not being there (and not answering their phone) is, “Well, let’s just go get him.” …it’s a sign that this is about to be a good trip.

We literally drove to one of the kid’s houses, piled all fifteen of us out of the vans, knocked on his door(s and windows) until he woke up, and took him the way he came out the door. Bed head. No toothbrush. No sleeping bag. Nothing but the clothes, shoes, and ipod he was wearing (and his wallet that had managed to make it to the church without him).

Points for a memorable start.

My van included the youth pastor, one of my cluster girls, the “kidnapped” one, another junior guy who had skipped school to be there, and a kid who actually lives back east now but was in town for Spring Break and came on the trip.

Points for legitly being there because they wanted to be there.

The trip over ranged from bad puns to castrated pirates and discussions of personal pet peeves. Yes. It really was that random, but, points for getting to know each other and having fun in the process.

Three hours of the afternoon were spent in groups of six, handing out sandwiches and trying to get to know the humans we were handing them to. I got to watch the kids in my group fix a pair of sunglasses with a bobby pin and a pocket knife, pray with a retired preacher who was living on the streets, and navigate their way through an area where they know more about where the homeless hang than they do about the insides of the shops.

I saw kids who are not naturally “outgoing” talk to perfect strangers. I saw them go slow enough to take things in and think about what they were seeing. And, I saw them grow frustrated because they just wanted more time.

One of my sandwiches went to a man with the most ridiculously amazing patchwork pants that I have ever seen and the other went to a dog named Mijo who belonged to a couple not much (if any) older than me.
Points to the kids for jumping in full force, with zero transition time, and giving it everything that they had.

(Part Two in the next post.)