Friends

Sometimes we have to find out hard ways who our true friends are but in the end you always find out there was always that one person who will stand by you no matter what, even if you did not know they were there. So called friends will surprise you with things like that, if they think they are going to look bad because you do whats right, and then your left standing there by yourself feeling like your whole world just fell apart because someone you thought was your friend pretty much just walked out of your life. But then you realize the one person you always thought was a little more weird or got on your nerves was the one person willing to stand beside you when everyone else walked out. I hate it when stuff like this happens but I guess in the end its good, I know now that some people I thought never even cared the least little bit about me was the only person willing to stand by me. and to me thats a friend sent by God, I friend that you should always stick by, and even thought I had to get hurt to find out who that was im glad I did. So thanks for being my friend when no one else would.


until next time


~Jessie~

missions trip

so i am not going to wright 9 more blogs for the nine more days I was gone because right now im using a really slow computer so it takes forever to wright a blog and post it but I will tell you about most of it in this blog.


So we finally make it too New York and we all were very excited. They pulled the bus up and told us to leave our stuff in it that we were going to eat lunch, so we had good ol peanut butter and jelly lol, and we met some of the metro staff. we were suppose to have to eat pb&js for the rest of our trip but the people who worked for metro found that mean so they said we would only eat pb&js for lunch that they would cook us supper. and after all that they took us to where we were going to stay and it was in a really run down building and there was only 4 showers for 50 some girl and we only had 30 minutes in the mornings to get ready and we had to clean the place every morning but we had no cleaner so we just had to find ways to make it look clean, I found out since our group was so big that I would not be going to Manhattan I would be going down in the Bronx which is a really ruff part of New York. and then we went to church later that night and got to meet a bunch of the kids from around there.


after a few days we started going out and starting side walk Sunday school, it was so much fun to get out there a play with the kids, but it was not all fun and games. We started out doing alot of games and giving out prizes and as it got later we would get all the kids to come sit down and then we would start our lesson and drama it was amazing at what alot of these kids had came from and how broken they felt, when alter call came they would just come up front and start crying and asking how they could know more about Jesus. But the first few day I really did not feel I was doing much good I had not really got into a conversation about God with any of them and so I started praying that the Lord would just use me in whatever way possible. Through side walk Sunday school we did not only try to reach the kids but we tried to reach the adults too, after I had prayed it was the first day we got to do our drama and a little old lady came up to me and gave me a hug and told me I had changed her life, I told her it was not me that God had only used me. and come to find out she was the grandma to some of the children there and she was trying to raise them by herself so before she left I made sure that she got a bag of food to take with her. Its amazing how God works I saw him do so many things while I was in New York, its way to many to ever tell. The last day that we did side walk Sunday school that asked all the teens with teen mania to come up front that they wanted us to pray with the children who wanted prayer so we were standing up front and a little girl who i had played with all day came running to me, she was 9 years old, I cant remember her name to save my life but I remember everthing she told me, she asked me to pray for her mom and dad that they were always really mean to her and her sister but she would not tell me what they did to be mean to her so I prayed with her and when I was done I told her that God loved her and that I loved her and she looked at me and started crying and just kept saying YOU LOVE ME, I dont know if anyone had never told her they loved her or what but she just sat in my lap carying and then she begged me not to leave her when it was time for me to go and I just started crying, and I knew right then and there that thats why the Lord wanted me on this trip to show the kids that people did love them and that he loved them so much that he would die to save them. I know I want to go back to New York sometime I just dont know when. Oh and I talked to one of the ladys who works with Metro and she told me that that little girl got saved.




Its amazing a how great God is and yet we take him for granted everyday, he died so that we can live yet most people in the world today are ashamed to even tell there friends about Jesus Christ and what he did for them, I challenge anyone who is reading this blog right now to be the one to make a diffrence in this world to step out of your confort zone and tell atleast one person about the love of Jesus Christ. People talk about all the time how bad schools are getting and how bad we need jobs, and what all this world is coming too. Sure they can talk about how bad it is but they wont step up and try to change that, as many churches there is around the world im sure if atleast one person out of every church steped up you could see change in no time. So if you are reading this I challenge you to step up and make that change, nothing will ever change if no one even trys. I never realized how lazy we are about our faith until I went on this trip, as many people as there are in New York you would think that these people would know about the love of Christ but 99.9% of the people I talked to in New York had never even heard about Jesus, I think that I remember talking to one person who really knew about Jesus, and we should feel ashamed for that, because we are the ones suppose to being spreading the good news of Christ.

I dont know why I wrote all that I just felt that someone really needed to hear it.




