In July our group went to Houston, and it was such a great experience. The Lord really taught us about unconditional love. We got to work with Patrick, one of my Pepperdine friends, who was interning at Impact in Houston. So so cool to see my HYG and Pepp worlds collide. I was so nervous about leading the trip that the night before, I literally made little 3x5 notecards/ cheat sheets about all the things I needed to be on top of for each day of the trip! Anyway, we made it and I felt like organization was definitely my number one strength that paid off. I got to know a lot of my youth group kids a lot better, which was awesome! They were and still are such an inspiration to me. One of our girls' grandfathers passed away during the week, and she had to fly home early. That was really sad, but she was such a trooper and I look up to her so much. Everyone was so supportive of each other all week and I really saw God using HYG as well as the kids in Houston.
The day after we got home from Houston, I taught class that morning and then that afternoon we had the annual photo scavenger, which is super fun but it was a joke because we were all just exhausted.
That week, we lost a friend. It is still super hard for me to write about it, and it feels so weird just inserting it into this blog as just something that happened in the past 2 months. Liz grew up at Highland with me, and was absolutely just the most angelic person I have ever known. We went to preschool together and our brothers' little kid basketball games together and later in high school we went on two mission trips to Paragould, AR and New Orleans (two of the most important weeks of my life) together. On her way from Memphis to Nashville, Liz was killed in a car accident. It was just terribly tragic and I don't know what else to say about it. God has shown us all signs of himself in all of this since then, but something like that, especially in the first few days, just hurts and makes me feel truly sad.
The next day, we had planned to go camping and white water rafting in Ocoee, TN. While it seemed so trivial after such a heavy week, I am glad we still went. It was a great chance to get away for a bit with the senior high kids and kind of unpack everything that was happening. It was one of the weirder situations I have ever been in to be grieving the death of my lifelong friend but also be a mentor and support to the kids in the youth group who had also known and loved her.
Before we knew it July was gone and it was August. We took a day mission trip to Paragould to help out at the children's home. I talked to a girl named Ainsley who I had met there in 2005. The only thing she remembered about our group was a precious girl named Liz who had given her testimony and talked about her family... nearly brought me and Thomas to tears. Pretty cool to be able to share that with our church family when we got home, though, and a powerful reminder that God used her life in big and important ways.
Just days later, Hannah my best friend from Pepperdine arrived in Memphis, the day after I ended my internship. I showed her around a bit and it was so cool to share my home and family with her.
They had a big intern goodbye party for me and Chet, which was a huge blessing and made me so so full of joy and gratitude that I got to be at Highland this summer, work with some of the best people I've ever known, and be a part of some teenagers' lives, and hopefully have said something that will stick with at least a few of them.
Best part of the summer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5EfFbpDoe4
Hannah and I drove cross-country to Malibu, which is a completely different blog post in and of itself, and I have been going full speed since then!
Here's to another blog post, maybe this weekend, that is more current.
Love to everyone
rach
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