Why are there so many boys?

"Are you a girls' leader?"

The eighth grader who has been talking to me in a constant stream of words for the last fifteen minutes suddenly stops to peer at my name tag, as if he has come across some sort of bizarrely disturbing fact. 

"Yes."

"Then, why are there always so many boys around?"

He twists his face into a comically exaggerated question, first glancing at the few who are clustered near me on the edge of the stage and then out at several more playing dodgeball. Picking "mine" out of the crowd with a laser like accuracy.

We've talked about everything from his current school to his elementary school to the fact that my sister is getting married, but this is the one thing that befuddles him. Why are there always so many boys around?

And, I almost turn the question back around on him, the eighth grader who is standing in front of me because his seat beside me was taken over by a sixth grade boy when he left to get a drink of water. "I don't know; why are there always so many boys around?"

But, I know that he'll tell me that his camp counselor isn't here, so he "doesn't have anyone else to talk to."

We've talked about it already.

As if the gym isn't swarming with other leaders who would be more than happy to talk to him. It's the Sunday after Christmas. We're across the parking lot from where we normally meet. We have maybe a third of the students - but almost all of the leaders. Better ratios than anywhere outside of camp or discipleship groups.

There are plenty of people to talk to. But, not the one or two that he tends to follow around like an eager puppy.

"Because, I've known a lot of these kids since they were in elementary school."

"Oh." He nods.

And, the conversation being with this particular kid, it continues with more words than I would be likely to get out of some of the boys in a month, but the gist of it is that there are always kids around. That today, even outside of their normal space, is no different.

Boys who call my name just so that we can pull faces at each other from across the gym. Who peg me with dodge balls, borrow my phone, and beg me for gum before the lesson. Who sit almost quietly for most of the talk.

Girls who sit to talk about friends and life, help me clean up at the end of the morning, and challenge the boys to play them one on one at the basketball hoop. Who don't mind my pitiful attempts to hit a giant volleyball and who long ago quit asking why there are always boys - if they ever thought to ask in the first place.

Kids who simply happen to share the fact that, at some point, they hung around me for long enough to decide that they thought it was a positive experience.

Kids who play sports like breathing. Kids who avoid them like the plague. Kids who always have the right answer and kids who just say whatever words pop into their heads. Top of the middle school heap. Bottom of the totem pole. And, everything in between.

The ones who wiggle and squirm and talk and run wild.

The ones who text me mid week. The ones who tag me on Inst*gram. The ones who keep me up at night praying for them. And, the ones who hone in like a missile whenever they see me.

These are "mine," this odd little combination of people who keep me always on my toes, by doing things like this, when ones who don't normally have my password get their hands on my unlocked phone.

(Yes. My sisters really are just as … unique as my kids. The conversation only stops where it does because he passed my phone back to me ding the lesson.)

(Yes. My sisters really are just as unique as my kids. The conversation only stops where it does because he passed my phone back to me during the lesson. The kids aren't the only ones who keep me well versed in the art of strangeness.)

Truth in Technicolor

Let no one ever tell you that sixth grade girls are not capable of doing work.

Each week that we have breakout groups, they thunder up the stairs with a herd of seventh and eight graders and slip off into our empty classrooms. Half on one side to talk through the discussion questions. Half on the other to work on a "triangle."

The more linear ones like the numbered questions. A checklist that tells them when they are done. A chance to give the 'right' answer. They thrive on it.

Others prefer to tell us what they already know, what they're already thinking and feeling and deciding to do. Prefer to flop belly down in a messy circle on the floor and jostle for markers.

"I get to write first."

"I'll write second."

"Can I write the big word?"

"I want to do the shwoop!" 

The last one makes a sound effect and demonstrates the underlining or decoration that is always the final step, the cementing of the big idea.

"Tell me a thought." We start at the top of the triangle, although they're well practiced enough now for the next breakout group to start somewhere else. "One true thing that you heard [the speaker] say today."

The first color of marker goes up near the top of the triangle, just under where I have written the word "THOUGHT." 

Careful sixth grader spelling as they retell truth with their own lips. Sort out what was illustration and what was real. Find the pieces that are solid enough to believe in. And, there is always more than one. More than one thing that they have heard. More than one thing that they want to talk about.

"Okay, so, if you really, truly believed that X, how do you think that that might make you feel?"

Private. Frustrated. Incredible. Confused. Thoughtful. Empowered.

Sometimes they know the word that they are searching for. Other times they only know the feel of it, turning to the rest of us, trying to explain, waiting until someone provides the elusive syllables.

Whatever they come up with, it goes inside the triangle, because, this is the part where, perhaps, they are the most honest, where they do the most work to share what it is that they are thinking. Feeling. The way that this truth feels in their gut.

This is the part where there are no 'right' answers. The part where we normalize this idea that faith can mix with doubt. Pain can mix with joy. Grace can mix with brokenness.

"So," the next step comes, "if you really, truly believed X and that made you feel A, B, and C, how do you think you would act? What would that look like?"

Sometimes they know. Sometimes we have to talk it through.

But, it seems to make more sense this way, when they've given themselves that why behind the action. If I believe this and feel any number of these ways, then I do this. Read my Bible. Talk to Jesus. Talk to  people. Ask questions. Care about others. Tell somebody. Live in awe. Live humbly.

Orthopraxy out of orthodoxy.

Heart. Soul. Mind. Strength.

And, then, a new color and a new writer, and we start again with another truth. Top right. Center. Bottom left.

Two truths, maybe three total, if they have a lot to say. Until the clock starts to run down.

"Alright," the notebook goes to the next set of hands, ready and waiting with a thick, bright marker, "what's the big word that [she's] writing today? What is all of this about?"

Forgiveness. Prayer. Gifts. Jesus.

This step has nothing to do with CBT and everything to do with the way that we draw 'triangles.' This is the wrap up that makes them feel like it's finished. Like they've accomplished something. The summary that they look for when they flip back through the book.

