From: Riley, Micah, Lauren, Jessica, Justin, and Patrick

Jesus wept and so did we. ): Tough feelings floated around the air like balloons being freed into the sky. Early in the morning, we embarked to Target Dayton- a church that feeds the poor around local Dayton.  We split up into groups of a few people. Some groups praying for the local community, other groups greeting them. Each and every person had their own little story that we listened to.

During the day, we began arguing because of the lack of sleep and selfishness that was hovering about.  We then gathered for small groups and each student shared their experiences to the class. After seconds most of us broke into tears.  After an already emotional evening, another enigma soon erupted: A death in the student’s family shocked us all, which led to another couple hours of crying.

This mission trip will change all our lives forever. We will keep the feeling that we felt this night and hold onto it whenever we have a choice to make.

WOW!!!!  It has been a very emotional, tearful, and gut wrenching night.  Our students have been challenged and stretched in so many ways.  Tonight after our evening talk I gave our students an opportunity to share from their hearts as they reflected back over all they had experienced this week.  At this point there were a few who were already emotional, but all of a sudden the tears really began to flow.  They expressed tears of regret as they thought about how much they have been blessed and yet so often selfishly want more – often material stuff.  Others expressed how they have fallen short in truly following God.

Then one of our students received a phone call that his great-grandfather had passed away.  This broke his heart and the hearts of all of our students.  We then put our arms around him and began praying.  It was encouraging to see these JH students rally behind him.

Please keep our students in your prayers.  God is working!  Praise the Lord!!!

Tommy

From Chase: This trip has been really fun and I have made many friends. Every day in the morning we all split up into our work groups and go to a park and have lunch with a bunch of kids, and play games.  Even though we have only been here 3 days we have made many friends.  I even met a guy whose nickname is burrito.  Over all it has been a really fun time.

From Micah Ridenour: I would rather spend a week serving others than be home doing nothing.

From Lauren Tilley: Hey madre and padre! J I miss you.. thing is.. I lost my voice :/ you would think after 2 straight weeks of talking.. that wouldn’t happen! J well miss you! love you, tell you more when I come home.

From riley uhferrkind: I like spaghetti weat meat on the top of the noodles.

From Joy Burto: Hey, having fun here in Dayton! We’ve met a lot of new people and seen a lot of new things here, but it’s been great. Tell Rudy I said hi, love you!

From Estella Donis: Having lots of fun and say I wuv u to Onyx and our wittle puppy Summit.

From Jessica Wegrecki

Hey mom and dad,

I am having a great time.  Today was the first day that I went to go help kids that did not have any thing to eat during the day!  Some of the kids are like 5…. It is so crazy and sad to think that little kids like that might not have food. A little boy named Bubba had his birthday today.  We all sang happy birthday and after that he yelled happy birthday!!  It was sooo cute!  We ate with the kids and then had games.  We played red rover, tag, and hide and seek.  It was very hot today.  Tomorrow is going to be hot too so when we go to that place we are going to bring water balloons and squirt guns. It is going to be fun for them and us. I will see you soon bye!

Jessie

From Justin Olenczuk

It was a difficult first day getting use to the surroundings and others…at times I was even getting upset about a couple things…When we got done listening to Tommy talk yesterday I got something out of it.  Philippians 2:3-4 says, “do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourself.  Each of you should look not only to your interests, but also to the interests of others.”

So what I got out of it was… I will just give an example.  If you see someone getting teased you should put yourself in their shoes and think about if you would like it if you were the one getting teased; You probably wouldn’t.  So help that kid out and defend him.

So to anyone who reads this please listen and help that person out even if that person isn’t being teased help him/her out.  That person could just been having a bad day. Thank you for taking your time to read this.  I just hope you will apply this to your life.

Today was a day full of travel, unpacking, picking up a ton of food, and having our first session.  Our theme for the week is “Serve Love“.  Tonight we began our first session with a great set of songs, which was led by my brother-in-law Justin Romine:

How He Loves – by David Crowder Band

I Could Sing of Your Love Forever – by Delirious

Unfailing Love – by Chris Tomlin

God of This City – by Bluetree

The song list was a perfect set up for our talk, which was called “What is Love?“  We focused on Philippians 2:5-8, which talks about the attitude of Jesus – his journey of love, which was ultimately demonstrated through his death on the cross.

Please keep our students in your prayers as we seek to “Serve Love” this week.  May our students begin to fully realize how deep Jesus’ love is for us and learn how to show that love to ALL we come into contact with.

Tommy

It’s amazing what can happen when you give up several days to serve others.  It can help you grow in your faith, build closer relationships with others, and create life long memories.

Will you join us?  Open to students currently in 6^th-8^th grade.

Forms and additional details can be found on the Student Ministries Café Counter or by clicking below:

2011 JH Mission Trip Forms

Tommy