These past few weeks have been one of the most stressful and most rewarding times of my life. For a while now my church, my teammate Aaron, and I have been praying for a youth club to get started. And most of my time has been spent preparing for Friday November 11, the kick off for our very first youth club.
It was so cool to be able to see this go from being a dream and an idea to becoming a reality; to see all the parts come together and for it to be a success. We had a crazy amount of kids come out for the first night! There were a total of 76 kids attending the two sessions, many who do not currently attend church.
This was such a blessing to see all of our hard work and prayer be rewarded. We had a younger session and God did some crazy things because honestly I was only expecting about 20 kids for this session. And while I was still setting things up, and I noticed a few kids coming in I was relieved that someone actually showed up. Then my vicar came up to me and said there was a line out the door and down the side walk! Now I’m not going to lie I was a bit overwhelmed. We had 56 kids in our church for the first session. I was so excited but also I was freaking out. We didn’t have enough markers for our craft, we didn’t have enough seats for all the kids to sit at a table, we didn’t have change for our candy shop. Everything wasn’t perfect. But God took care of everything and although it wasn’t perfect the kids still enjoyed it and had fun.
The next session, for the older kids, was less stressful. 22 students showed up to this one. We had so much fun playing silly games with the kids and getting to dive into James 1 with them. Again not everything in this session went perfect but it didn’t matter because the kids were still having fun. It was so encouraging to hear some of the parents say how much fun their kids had and that they were glad that we put this on because there isn’t really anything for their kids to do in the area. We had one mom who came in to pick up her child and she started tearing up because her daughter has been having a hard time at school and she saw her having fun with other students and participating in our games. That is the reason we wanted to do this. We wanted to create an environment where kids felt safe to be themselves and to have fun. We also wanted this to be a less intimidating introduction to church, and these reactions from the kids and parents is so encouraging to know we are doing the right thing.
I learned something very important this night. I can tend to be a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to planning things and I want things to work perfectly, but in this case it wasn’t perfect. But even though it wasn’t perfect in my eyes, God took care of everything. I learned that even though it didn’t all go to plan God had my back and made sure everything works out in the end. I am so thankful for everyone who has been praying for this event and for all who came out to help and volunteer. We couldn’t have made this happen if we didn’t have such amazing helpers!
Here are some pictures from Ignite!!
Following God to England 
Madi it is so encouraging to hear the amazing ways God is not only moving in England but in your life as well! The fact that I see Him moving in my own life and then reading of His presence in England really illuminates how big our God is and how He is working things out for His glory in every part of the world. Such an encouraging perspective changer! Sending much love and prayers your way as your work for His kingdom continues!
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