This is the part that feels a little like art.

They give the answer, and we fumble around a little bit, until everyone is certain of the spelling. Until it criss crosses our page in giant letters. The big picture behind all of these careful stacks of syllables.

Someone else decorates the 'big word' with squiggles, or dashes, or bold underline; and the markers go back into my bag, the rainbow of colors that have captured their thoughts. One of the girls prays. We hand out any paperwork that needs to go home. And, they scatter to the wind.

10-15 minutes. A notebook. Some markers. And, a slightly crooked triangle.

This is how we draw theology.

Perfect

 

Snow falls on Friday morning.

Fast. Heavy. Quiet. Wet and warm as only desert snow can be. Too late in the day to mean a change in school. Too vulnerable to the wind that comes after to stay.

By the time I drive home, it is almost melted. Almost. But, not quite.

Because, there is a patch on the mountain that stays brilliantly white. One spot.

The place where last summer's fire burned through.

There is a scar on the mountain, a burnt place that might heal when the spring brings rain and that brief flash of green that paints the desert in the early parts of the year, as if even nature can't wait any longer to shake off the last vestiges of winter.

For now, though, it is black. A few minutes of heat and rain that still show themselves half a year later.

Every time that I see it, I pray. Pray for Haiti. Pray for churches and programs and children. Pray for the kids that we took this year. Pray for the kids that we have taken in the past.

Pray for the places where these trips have marked them, the memories that they hold as proof that God is good even when times are hard.

And, it is always a little bit sad, knowing that something was destroyed in the process, that we stood beside them and allowed their hearts to be broken. But, the memory of it takes my breath away. As if my protective side and my whatever-the-other-side-is are arguing with each other. Arguing over how best to do life with these kids.

And, I am reminded of the oxymoron of grace.

Because, today, the scar is white.

Today, the burnt spot is the place where the borrowed purity of snow shows through with the greatest definition. Today, the broken place most clearly demonstrates His grace.

As it does every day.

When it's almost Christmas and they are antsy with the thought of it. When it is Lent and they are growing faster than any of us can keep up with. When we're in the midst of the ebb and flow of normal time.

Every day, His grace shines through the most clearly when it is allowed to cover our brokenness.

But he said to me, 
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
2 Corinthians 12:9a

Tidings of Comfort and Joy

There is something in me that wants to put a neat bow on everything that I write; wants to pick apart every story, find the whys and the hows that are hiding in each line of black and white text; wants to understand.

Even if mine are the only eyes that see it, it seems important that it make sense.

Neat and gift wrapped and tidy.

But, it is December. Advent. Holy time. And, the messy bits of humanity seem to ooze out from under the tape and burst at the seams of the wrapping paper.

The stories blend together, and I can't seem to decide, even as I am telling them, whether the mess is joy or pain. Can't decide if this is the part of the Christmas story with the angels and the shepherds and the newborn king. Or, the part where the Savior escapes into the night while children are slaughtered.

We pause mid song with the high schoolers, and they are given a chance to write down something that is heavy on their hearts, something that they want to give to God.

They step forwards as one.

Without hesitation. Without pausing to consider. Without having to think.

Advent.

When we carry our hurts raw and close to the surface. When things spill over and out and I am constantly, constantly reminded to pray. When the gentle tugs at my soul that means each child blend over and around and beneath each other like a chorus, whispering every time of a unique need to talk to the Savior.

The Savior whose birth brought eternal hope, but also a temporary sorrow. Who knows what it is to be poor. To be a refugee. To be oppressed. To play. To laugh. To live with the messy ups and downs of a ragtag group of humans.

So, we celebrate Advent. When a tiny young family made a journey required by a harsh decree. When the unknown and the despised watched their sheep, not knowing that they would live to see angels. Live to see the Son of God.

When Magi prepared to travel, already carrying the gifts that spoke of burial.

So, there is a tiny tree beside my bed, and, tucked into its branches, is a tiny cross. Carved out of two pieces of playground bark, years and years ago. Lashed together with a well worn piece of string. Keeping watching over the creche where a wooden family kneels.

And, I am reminded of the gifts that used to appear at its base when my sisters and I were little. Advent gifts. Unwrapped. Loose. Small piles of candy or coins. Socks or a book. Movie tickets on one special Sunday. No paper. No bows. No neat finish but the one that was coming.

The one that is still coming.

1 Chronicles, where I am reading with my high school girls, rewinds back to the beginning. Back to Adam. To the garden. To genealogies that are important because they carry the thread of a promise. A promise already come, but not yet fulfilled.

And, I am reminded that none of our stories are ever finished. That the longest book I could ever write would never fully come to "the end." That eternity stretches in front of us. That it matters less if this record makes sense, and more, for my own sake, that it is true.

Even when it is a mess.

When one of my kids is too quiet. When we go through this pattern every December. When I am too chicken to ask the question that I know the answer to, because I don't want to see the tears that will spring up in his eyes. When I know that next Sunday, for his sake, I will have to ask anyways, so that he knows that I care.

When there isn't enough time or I don't have enough eyes or ears or hands for everyone. When I haven't yet started shopping for presents. When I don't have the words to pray. When the answer to the story is somewhere out of sight.

When we're still waiting.

Because, there is something uniquely holy to this kind of a mess. Some kind of unique treasure in this unwrapped, mixed up, pile of gifts.

A reason, in the midst of the mess, for rest. Comfort. Joy. Blessing. Charis.

Waiting and Carving Spaces

The second Sunday of Advent comes bitterly cold.

Still. Silent. Frozen. As if the entire world is waiting.

The fifth graders come in slow and quiet. Only three of them this morning, the rest hiding away from temperatures that no one here knows how to deal with.

Tired after a full week of school, we manage to collectively complete an entire verse of "Angels We Have Heard on High" to the tune of "Hark the Herald" before the music leader manages to stop the momentum.

