Days 61-62: St. Mary’s School (10/14-10/15)

I thought by committing to NET I wouldn’t need to wakeup up early for school on Monday mornings. I was wrong. We woke up around 6:00am to do what we needed to prep for the 8:30am school retreat at St. Mary’s School in Hagerstown, MD. At this point, we are not worried about messing up any ministry things, but more interested in what we can add to what we already know, plus the kids that we minister to. For example, my small group was the 6th grade class of boys, and one of my kids was Hindu just going to the school for an education. Not everyday you get to say that. Nonetheless, the kids were high energy, almost too energetic at some points, but we were able to control it which was nice for sure. It was a special day for the retreat contact person, because her come-to-Jesus moment happened on this day 17 years ago, which I found so special and honoring that we got to minister on such a special day. Later that evening, the team needed to go out and do something. So we did as all cheap missionaries do: go to Taco Bell and Dairy Queen. When we arrived home, I got to have some alone time to call a friend and just chill out. I almost never get this time, so I truly cherished it, because I also didnt know how bad i needed it. Overall, an awesome day. . . The next morning, we packed our bags, took class photos with the kids, and headed out to our next stop. For breakfast, the school gave us IHOP gift cards, so we spent the morning at the glorious breakfast stop. After breakfast, we chilled out and eventually split into our weekly Men’s/Women’s Session at a park, which was alot of fun and impactful in many ways. After that, we had time to play games at the park: tips, Oklahoma drills, the usual. Eventually we headed back to the van and drove to our next city: Gambrills, MD. Im actually enjoying staying in the same state! We arrived at the School of the Incarnate, where we got picked up by our host families in preparation of tomorrow’s retreat at the school. Brian Stohl, also the person that asked us to host a retreat, hosted Nels, Jakob and I for the night. He just moved into the area two months prior, so he stayed at a snug condo above a chiropractor’s office. When we got there, he gabe Jakob and I the TV remote, explained how to use it, and ran off to run errands. An odd feeling of freedom rushed us, as we watched Netflix for the first time in two months. What a feeling to be connected back to the real world right?