In Honor of my 50th post...

...here is quite possibly one of the funniest/coolest things EVER!

Wednesday night was AMAZING! But before I can tell you that story... I need to give you some background information (which is a little bit funny too :).

A couple of weeks ago, I was sitting in the Spanish service on Sunday night when my phone rang. It was a blocked number so I excused myself and answered it (oftentimes parents will call wondering when things are over, or teens will call wondering about something, so if it's blocked I answer). The following is the conversation that took place:

Diandra: Hello?
Teen on phone: Diandra... is Crystal (one of my teens) with you?
Diandra: Yes
Teen: Can you drop her off at Ralph's? (a grocery store down the street)
Diandra: Right now?
Teen: Yeah
Diandra: (knowing full well I was not going to drop her off at Ralph's in the middle of a service but now very curious why they wanted her there) Why?
Teen: Because we're going to go evangelize and we need a singer...

As I continued talking to him, I realized that he and another boy had been going to the grocery store and standing outside with a guitar singing and handing out my business cards and inviting people to church. There was a little part of me that really thought this was a hilarious picture. See... these are the two boys that started the whole "your face" movement (see previous post). I pictured their evangelism going something like this:

Teen 1: Hey God loves you!
Teen 2: Your face is God

Teen 1: You should accept Jesus...
Teen 2: Your face should accept Jesus

and so on...

But there was another, bigger part of me that was incredibly proud of them, and thankful for these two boys that have come such a long way from where they were the first time they came. They saw a need for reaching out and they decided to do something about it!

So last Wednesday (still not the main point of this post), a boy came to our youth group. He'd never been there before, and he kind of stood out. But our kids included him right away... in fact I wasn't even sure who he'd originally come with because he was with several different people. He sat near the back and when we started worship and some of the kids stood up... he stood up too.

I watched from the back and started to get kind of excited thinking "hey, maybe he's getting it!"
Just then, something changed my thought.

He pulled out a lighter.

And then he started waving it back and forth in the air like they do at concerts.

There is rarely a time when I have no IDEA what to do... but this was one of those times. I was so caught off guard. I didn't know if I should laugh, or yell, or tackle him and hope the church didn't catch on fire.

So I just stood there and watched.

A couple minutes later, he put it away and the service carried on as usual.

This leads me to this last Wednesday night.

He came back! We had a smaller group than usual, but we had several new teens that I hadn't seen before. I looked around the gym a few minutes before we were going to start the service and realized we were missing quite a few teens... and our intern. So I wandered into the teen room and found them all in there... including this teen that had come the week before. Our intern, Sarah, was sitting with them and talking to them about God. Answering their questions and talking them through things. Javier and I decided that rather than stop what was happening, we'd allow this teen and one other one that is still fairly new, to stay in the teen room and talk with Sarah. In the mean time, we started the service.

I spoke about John 4:1-26... the story of the Samaritan woman. At the end of the lesson, I started talking to the kids about the importance of making a choice, and the fact that not making a choice... IS actually making a choice. Then I said, "the fact is, if you haven't accepted Jesus, you're going to hell. I know that seems harsh, but that's the truth. The good news is, it's not too late." We ended the service with worship and a chance for the kids to go to the alter. Many of the kids did. And two of the kids that came with friends ACCEPTED JESUS!!!

***Side note*** Since Javier joined us... I have learned a lot of things and I have changed the way I do a lot of things. One of the things that has made the biggest difference is simply ASKING if anyone wants to accept Jesus. We have kids saved every month just because we ask if they want to... a lot of teens are just waiting for an invitation.

After the service, the teen that had been invited from Ralph's came out of the youth room... he still has a lot of questions, but things are starting to be more clear to him. I realized he'd been carrying around a plastic grocery bag full of something.

Then he announced that he'd brought 48 lighters to share "for the concert"!!!

But when he realized it was over, he said, "what am I going to do with 48 lighters???"

I found out later, that this kid had gone to Ralph's looking for nutmeg. he'd been told that if you smoke it, you can get high. Just because two of our boys got an idea in their heads to do something... and they DID it... this life is being changed.

I know this post was longer than usual, but there were so many parts of this story that were both funny and touching and simply amazing, that I wanted to make sure to share the whole thing!

We all have good days and bad days. But at the end of the day, God is good, regardless of how our day was. For me, Wednesday was a bad day... but God had other plans :)