But, we tuck into our small group spot under the stairs and draw quietly. Talk about Song of Solomon and Isaiah's coal. Talk about how God purifies and how every poem may indeed be about God. Add to our "Because of Jesus" pages and listen. Listen to spoken word. Listen to "Overcomer" and sing along.

Because, they know this now.

They know that the things that we do here tie in to the things that they do and hear throughout their week. They know that we listen and we watch and we find videos that connect.

This is how we make this space theirs.

There are a thousand other things that we could do. But, like always, there isn't time to fit them all in. Not enough space in an hour and twenty minutes to cram in all of the words and thoughts and life that ought to be shoved into this box that we call church.

(I am mildly convinced that heaven will be one long Sunday, where we have all the time that we could ever want.)

So, we fit as much as we can, and we call it good. This messy thing that is spilling out over all of the edges and defying our best efforts to scoop it back up.

Because, they aren't the only ones who are tired this morning.

Tired and close.

Close enough to spin circles within circles as they weave conversation around us like a web. Sixth, seventh, eighth graders. Freshmen who still come over here to hang out. Words that continue even when one of us is in the octagon and the other is not.

Kids who get me out, just so that I can go and grab a bandaid for someone else.

A game that separates us by grade and gender, but seventh graders who materialize afterwards with the ease of long practice.

Complaints about "sexist" gym teachers and constant play with the simplest of apps on my phone. Mischievous glances during music and constant comments during the lesson from the one who has once again glued himself as close to my side as he can possibly get.

We talk about racism and colonialism, about politics and human nature and the scope of history - and about girls and mad libs and the fact that my phone keeps vibrating in his pocket. 

Another leader tried to be playful and ended up dropping him, and there is confusion in his voice as he tells me the story, rubbing the sore spot on his head, crowding a little closer, capturing my attention the way that they have always done when their worlds are sideways.

Because, it's Advent.

When my quiet ones spill out words and my goofy ones go quiet, withdraw a little, waiting.

When we're messy and raw, honest and beautiful, and I could ignore the schedule all morning and still not quite get to the bottom of it, not solve the things that have them twisted up in worried, tired knots.

When I can feel them carving time out of a Sunday morning, claiming chunks of it as their own.

Like the kid who asks if I'll take him and some friends to the storage room where we spent the coldest of his elementary school Sundays. Notices instantly that I am wearing shoes instead of flip flops. Sits apart for the first time in several weeks but carefully, still catching my eye when he is talking and knows that I am about to shush him.

Gathers up his friends after service and follows me to the "secret room." Not because he doesn't know the way or forgot the passcode or can't find the lights.

He knows all of those things.

But, because this is his time, his space, his constant at an age where everything feels like it is changing. 

Because we can laugh and hide and tell stories as we remember. Because we can jump around corners at a friend and watch his eyes light up as he tells his brother about sword fights and hide and seek. Because, for a thousand reasons uniquely his, this is what it looks like, for today, to jump in and drown ourselves in grace.

This is what it looks like to wait together for a Messiah.

Wait

Sunday comes, and it is almost so par for the course that I don't take note of it.

But, I know that I'll want this record next year, when I am trying to sort through behaviors, trying to find the patterns and the normal. And, I know that our par for the course, is not necessarily par for the course.

So.

Advent comes gently this year, a Sunday right on the tail end of Thanksgiving break.

They come in well rested and well fed, and, if doesn't make it easy, it makes it easier. Makes this first weekend of Advent more like a late night with friends waiting for a midnight premier, and less like white knuckling through.

The fifth graders come in full of questions and humor and stories. Full of life and the desire to move. Eager for Christmas songs and simple games.

We work on a project and notebook.  Run wild around corners in a relay matching up bits from Proverbs and Ecclesiastics, and play fly up until the parents get there. Sing songs, and listen to teaching. 

There is a rhythm to it that they fall into easily these days, a knowing of what comes next. They know what we do, and when and where and how we do it. And, it makes the rest of it fade into the background a little.

My one who fidgets and bounces her body off of mine, but adjusts the impulsive sarcasm at my gentle reminder that it is beginning to be hurtful. The iPod that continues to go off with texts during the lesson. The whispers that are louder than they should be. The irony of the sudden volume and violent shaking of my arms that comes with their excitement over Silent Night. 

And, the kid who stays with my group of girls simply because he knows me and it seems like a better idea than going with the rest of the boys and a leader he has never met. He stays, and no one dies from cooties on either side of the equation.

We finish. One of the seventh graders and I walk to middle school together.

And, it's different, but still so very much the same.

They come in bouncing and eager and full of the need to have eyes turned their way.

I pass out bandaids and gum, and, when we split off into groups for the game, point the ones who drift towards me in the direction that they need to go. Because, it might be the age or the season or the unexpected method of diving up groups, but it takes a while for everyone to figure out where they need to go, and they drift back close while they try to figure it out, like boats coming back to the harbor.

But, they make it, eventually.

We take a Thanksgiving quiz, and they're pretty sure that Columbus sailed the Mayflower in 1492, loudly certain of it, while the little peace maker of a sixth grader murmurs confident answers beside me.  One of the more exuberant boys tries to google whether wild turkey's fly and somehow comes up with the wrong answer.

(That they can be in middle school in 2013 and not know how to research something is an entirely separate conversation about the American education system.)

Boisterously talkative. Silly. Grabbing. Pointing. Poking. Circling.

Not quite hyped up. But, not quite settled, either.

We finish, and my circle dissipates, coming back to check in a few times, but largely finding other places to sit. In their place come the kids who were once my small group.

They cluster in, not as tight as last week, but very conspicuously here, as if we've given them a broken compass and this is the one place that they can find. And, there are a thousand things going on beneath the surface that we try to deal with at the same time that I try to hush them into "acceptable" behaviors.

