Cleveland Mission Trip: Day 4

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

All of us went to the Laura’s Home for the entire day.  We began by getting ready for a big cook out and a fair for the kids.  I took on the task of grilling hot dogs and hamburgers with the hopes that I would be inside and out from the heat.  But unfortunately they took me and my guys right through the kitchen, out the back door, and into the blazing sun were there were two grills.  So we fired them up and got the burgers going.  Some of the other teens were busy filling up water balloons, setting up play stations, a face painting station, and preparing other food.  Once all the food was cooked, we all lined up for our lunch and went out to the pavilion and ate lunch together.  Lisa and Deb did an amazing job in connecting with many of the moms who were staying in Laura’s Home.  They got to hear some pretty intense stories that were difficult and heart-breaking at times.  Our teenagers played for a long time with many of the kids.   They had all kinds of fun things set up for the kids to do. There were also a lot of prizes for the kids and they all had a lot of fun throughout the entire day.   This gave many of the moms an opportunity to have a break from the constant presence of their kids and just talk with some adults.  Of course since there was water, eventually most of the teens and kids ended up wet.  A sneak attack came towards me and I tried to react quickly, but not quick enough.  I got soaked.  We all enjoyed the relational opportunity to minister to women and children who were going through rough times in their lives. 

After we were done with our time with the kids and moms at Laura’s Home we headed back to the Nehemiah Mission to get ready for an evening activity.  We headed out to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame!  This was a great night!  There are 7 floors at the Rock Hall so we started at the top and worked our way down.  On the top two floors there was a large exhibition dedicated to Bruce Springsteen.  It was very cool.  Of course I almost blew a gasket when one of the teens started to get bored and asked me, “Who is Bruce Springsteen anyhow?”  I started to have my doubts wondering if the teens would have liked going to the Lady Gaga concert in town instead of being at the Rock Hall!  But in reality, we all had a good time even if rock music was not your preferred style of music.  I was personally surprised by how small Springsteen’s jacket was that was on display.  He is a small guy. 

            After checking out all things Springsteen we went to see the U23D movie that was being featured at the Rock Hall.  It was truly an amazing experience on many levels.  First of all, the 3D quality was amazing.  It felt like you could reach out and touch Bono, or that you were actually floating right above Larry Mullins banging away on the drums, or that you were right in the audience with the rest of the crowd cheering on the band.  The spiritual aspect of the concert was deeply moving too.  They performed many of their songs that had strong spiritual themes.  Bono preached for justice and love and tolerance.  In many ways it was the most emotionally moving concert film I have ever seen.  This is of course coming from someone who has grown up with U2 and has loved their music.  Some of our teens were lulled to sleep by the melodious sounds of Bono and Co.  But the way I see it, at least they got it on a subconscious level. 

            Once the movie was over we check out the rest of the museum.  We saw the displays from “Pink Floyd’s The Wall” Tour; large displays on Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, The Who, and many, many others.  There were a bunch of interactive displays to discover the influences of certain bands, to hear the best rock albums of all time, to see clips from those who have been inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame, and many others.  It was such a cool experience.  We also took a group photo of us superimposed on the cover of Rolling Stone.  It is very cool!

            As we left the Rock Hall we went to go see the sun set off of Lake Erie.  It was a gorgeous sight.  To see the reflection of the sun off of the water with all the colors is just a breathtaking experience.  And then when you turn around you can see an amazing view of the Cleveland skyline. After just chilling out enjoying the sights for a while we then got hungry and wanted some dinner.  We headed down to a nice area in Lakewood that had a bunch of restaurants.  We tried to get into a local place call “Melts” but they were too crowded so we walked down the street and found a Chipotle and Five Guys.  So the team split up between those two restaurants.  I went to Five Guys.  We goofed around and had a lot of fun that night.  It was an enjoyable night as a youth group.

Cleveland Mission Trip: Day 3

Jaime and her son

Today we flip-flopped the teams.  I took the other group down to the City Mission.  Lisa and Deb took the other team down at Laura’s Home.  Both teams did a lot of outside work.  On the downtown property there are a lot of trees!  Many of the branches were quite long and needed to be trimmed back.  There were also some dead branches that needed to be taken out.  So we attacked the trees!  This brought back memories of the Junior High trip last Summer were all we did was eliminated Honeysuckle.  But this job was not as brutal.  It was a relatively easy landscaping job.  At one point we got Mitch up in a tree to try and get at some branches and this provided an easy target for many of us guys!

