7/11/2010

It’s been a busy week at the Power House in Baltimore, Maryland.

It started out Sunday with about 30 people at Morning Worship. During the service we remembered why we're engaged in youth ministry, reviewed last year's youth ministry highlights, and recommitted to this for the year to come. Once the service was over Sarah picked up Robert and Ebony, who were to serve all week at camp, to go down a day early to help get things set up. We also had a person volunteer to serve at camp next summer.

With Sunday being Independence Day, we didn't know if anyone would come to Kids' Church due to other festivities. We were pleasantly surprised that about a dozen kids came. For the craft and snack that day we decorated cookies with red, white, and blue frosting.

Vonceil and I picked up Gloria at 8:00 Monday morning to head out to the airport to pick up our rental vans. Vonceil and I each rented vans while Gloria drove our van and Earl drove his van to transport kids to camp. Shortly after 10 a.m. we hit the road with 20 campers, 2 staff, 4, drivers, and Onalee, meaning that all but one of the 28 available seats was taken. Luggage was stacked up to the roof. We fed them lunch once we got down there then got kids registered and off to their cabins before heading back north. Gloria, Vonceil, and I rendezvoused at the airport to return the rental vans. We got home about 4 p.m.

Baltimore seemed to be at the center of the heatwave that hit the East Coast this week. Tuesday was the second hottest day in weather history in Baltimore with a temp of 105. We spent some extra time in the church building on Tuesday and Wednesday to absorb the air conditioning and get some work done. Vonceil transferred 10+ songs onto Power Point for the worship services. I did some "spring cleaning" type of work including cleaning behind the furniture, cleaning out a couple cupboards, and shampooing the area rugs.

Throughout the week we also spent quite a bit of time preparing for August. We've got the bulk of the craft and activities planned for Bible School (August 10 - 13) and coordinated some plans for our World Service Corps volunteers who will be here for that month. We also started working on reminding people of our school supply drive in anticipation of our August 29 school supply distribution event.

I got a message Wednesday evening that one of our kids had injured her ankle at camp. They didn't know at that time if it was broken or if the girl would be able to stay. They were still trying to contact the mother so I needed to be ready to try to find her if she wasn't able to be contacted by phone.

I got a call first thing Thursday morning saying that the ankle was sprained. Since she was to stay off her feet for four days she needed to get home. We waited for rush hour traffic to clear then Vonceil, Onalee, and I drove down to Virginia to pick her up.

When we got back I received an email from Jane at the museum house. They were getting rid of some 6-foot long tables and offered them to the church. I coordinated with them to pick up all seven of them Friday morning.

After getting the tables to the church it was time for a stock-up trip to Sam's Club. We had run out of paper towels and gotten low on many other items so we bought enough to last us for quite a while.

Friday night brought Pizza Church. Even with our most faithful attendees at camp we still had about a dozen kids come to the activities. We did have quite a bit of leftover pizza so we were able to surprise a couple of neighbors when I offered free pizza delivery.

On Saturday Earl, Gloria, Vonceil, and I reversed the process we did on Monday with the vans to retrieve the kids from camp. We took different routes around/through Washington, DC, for each of the three round trips this week. All three routes include major construction so, though all are tough drives on a good day, none of the routes posted any advantage.

We did get to camp a little early, though, to share in the closing service. I brought a few words about baptism and assisted with the staff in the blessing of the graduating seniors. We got back home from that trip around 4:30 Saturday afternoon.

Once the we got the laundry started I checked my Facebook account. One of our campers posted, "Back from camp, it was a life changing, epic week of awesomeness!" I thought that was a pretty good review of the week. It was also neat to see how many kids became Facebook friends with the other kids from camp within minutes of getting home.

While on line I learned that one of our members fell ill at work and was in the hospital. We were able to visit on the phone. He'll be there another day or two.

Saturday night brought our monthly Solid Rock Cafe. Many of the campers came back to church for it as did several non-campers, too. We also had one young adult who participated in church activities and camp when he was in middle and high school dropped by. He's in college now studying criminal justice.

Looking ahead to next week we have our full schedule of activities. In addition, we're taking the kids who came to church 90+ times last year to the Golden Corral for dinner on Monday evening. The scout group cancelled its meeting this week due to the leader having jury duty that day. Our monthly priesthood meeting is Sunday evening. Next weekend is our Mission Center Reunion in Springfield, Virginia.

Along with the individuals and activities mentioned, please keep the following families in the forefront of your prayers:

The Stallings Family
The Doggett Family
The Jeffers Family
The Lydick Family
The Roy Family
The Conley Family
The Banks Family
The Meile Family

Thank you for your continued prayer support.

Jeff and everyone at
The Power House
“Building the Kingdom of God Here and Now”
PowerHouseMD@Juno.com
www.pigtownchurch.org
http://thisweekatthepowerhouse.blogspot.com/