*nn* reminds me to smile. M*t** reminds me to laugh.

And, even if they are loud enough to draw another leader, every hand goes up during worship. And, it might seem small, that they are doing the same thing as every other kid in the room. But, it isn't. Not for these kids.

Their hands are up. If only for a moment. There are words coming out. And, I will take it.

On this week, when they can't keep their hands and feet off of each other. When the youth pastor talks about being distracted and they are too focused on other things to even glance at me guiltily. When there are no breakout groups and the extra time sitting is like pulling their teeth, but somehow still easier than it would have been to send them away.

When even the shy ones stand close and spend long minutes sticking a name tag to my sleeve over and over and over again. When church runs long but they stay close instead of going to the storage room. When they need me to chase them or jump into the octagon.

When it is gentle but still Advent.

On this week, I will take it.

This is easier. Easier than it could be. Easier than it has been.

Even the high schoolers grin and laugh during the game at Intersect PM. Run around. Just act goofy. Play.

They tell me ridiculous things, and, even though it isn't light or fluffy, there is a settledness to this waiting. An end game. History.

Advent means coming. Jesus is coming.

Already present but coming again.

So, we pour a little extra oil in our lamps, and we sit close to one another, because the night can get cold. And, we wait.

Shoeboxes

There are kids who have grown up on this, "Shoebox kids" who do this as naturally as breathing.

Pack shipping cartons more efficiently than many adults. Handle a tape gun as confidently as the blunt tipped scissors that they still use in school. Load semi trailers. Keep log books. Stretch their arms to carry in a stack of five boxes, because they can. And, because that is how we double check numbers.

Kids who bake cookies and write letters and spend time in the prayer room.

Who know that Sunday and Monday mean eating food in short bursts, whenever they can get it. Who always have a sharpie for carton numbers and an extra rubber band, just in case.

Who do homework when it is quiet and know, instinctively, that more work will come.

They fill balloons and run errands and sort donations. 

Call carton numbers when the relay centers come in and outwork many adults.

Twelve and thirteen year olds who move hundreds of shipping cartons. Seventeen year olds who spend hours of their time down in the collection center. Five year olds who come to work and second graders who keep them in line.

Clusters who come year after year. Middle schoolers and high schoolers who show up to box and load Bethel's cartons.

Sixth graders who refuse to take off their sweatshirts in the sweltering middle school service, because they know that leaving them behind will mean freezing later as they unload and stack and carton thousands of new boxes in a room with an always open door. Who melt to the floor during a game of spoons and play kneeling instead of standing, because we're almost to the end of the week but not yet, and they're tired.

Kids who play in semi trailers as naturally as if they were in their own house. Who clamber on top of boxes to get the highest row. Who pray for kids that they will probably never see and practice the spiels that my mom gives when she talks about the project to a visiting group.

Who finish out collection week with goodbyes that sound like, "See you next year!" and don't think anything odd about it.

Kids who are growing up here, for this one week a year, the way that we did, my sisters and I, back in the days when the semi parked in our driveway or our school books traveled with us in bursting totes.

Growing up serving. Growing up working. And, this year, growing up seeing boxes stream in until we are over a thousand past our goal.

14,814 boxes.

Packed. Cartoned. Recorded. Loaded. Prayed over. Sent off.

Growing up hearing and seeing stories of simple provision time and time again. Growing up with this bustling, temporary community that eats together, works together, laughs together, and fights hard to keep from getting short tempered. Growing up with adults and children working alongside and as equals. Growing up where the length of your reach is the primary job qualification for anyone who comes with a willing heart.

Growing up with shoeboxes.

Charis

It's winter now, fully and completely.

There is ice on my car in the morning, and the short drive to church isn't enough time for my defrost to even begin to think of being warm. The heaters in the church building are on full blast and rooms that are usually cold are nearly tropical.

The kids have settled in, and, even with the squirrely energy of a last Sunday before Thanksgiving break, even with a main service that runs long for communion, we are relatively calm.

Transition antsy. Pre holidays stressed. But, in a familiar sort of way. Like we've done this before. Like we know how to get through this.

So, the fifth graders come and tell me all about their weeks. About basketball tryouts they had and funerals that they are leaving for. We work on a project and finish up the week's notebooking. We sing and hear a story and talk about Job.

And, we find grace when their voices are too loud and too forced. When we have to remind them to listen even though they want to be playing. When they explode for a few minutes an it is a little bit wild and a little bit sassy. When it has nothing to do with candy or sugar or hours of sleep and everything to do with big feelings in small bodies.

When they borrow my phone to play a preschool science game about things that sink and things that float.

When they need the space to be a little bit hurt and a little bit broken, a little bit sad or a little bit uncertain, there is grace to cover.

Charis.

A Strong's Concordance entry that starts at 'eucharisteo' and meanders through until we are here. Until we have taken gratitude down, almost to its simplest form. Until we are once again drowning in grace.

Grace for a seventh grade boy who looks at me in confusion when they are told to find their leaders for rotations. As if, somehow, the fact that all of the other seventh grade boys are flocking to these men might not mean that he is meant to follow.

Grace when I point and he nods, and my group stars going one way and his starts going another. When he falls flat to the ground and looks for me to pick him up. When I do and he stands for a moment and then lets himself fall the other direction.

Maybe he honestly doesn't know what to do. Maybe he just doesn't want to do it.

Maybe we are pushing too hard, asking too much, on a week where they just want to be close.

But, there is grace.

Grace to nudge him to his feet and send him off with hands on shoulders and in his hair.

Grace when he tells me that he is going to get "lost" and then hides behind a set of doors until my group goes past. When the seventh grade boys shout my name over a balcony and the seventh grade girls call me over to watch them play duck duck goose.

When we talk about old times and they ask over and over why I am not still their breakout leader.

When we come back together and his friends clear a space so that he can sit right beside me. When sixth graders are on my left and seventh graders on my right. When they do all of the things that they are not supposed to do during music.