Until Next Time,


~Jessie~

Day 3

So I got up the next morning and ate breakfast and then we went to sessions, and praise and worship was awesome it was just like God was in there. Then after all that they showed us some dramas, and they told us that our leaders would pick one of those dramas and that's what we were going to do when we were in New York. So after they are done talking they told us to go fill our water bottles and then meet them where the phones were, So we all get down there and it where we make all our calls home and its outside under a huge tent, and instead of having cement they had shredded up shingles and plexyglass on the ground and we found out that where we would be practicing our drama. So they told us all to get in a circle and then they mad us make angry faces and excited faces and happy faces just stupid stuff to figure out who could have what part, then they told us to find a seat that they would tell us what our parts were, so we all sit down and the start roll calling. Well they finally get to my name and I find out that I'm one of the people in the very back and at first I was mad about my part I guess you could say I thought I deserved a bigger part, because i knew that I was good at drama and I knew that I could be good a big part. So holly my team leader talked to me about it and told me on her first missions trip she had the same part and that if it was not for the people in the back that the drama would make no sense at all and that I had a bigger part then I thought I did, But I still did not see it that way I still thought I deserved a better part i don't know I guess that was Satan just trying to get to me. So we start practicing and at one part in the drama I had to throw myself down on the ground well when I did the shredded shingles and plexyglass just cut into my skin and it hurt really bad, but I decided that I was not going to complain that I would just get right back up, so I did and then they made us practice is like 75 times literally because no one would act serious about it, and every time i would throw my self on the ground it would make my cut on my knee even bigger and it was 114 f. outside so i was ready to stop. Well they finally told us that we had it down pat and we could stop, well we finished before everyone else so we got to sit and watch others practice, and watching them practice made me realize what Holly was talking about and how big my part was and then I felt bad about having a bad attitude about it. Well when everyone was done we went and talked about what all we were going to do on our trips and then they told our group that we could go and pack and get showered and to meet them at the bus at 11:45 that night, so we get all our packing done and are all excited about finally getting to go to New York. We went down to the buses like 15 minutes early and was going to help pack up all the stuff to find out that our bus was late and was not there yet, well finally at 12:3- a.m. the bus got there and we were on an old ran down school bus that had no air and there was no where for our bags so we had to hold them to whole two hour ride to the air port. Then we finally get there and get our bags checked and get on the plane and we were on our way to New York.



Until Next time,



~Jessie

Day 2

So I woke up the next morning to find out that my alarm clock did not go off and I had over slept 45 minutes so I rushed around and got ready really fast. Then I went down to the lunch room and I really did not have time to eat so I grabed me an apple and started walking over to the big building we had our sessions at. So we get our seats and the adults were just pretty much welcoming us, and telling us how amazing it was going to be, but I was just sitting there letting it go in one ear and out the other (haha) So we have praise and worship but I guess you could say I just stood there mad not paying any attion to what they were singing, because I was still made over the day before and that morning. So then Pastor Ron gets up on the stage to preach and he started talking about love and how when we get to New York we would just have to pour our love out on these children because most of them dont even know what it feel like to be loved, and he was talking about how before we went that we needed to make sure that we were not doing this for just doing this for the fun of it, we needed to get rid of all our selfishness and pride. And it just like hit me right then and there I knew whith out a shadow of a dout that this was what the Lord wanted me to do and no matter how hard my first few days had been that I did not need to keep carying around all this anger and fustration so I went up to the alter and prayered and it was like and big load was just lifted off of me. After service we had what they called Qiuet time, and in this time we went and found and place in the room where no one was at and we could just have our time with God, we could read in our bibles, pray, or wright in our Jurnals. So I stayed in my seat and I pulled my bible and Jurnal out and I had no clue where that I wanted to read so I just let me bible fall open and it fell open to the scripture talking about the armor of God, and I guess you could say I turned that scripture into a prayer and just asked God to help me to have on my armor of God and be perpared for this trip. So when we got done with that we had to find our team leaders and they led us out side beside a pond and told us to find a seat so we all sat done on the ground to find out that we were sitting on a fire ants nest, so Michal our project director goes and stands in front of us and starts telling us about what all we were going to do on our trip and how much fun it was going to be and about the lives we would change and how it would change our live, but then she started talking about how we were going to have to have an open heart and have faith that we could do this. Well she started talking about how much Christians now days just want to go to church on Sundays and then out on the weekdays they want to go out and do whatever, and she used a rock as an exzample she through this little bity pebble into the pond and of course it made a really really little splash and she said thats how Christians are today they just want that little splash, well then out of no where Jon jumps up and goes running and jumps in the pond, and of course it made a huge splash and Michal said that how we need to be we need to be so into Gods work that people can just see it in us and they will want to know more about it. well then we split up into our teams and the rest of the day we just played game like you would in 4-H to get to no everbody. and then later that night we had a bond fire because the kids going on othere trips were leaving that night well we go outside and they have all these crosses set up well you had to go to the cross that had a flag of where you were going, so we all get to our cross trying to figure out what in the world is going on, and we get up there and there is a huge bucket of water and a huge bucket of mud. so we get over there and they rub mud all over our hands, and they told us that stood for whatever we were holding on to and not giving up and is long as we were still holding that we could not do what God wanted us to do on this trip, and they told us that they wanted us to pray and decide what that was, and well I knew right off that it was my fear I was afraid of getting out there and messing up or not doing something right. So when everyone was done praying we went up to the cross and washed our hands free from the mud which stood for leaving it at the cross. When we were done we went back up the hill and took our showers and got ready for bed and I made sure this time that I had someone to wake me up in the moring. (haha)




