Lesbians and Conga Lines

Last night, we had our first middle school night at United. To give you some background, for years our student ministry had separate programs for middle and high school students. At the beginning of this school year, we combined all students for one big Wednesday night deal in the hopes of getting everyone on the same page and building energy. It worked great and we decided that this semester we would launch a brand new Middle School program. Since early December, I have been working with my half-boss (as I like to call him) Matt to design a program that specifically targets where middle school students are at. Last night was the kickoff.

Matt and I were really unsure of how everything would go. We kept saying "well we know it works on paper but what happen when you throw 200 kids into the mix?" Thankfully, God step in since we had 280 middle school students and it worked way better than we had thought. Sure it has some areas that need work...Sure we had girls making out (with each other) and a conga line--both during worship but it was a really cool night.

If you had asked me at any point, if I thought I would like working with middle school I would have said no! But I really can say that I love my job. I get to design really wild and crazy games. I work with some amazing people both in personality and talent. I have a boss who isn't scared to let us try and fail. Most importantly, I get to watch students who may be kissing other girls this week come face to face with a God who adores them. Maybe it won't be next week that her life changes, but each week I know she is getting glimpses of the life God wants for her. Maybe in a month or two those kids who are running around in a conga line will realize that at some point it stopped being about running around crazy and it became joyfully worshiping the God they love in a way that is as uninhibited and as wild as they. And that's totally okay...in fact, I gotta believe that God loves it. In fact, I think it is one of his favorite things to watch his kids do...young or old.