Glancing at me every time.

Testing the limits of grace.

Daring me just to reach out and hold on. Daring me not to let go.

Another leaders steps over, and they settle for a minute or two. Taking off for the storage room as soon as we finish. Basking in the familiarity of something old. Knowing that, when it is time, I will come to find them.

I do. I always do. 

And, somehow, in twelve and thirteen year old minds, it is a picture of grace.

Charis.

Not 'just grace,' as if there were any such thing, but the way that we live because of grace. The gratitude that covers everything. The loving kindness and favor that comes, not because we are perfect, but despite our imperfections.

Grace that sees them. That knows where they are and what they are doing. That has the time to watch ridiculous puppet plays and shout goodbyes across emptying rooms.

Grace for kids who notice everything, from the fact that I am wearing shoes today instead of flip flops, to the fact that it is my phone that travels with the 7th grade boys to take pictures. Grace for leaders who are messy in our own ways, tired, or out of our depth.

Grace. Not because any of us deserve it. But, because all of us need it.

Enough

Sunday.

When I can't decide if I should be letting go or holding on a little tighter.

When smiles are more important than almost anything else, not because there is so much stock put into being happy, but because every grin is a deep chance for connection, an excuse for eye contact and proof that they are loved.

When I do my best to look confident, even when it isn't true.

And, when I don't know that I am doing it right at all.

Because, sometimes, on Sunday, I let fear whisper back at me. Whisper that I am too much. Not enough. Wrong.

That this isn't how it goes. Isn't how it's done.

But, I look in their eyes that have never known anything else, and I wonder what it would mean for them if we suddenly started doing it "right."

Would they learn to behave? Would they settle down? Or, would they disappear? Quit coming?

Monday comes.

And I am reminded in a dozen ways that it is sometimes okay to do it wrong.

Reminded by an eleventh grade boy who stretches tall above my head these days but still laughs over the days when I was his third grade Sunday school teacher. Endless relay races and failed kangaroo kicks. Too much noise and not enough sitting still. Once quiet relationships that still stand.

Although, these days, he is far from quiet!

Reminded by a teacher in the behavioral room who murmurs how much smoother things ran today with my unexpected drop in.

By kindergarten boys who smile and grin and show me every stroke that they make with their pencils.

By fifth graders who run up to tell me the details of their new Indiana Jones hat and the imagined adventures that it took to get it.

By a youth pastor who gives us the four keys of a successful youth ministry:
1) Relationship
2) Relationship
3) Relationship
4) Relationship

By the faces that look up from a photo directory.

We do the things that will most help this particular group of kids to see Jesus in us. We look for the good, and we call it out. Even when good isn't "right."

It's almost the the holidays. Almost Advent. And, they can feel the end of normal time pressing down on them like a blanket.

Warm and comforting to some.

Wet and smothering to others.

So, we'll take advantage of this this space before the next colored block on the liturgical calendar, this last breath before the holidays scatter them to the winds.

This week's fourteen of them sit clustered around, turned all sideways and catty whompus, tucked in amongst feet and knees that seem to be going every direction at once, but somehow still mostly facing front.

They listen and type answers to the question that I ask when their attention starts to waver.

Their answers are simple but very much not so simple, right at this age where they are trying to figure out life and death and everything in between.

There's no magic in this. Not of the Hogwarts variety, at least. Sometimes, not even a lot of confidence. Nothing that I can whisper to make it easy or smooth or painless. But, there is Jesus. And, that is enough.

Beautiful Eyes

(7:11)

There are days.

There are days when you wipe blood off of the walls of the dodgeball pit and the kids point out the places that you missed.

There are days when you pass out bandaids.

There are days when it is all just another brand of normal.

When the seventh grade boys press in close and the one girl in the group tries to maintain her space in the squirming puppy pile of boy.

When ten seconds of intentionality can be enough to mend broken connections.

When they smile and grin and sometimes say exactly the opposite of what they mean - but it's okay, because we both know it.

When it isn't that it's easy, but rather that it works.

Days when sorry and forgiven are done without ever speaking the words. Where I have to go them, some of them, rather than the other way around, but, when I do, when two hands go down on tense shoulders, all is forgiven, forgotten, and they settle in close, determined, for this week, to be mine.

M*t** sits first, not quite center, not quite back. Not his normal spot. My spot. The spot where he angles each week so that he can see, but only occasionally sits.

M*tt** and K*r*n settle on my right, the rest of the kids follow, and we play a game, together, with another leader.

(Well, first the room descends into the chaos that can only come when you give 100+ middle schoolers pool noodles for a game of ninja, and the careful mask on my anxious one falls. 

People are hitting each other - hurting each other - and laughing, and he dislikes it with an intensity that I did not expect. An intensity that I last saw when the youth pastor showed them a video of a lamb being led to the slaughter.

He can't keep track of who to defend or how. And, he hates it.

Hates it enough to do something.

So I watch him fall to the ground and curl up in a ball. Let them hit him so that they are not hitting each other.

And, my heart leaps a little for this amazing kid.

This brave, scared, jumbled mess of thirteen year old thought and emotion who has glued himself carefully within the sphere of where my arms can reach.)

Worship. Music. Where they jostle again like puppies, and a few of them come and go and come back. Always come back.

"I'm glad that you don't make me spin and stuff any more."

J*yd*n says it, and we talk a little about how I used to lift him by the elbows until he was "jumping" or spin him around in the circles he wouldn't make on his own. He's getting too tall for that now, easily to my chin or higher. 

But, when the song ends, and his slow clap goes on for too long, I lay my hands over his, make them stop. And, he smiles.

We're all distracted. But, we smile a lot.

The tired, sullen looks that they came in with slip, and every antic is met with a grin and a glance that cranes around to meet mine.

For today, although they are antsy over the God thing to come, these kids have beautiful eyes.

