Coming Together

Yesterday I woke up around seven in the morning which is pretty typical for Sunday. I laid around in bed until eight and then I realized there was no time for a shower. I pulled on my pants and thin sweatshirt and was struggling to get out the door. I pulled my hair up into a somewhat messy ponytail, brushed my teeth grabbed my keys and ran out the door. I struggle to get anywhere on time. Someway, somehow I will either be incredibly early or incredibly late. This was a late morning, on the way to church I told myself maybe I should just stay home and miss. I really don't believe in going to church unless you want too. It's like a quote I read one time "I'd rather be fishing and thinking about God than being in Church thinking about fishing." Then I remembered this would be my last year with the youth group and my heart sunk a little. It didn't change my somewhat callous mood. I got down to the youth room and you get the yells of your name and smiles. Of course they had already started. We did somewhat of a game which I was not in the mood for. We came back together and talked about balancing our struggles. How much do we have on our plate? How much do we need to think about?

• High School
• Work
• Family
• Friends
• Homework
• Exercise
• College
• Church
• Sleep
• Eating

And a whole lot more. We filled the paper. Then Melissa asked us what do we do when we're ticked off. Do we take it out on others? Cry? Scream? etc. Everyone had a different answer. We talked about our center, something that we need to focus on.

Of course the answer was God. We all knew that.

Then she listed things that pull us away from God. Things that we think will fill us up and make us happy. 

• Drinking
• Sex
• Drugs

Again the list goes on and on. At this point we all got a little teary eyed. Then she told us how her little daughter Abi who had complications since she was born. I've talked about her before but she can't speak or hear and has the mental state of a five year old. There's something else wrong with her and the doctor said that she probably won't grow to be four feet tall. We felt the weight of Melissa's anxiety because she had to quit her job and even with her job the family income is tight. She doesn't know what God has planned for her or what her 'Next' is. After that she told us to share our anxieties if we wanted too. I told them about work and how I might have to quit and everything that was going on. They all looked at me like.

"You need to quit."

After that we prayed and went upstairs and I saw Megan who is now off at college. I decided to stay for the second service with her. At the end of the service Abi comes up to me and grabs my hand, signing for me to come with her. Melissa told me that she wanted me to go with her to get her baby doll named 'Tyler'. We walk to the nursery get the doll and she wants me to change his diaper. After that we go back to Melissa and she looks at me and says,

"You must be special because she never does stuff like this."

Then Abi signs 

"Are you going to take a nap today?"

I wish Abi.

Then she waves goodbye to me.

When I got to my car I was flooded with the holy spirit. I just started crying and smiling because I had forgotten how blessed I was. I was so wrapped up with what I needed and how am I going to get stress out of my life? That little girl trusted me to get her where she needed to get. That spoke volumes to me. 

I think we all need to be a little bit more like Abi with our faith.

DFTBA

-AB

This song is so special to our youth group. We heard it on a mission trip and we've never forgotten it.