Until Next Time,


~Jessie~

My missions trip Day 1

So as you all know I left July 12th at like 5:00 in the morning to leave for Texas. I was going to Texas for three days for training. So I get to the air port and im all excited im really doing it im finally getting to go on my missions trip, well we get there and where I have a later birthday and was not 15 yet I had to pay a flight attendant to follow me around, So they made me be the first to get on the plane. So I say my good byes to my family and I get on the first plane that I have ever been on in my hole life going on a two week trip and I had never been that long or far away from home, so I get on the plane and the put my in the very first seat, and I was getting all nerves knowing that I would not be able to go home that this was really it I was really leaving my family for two weeks to go on a missions trip. I was starting to get really freaked out worrying about anything and everything, well between already missing my family and being nerves about my flight I started to get sick feeling, so I was just sitting there praying that I was not going to up chuck every where. So the lady sitting beside my decided that she wanted to talk so she started asking me all kinds of questions and I was nice and talked but the whole time I was sitting there thinking lady would you please shut up before I throw up all over you,. So we get to the next air port where im suppose to switch planes well they make me wait until everyone is off the plane and then they walked me to the gate guard and he made me wait while he called someone up there to come get me, so I was standing there praying the whole time that I was not going to throw up everywhere. So someone finally comes up there and then I got to ride a golf cart all over the air port not fun at all (hahaha) so the lady takes me to the brake room place and makes me wait with all the flight attendants, so im sitting there plum sick feeling and they are talking about some famous person who was in the air port, which I had no clue who it was. Well then one of them looks at me and then there watch and said oh you were suppose to be at your plane three minutes ago, so here i am ready to throw up and they make me run through the air port to get to my next plane, well needless to say I made it in time but I was really angry. So I get on the plane and get my seat and I was so tired I wound up going to sleep, then the flight attendant wakes me up to ask me if I want orange juice which made me even madder. So I finally get to the air port in Texas and they take me to the place where you get your lost bags, so I sit in there with the gate people and waited and waited and waited, well finally one of the guys going on our trip saw me sitting in there and came in there and told me where everyone was, so I had to ask him to go get one of the leaders to come and sign for me so that I could leave (I felt like a package or something that just kept getting tossed around.) So I finally get to go over to where everyone was and I signed in and then I found out the my bags got lost and were now in Detroit, I was getting so frustrated I did not get why my trip was being to hard when this was what God had wanted me to do. So they tell me that they will get my bags later that day and they will put them in my room, so then they lead us out to this huge charted bus and the give us all a bottle of water, well of course we pretty much just chugged it down because it was really hot out side and we had not had anything to drink in awhile, do we chugged it down to find out that the bathroom on the charter bus did not work so after drinking all that water we had to drive little over two hours before we could go to the bath room (and I was sitting there thinking great this trip just keeps getting better and better.) So we finally make it so the place we were staying in Texas which was a big college so we go inside and get signed in and all out papers filled out, and then they send us to sit at a table with the other kids that were going on our trips. So I get to the table and sit down and of course im the more shy person who is not good at walking up to complete strangers and making friends so everyone else is sitting there goofing off talking about how excited they are, and then there I am sitting near the end of the table by myself looking at the map of the place trying to figure out where I was staying. So random people just started coming up to me trying to make conversation so i finally meet some of the people going on my trip and then I got to meet my team leaders and project directors. So I called home and lied and told my parents that I was having a great time so far, well it was later that night and we were walking back up to where we were staying to find out that where I was staying was all the way at the top of a hill way back in the woods the highest place up, so I walk up the hill to find out that they are short beds and my bags arnt there, so I went to my project director all upset well we were standing in the middle of the parking lot and she looks at me and says just cry go ahead cry and I look at her and go what are you talking about, and she bust out laughing at me and started telling me about her first trip and how her bags had got lost and how much she hated the first few days, well I wound up braking down and telling her how awful my day had been and I just stood in the middle of the parking lot and cryed, well you would have thought I would have been embarrassed but it helped a lot, and no sooner then we were done talking a bus pulled up with my bags I was so happy, so they found me a bed. And we were staying in these big like green house thing that had a bunch of bunk beds in it and 60 or 70 girls shared that room, well I got a bottom bunk to find out the only thing to keep you cool at night in the 114f. weather was one fan and all the air blew on the people on the top bunk, but I was just happy to have a bed and I finally went to sleep after about an hour of just laying there.











so im going to wright these blogs in the days I was gone because its to much to wright in one night, I will right the next day of my trip as soon as possible.


until next time,

~Jessica~

Update

Sorry I have not wrote in awhile, but just to let everyone know I will be posting a blog about my trip here really soon.