Beautiful eyes that look at each other and see something worth protecting, something worth noticing and celebrating.

Beautiful eyes that see my presence with more clarity than my frazzled hair or my awkward attempts at this thing that we call church, that somehow instinctively know that this is a thing that we do together.

That let this be a new week to try again after we got our wires crossed.

That put my phone away without prompting.

That sit still and quiet and close to listen as a ninety-five year old man tells the story of salvation.

And, this is normal.

This blood and fear and laughter and courage. This is middle school. But, it is also magic.

Conflicted

Conflicted.

It might be the word of the week.

As if our insides were tugging in two different directions at once. Fighting against ourselves. Losing as often as we win.

The fifth graders feel it, talking over the top of each other, serious in the same moment that they are goofy. 

Racing to see who can come up with the most things to be thankful for, but writing down real things nonetheless - friends and grandparents, warm homes and supportive parents. Retelling Bible stories while the person next to them interjects with unicorns and rainbows.

Wired on an extra hour of sleep but discombobulated with the change.

And, I tend to forget how carefully we have choreographed the steps to our dance - until something happens to throw it out of sync.

There's a kid who has been making a habit of waiting for me in the children's wing, where we both teach first hour classes. We walk together to middle school. Two minutes, perhaps, that are all his.

This week, I leave early.

I'm watching some kids between services.

It's simple. Thirty minutes, maybe forty. Myself and another leader. We're scheduled to be finished before middle school even gets really started.

But, as we walk down into a game that is already underway, I can tell that I have thrown him for a total loop. Whatever his plans were for the intro time, I messed with them. Messed with the steady security that he thrives on.

Enter: conflict.

Because, for all that he doesn't have the words for it, for all that it wasn't intended to have anything to do with him at all, he feels betrayed.

And, when the kid who would jump in front of a dodge ball before he let it hit me begins to throw Sweet T arts at me - hard - I can see it in his eyes. Because, it's just this side of the playful roughhousing that makes up so much of middle school with these boys, and it's the only way that he know right now to communicate.

Barely thirteen is a rough age for words.

There isn't a right way to say the ones that he needs and still look cool, collected, in control.

"Where were you?" The girls manage to find the words, clinging to my arms - a little roughly, as if it is both accusation and lifeline. "No one knew where you were."

Some of the ones who ask barely do more than say hello on a typical Sunday, but it is a steadiness that they trust, a step to the dance that was missing, that threw off the rhythm of their morning.

The one with the Sweet T arts is daring me to fix it. Daring me to come and hold on until it is better - but also daring me to feel how he feels.

So, he stays close. But, not too close. Barely out of arms reach. Not smiling. Not looking me in the eye.  Only glancing over when he thinks my head is turned. Still. So very, very still.

We are close, but I am not forgiven.

It roils inside of him, in the set of his shoulders and the tilt of his head, this conflict of desires.

Reconciliation or retribution.

The speaker talks about the Fruit of the Spirit, and the girls in breakout group are brutally honest.

Sometimes, if I believe that I need patience in my life, it makes me feel patient and forgiving, BUT, sometimes, believing that makes me feel angry and impatient, anxious and worried. If I believed that and felt any of those things, I could always pray, but I might also de-stress - go on a run, spend time thinking, talk to someone, or sleep on it before acting.

I believe that I need love in my life, that I ned to be loving, and that makes me feel challenged and puzzled and confused, so I do something about it. I pray or ask someone or think about it or read the Bible.

They know that they want these things, but they know that they aren't these things. Not naturally. Not all the time.

There is this conflict, the fruit of the Spirit or the fruit of the flesh.

I love that they are safe enough here to speak truth, even when it isn't pretty. Safe enough to feel honestly, even when the feelings are not happy. Safe enough to act genuinely, even when the actions are not always on task.

These are my kids, my conflicted, messy kids.

I am not perfect, and neither are they. So, we dive deeper into grace, and, next week, we might come up on the other side.

Haiti Again

It's the first week of November, and, already, we're talking about Haiti.

They are juggling dates for next summer, trying to ensure that it will fit, pushing to see how much leeway they can find in the other bits and pieces that make up their lives.

Somehow, this is that important.

Not that it defines everything, but that it is somehow there, just under the surface, waiting to be woven into the fabric of who they understand themselves to be, who they understand God to be.

A God who lives in poverty and wealth. Who is always on time, even when the actual time isn't important. Who provides and comforts but allows for sickness and pain.

A God who soothes fears but pushes them beyond the limits of comfort. Who exists in community and in solitude. Who paints the night sky and the sunrise.

A God who allows for destruction but trains hands to rebuild.

A God who has made them.

Made them bold and brave and strong and scared. Who watches them laugh and dance and cry and grieve. 

Who has built them for honesty and late night talks on the roof. Who has designed them to help heal each other's hurts and stand guard over each other's fears.

A God knows their name and remembers their faces.

A God who delights every time that they come to Him and who cares deeply for a deeply broken world.

So, it's barely November, three months earlier than last year, but it is Haiti season.

Not yet the all consuming everything that will tinge every conversation and every interaction, but the rumbles are building, next year's team already beginning to sort itself out.

Because, it is in their blood. Deep enough in the fabric of this youth group that, if we choose, everything can be drawn back to Haiti.

It could be named as a strength, but also as a weakness. Whatever it is, it is infectious. And, not four months after we came home, they are talking about going back.

Even kids who have never been before use that phrase, talk about "going back." 

It is that much a part of who they are as a youth group. VBS in Haiti is something that "we" do. 

A week and a half that lasts all year.

Ravenclaw

4th and 5th grade fun night.

This group of them, at this age, are still so easily entertained.

We can keep them in the same room, for two solid hours, playing carnival type games, decorating backpacks and pumpkins, and they think that it is the best thing in the world.

And, it has more to do with it being this class of them, this group, than it does with their age.

Because, there are kids here, middle schoolers who are helping, who would have chaffed at this so badly. Kids from classes who would have had the marshmallows in their mouths or in the air, but not on the tables to construct. Who would have had sharpie on each other just as soon as on the pumpkins. Who would have scribbled rather than deal with a drawing that didn't turn out.

These guys are calm. "Easy." Talkative. Questioning. Careful. Thoughtful.

Every three years or so, there is a class like this, one that plays with words and ideas like they are toys. One that examines everything, picks it apart and tears it down to it's tiniest pieces and then decides what to do with the results.

They will go wherever there is knowledge, information, just as happy to sit as to run, and they spew forth stories, words, ideas.

Loyal, but tentatively, testingly so.

A strong sense of systemic justice, "This thing (idea, way of being or doing) is broken; We should think of a way to fix it," and, a careful counting of fairness.

Everything is thought through. Everything is considered. And, if they act, it is because they have decided that it is the right thing to do and the right time to do it.

There are rules to their worlds, and, unless those rules are proven to be unjust or unfair, they will follow them largely without comment. An unjust rule is simply brushed aside, considered and then ignored as if it never existed.

Out of control doesn't feel good to them, and, although they will use it occasionally to test unclear rules and boundaries, they are the most likely to ruefully apologize for it later.

This is the class most likely to shadow and mimic behaviors in order to learn. Most likely to be astoundingly capable and confident when they finally step out on their own. Most likely to write a letter, make a craft, play music, express themselves by creating something tangible.

We have them as our fifth grade, eighth grade, and eleventh grade classes. In theory, our second graders and preschoolers as well, although I don't know the little ones well enough to say for certain. Every third class, up through, at least, the class above mine.

If Hogwarts students were sorted by year, by group, these classes would be Ravenclaw.

Bird Song and Old Steps

There is a certain kind of hoarse shriek that I am convinced only the middle school male is capable of producing. Some of them with more regularity than others.

It is unique. Identifying. And, I can tell without looking which sound belongs to who.

Other people learn bird songs. Jessica learns the piercing sounds of middle school boys who shriek like they are trying to use echolocation to orient themselves in space.

Some weeks it is quick, announcing their presence as they come running in or jumping over or hurtling down. Other weeks, like this one, it continues until I am sure that their throats must be raw with it.

Over and over and over.

Not quite echolocation, but almost. 

Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play. Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play.

Bump. Run. Catch. Torture. Release. Bump. Run. Catch. Torture. Release.

Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play. Shriek. Look up. Catch eyes. Play.

He's in seventh grade, starting to get long and lanky, and the walk from one end of the church to the other was punctuated by greetings from the kids that he teaches, little boys who adore him.

And, maybe it is because it doesn't seem like so long ago that he was that size himself that I indulge the repetition and the patterns that we haven't used quite this way since elementary school.

Or, maybe it's something in the kids.

He brings up stories from our small group. *bby talks with me about when she was a baby. *nn* compares only knowing me since 4th grade. The girls huddle close but don't blink when I go to chase the shrieking one.

J*m** sits beside for the first time in forever, and J*m** rubs coins across the carpet until they are hot, pressing them against the tops of my bare feet, challenges me on our mini basketball hoops. There are no breakout groups. And, it's one of those weeks where growing up means going back, just for today, to being little.

So, when our pattern is interrupted by a game, he makes sure to tell me what side he is going to be on, makes sure that I see him during music (even when I break old patterns and don't come over), maneuvers his space during the lesson until we have a clear line of sight.

Because, these are steps to a fourth grade dance.

It's been three years, but we were once very good at this.

It gives us something to fall back on, something known. Something other than those messy questions that no thirteen year old wants to answer in a room filled with dozens of peers. "How are you doing?" "What's wrong?" "Are you okay?"

Not honestly, at least.

But, there is something raw and honest to the shrieks that never stop, to the running and the catching and the chasing. To the little boy who never gets up until I do, who asks that we not add other leaders into the game the way that most weeks allow. Who stops when I am talking to another boy and allows me to reach out and snag him.

Right to left. Back and forth. Rhythmic. Steady. I talk and swing him in a loose basket hold that he doesn't fight. 

And, I am reminded of the fourth grader who used to run wild circles, watching me out of the corner or his eye. Until I caught him. Reached out and snagged him in the circle of an almost basket hold. Let him stay there until he finally melted.

These patterns. Seasons. Fourth grade steps in a seventh grade dance. Grown up and little all at the same time. These are the languages that we speak.

Languages where shrieks are sometimes just as good as words.

Because, well, that's just middle school.

Cluster

For four years, I have co-led a high school girls' group with two other people, one of whom was actually my high school leader once upon a time.

Every week, the girls are incredible and insightful and thoughtful and oh so very funny, and I wish that I had the freedom to write more. But, what happens in cluster stays in cluster.

Unless, of course, we put it on YouT*be for all the world to see.

Because, yes, in what has to be the most exuberantly truth and information loving of all the clusters, this is the sort of thing that we do… talk about the eight sections of the Old Testament and how which of the things that we are reading fit in where.

And, then we make up hand motions to help remember them.

Enough?

"He was talking about you [at school]and he said that, 'my church leader has a phone on her app.'"

It's a simple phrase, the fore spoken 7th grader looking sheepish at my other elbow, and I don't want to put too much into it. She's only telling me because of the flip flop of words. Phone on her app instead of an app on her phone. It's gentle mocking. Nothing more.

But, I do anyways.

Between the quiet laughter and the half listening to game instructions that leaves all of us uncertain of what we're supposed to be doing - I over think it.

My brain spins a million miles an hour when I'm with this group. We've made four years' practice of sifting through every word and flicker of action in order to find truth that has always been buried in a certain level of noise and chaos. And, I'm not about to be able to turn it off now.

These are my kids.

Or, they were, but they aren't, but they are. And, it's as mixed up in real life as it sounds on paper.

As mixed up as it sounds in K*r*n's rendition of J*d*n's story. His church leader, even though this is the second year that I am not officially his leader at all.

But, I am.

Some weeks they are as close as my own skin, like someone forgot to install the normal space between our elbows, feet, knees. And, some weeks they remember that there are other people here, other leaders, other adult - or nearly adult - humans who want to teach them and love them and learn who they are.

Some weeks they forget in one moment and remember in the next.

Some weeks I am intentional about giving them space, about letting another leader step in to handle it, whatever it is. Some weeks they are intentional about not letting me do so.

Some weeks it is relatively clear that I am a sixth grade girls' leader.

Other weeks, a quick scan of the kids around me would make that distinctly less than clear. Because, there are still weeks where I am surrounded mostly by seventh grade boys.

Sometimes I think that I am as mixed up about it as they are, like a mom who can't decide if it is better to let her child cry for a few weeks in the nursery until he gets used to it or just not bother bringing him in at all.

I may have become that mom who just starts working in the nursery with her kid instead.

Over thinking.

Over thinking because church is meant to be a place where we can come to feel safe, known, steadied against the instability of a broken world. But also pushed, grown, challenged.

And, I have to wonder if we're finding the proper balance between the two.

Am I pushing them hard enough? Would they learn more if I stepped back? Or, would the lack of connection just be an excuse to disappear?

Since forth grade, I have trusted, we have trusted, these particular kids to self select, to put themselves in the groups where they need to be. They moved around a little, at first, but they stopped here. For the fourth year in a row, they have largely stopped here.

Is that okay? Shouldn't the boys have males at church that they look up to more than me? How much does shared history outweigh shared gender?

Is it enough? It must be enough. Surely it is enough. Is it enough to teach them how to be human and trust that, once they know how to be human, they will be wise enough to figure out how to be men?

Is enough to be slow and gentle, to let them learn to trust other leaders at their own pace, without breaking their trust in the process?

Is it enough, for the boys and the girls, to just do life, and trust God to take care of the rest?

These kids have a marvelous ability to set my head whirling, to bring up constant questions that might not have any answers. To turn ecclesiology back into a pondering of this situation, with these people, right now.

And, when ecclesiology turns to eucharisteo. When eucharisteo turns to chario. When the study of church turns to gratitude and gratitude turns into a greeting, a cause for joy.

That might just be enough.

Spinning Sabbath

Sabbath.

First day back to fall Sunday school, and I am reminded to breathe deep and make each moment count, reminded of how short the time is that we have them here.

It is a specials week. Music. Gym time. Four speakers. Twenty minutes of small group time carved down to ten, and we notebook at the speed of light. They're learning, but I don't think that they realize it yet, these girls who love to draw and cut and glue. They're having fun, and, as they close up their folders, they tell me so.

5th graders now. The smallest group that I've ever had in children's. Six girls this week.

And, yet.

This day of rest spins around me like an overzealous puppy.

Fifth grade. Fourth grade.

Boys. Girls.

They'll settle soon, divide up, begin to sit with their small groups. But, for now. For now, they sit close and play with my lanyard or the ring on my finger. For now, they take half a dozen pictures, not of themselves, but of me. As if I might cease to exist when they stop looking.

I won't, but they don't know that yet.

And, it's okay.

We're setting patterns for the rest of the year. Patterns that they are seen. That they are known. That every moment is precious. Patterns that might just carry us through the tempest that comes as they get just a little bit older.

Because, the middle schoolers are raw today. Antsy. Close. Coming out of a rough week.

Remembering last Sunday's video and quiet tears.

Last week, the boys miscalculated and ended up separated from us in a game. This week, they flop down into tight spaces, this messy muddle of different friend groups who all claim to be mine. 

"Your kids are misbehaving," one of the girls teases me as they jostle and talk and play with my phone when they should be listening to instructions. 

They should be listening.

But, truth comes out in spurts, blurbs that I want to hold on to, go back to. Honest words from the sad eyed one who almost always choses to speak to me with actions instead. Words that I would delve deeper into. If only we had the time.

So, I am listening instead.

Because, these moments are few and precious. These minutes where they pretend to still be a small group.

We split for game, girls on one side, boys on the other. Separated again. And, it does nothing to ease the restless hurt in their souls.

One of my quieter ones connects himself elbow and arm for music, nonstop chatter and fidgeting like the slow release of a pressure valve. He bounces his knee over mine during the lesson and finally spits part of it out as we transition to small groups.

Not all of it, but part.

Enough.

And, I am in the middle of a whirlwind. But, there are patterns.

Patterns that allow them to scramble close at the beginning of the lesson, because, during last week's video, they were too far away. That let them move back to where they were when it becomes clear that this week holds no such surprises.

Patterns that tell stories about soccer games, football, volley ball. But also about boy problems, friend problems, people that they miss, hard things at school.

That make it okay to just be close without needing to talk.

They are raw, and it isn't pretty or smooth, but there is a trust here that has taken long years to build.

Hours in trees and busses and storage rooms. Semi's filled with shoeboxes, kayak rides on a river, and frozen fingers out in the snow. Donut fights and crayon wars. Honest conversations and a thousand holds and catches.

There is a beauty here and also a sweetness. A sweetness in seventh grade boys who offer me m&m's or tuck pieces of gum inside my phone case; in kids who feel no hesitation in referring to me as one of their "best friends;" in girls who lay on their bellies around a piece of paper and allow me to see a glimpse of their hearts; in shouted goodbyes across the parking lot, and in a phone that, almost every week, carries a mark of their presence.

In kids who take pictures of themselves, because they know that I am not going anywhere.

And, even the nomad longing in my soul can find the beauty in this. 

Steadiness. Consistency. Trust.

Sabbath.

A day to rest and to heal.

Loud and raw and spinning.

But, good.