At lunch time the teens got to hear some of the same stories from the men living in the City Mission that shared yesterday.  It was powerful. 

Once we were done, we headed back over to Laura’s Home to get the rest of our team.  The teens there spent time disinfecting all of the toys in the kids rooms and helping with many of the flowerbeds and spending time with the kids.  We got to meet some of the kids and let them know that the next day we were all going to spend the day with them.  They were excited and looking forward to it.

That evening we had a very special chapel time as a group.  Our teens lead us in worship and then Jaime Buxton spoke to the teens.  Now let me remind you that Jaime came through my first youth group.  She did a phenomenal job in telling her story of growing up through high school, college, single and married life and how God has impacted her through all of the stages.  She was very vulnerable in explaining how it was very easy for her to live in two different worlds in high school: her “party” life as a popular cheerleader and her “religious” life as a youth group member.  She talked through how those two worlds eventually collided and she realized that she had to make a choice between those two identities.  She described how she finally committed herself 100% to follow Christ.  Since then, God has used her throughout college, and as a missionary in Belize and now as a youth pastor and social worker in Cleveland. 

I have always wanted to get Jaime to speak to the youth group but I always knew that her life was to crazy to be able to get away and come down to Cincinnati.  So this was a dream come true for me.  She also brought her husband Sean, their son who is 3, and 2 of their youth group girls who apparently wanted to know if we had any cute guys.  I did not hear the verdict on that mission but I am sure there was moderate success in their opinion. 

It was a good day!

Cleveland Mission Trip: Day 2

The 2010 Senior High Mission Team

We were off to a good start on our first full day on the mission trip. After breakfast we had the president of the Nehemiah Mission give us a talk about the history of this church and how the East Ohio Conference turned this church into a mission site for people to come and make an impact on the city of Cleveland. He told the Nehemiah story and how it related to him and his staff as they have seen Cleveland fall apart and God has challenged them to rebuild the community and help restore hope.  It is always awesome to here about someone’s passion that God has laid on their heart. 

Then we headed off to Laura’s Home which is a ministry of the City Mission in Cleveland. It was awesome to go to the Laura’s Home. About 9 years ago I took my youth group in North East Ohio to this very building when it was bought by the City Mission. We helped to demolish the insides of the building so that they could begin making it into a mission for homeless and hurting women and children. So now fast forward several years and here is the mission in full swing with a large staff and a lot of ministry going on. Also, one of my students from my first youth group was a full time staff member helping to make an impact on the children who come through this mission.  It was great to see Jaime and to see all that she was involved in at the mission.  I was really excited to introduce her to the teens. 

 

After that we split up the team into two groups and I took one of the groups to the City Mission site that was directly downtown. We were told that the City Mission is right on the 21st most dangerous intersection in America in the 7th most dangerous city. This site primarily took care of men.  At the City Mission we met a guy named Bob who was a really nice guy that helped line us up with jobs around the mission site.  We did a lot to make the outside look really nice: yard work, weeding, cleaning, taking care of dead plants, etc.  During our lunch break Bob got two of the men at the mission to come and share their stories. It was very powerful for the teens. These men shared how they ended up here at the mission and what God has been doing in their lives to change them around. Their former life and their current life were seen in very stark contrasts. They both emphasized how they wish they could be young again and make the right choices instead of the path that they lived out.  They let the teens know that that just one bad choice can forever alter their lives.  They need to be smart, follow God, and make good choices.  J.R. said that at 53 years old he is just now beginning to put his life back together.  He has just about ruined all relationships with friends and family and is just now trying to rebuild relationships with his grown children that he neglected throughout their childhood.  Toby told the teens that he has lived more than half of his life in prison because he stole millions of dollars.  But even with all the wealth he acquired, he was never satisfied until he came to know God. He challenged the teens to stay focused and follow Jesus.  He shared how someone in prison began witnessing to him and through that relationship he came to know Jesus.  Now he would like to go back and minister to other guys in prison.  After lunch we did some more work around the mission and then headed back over to Laura’s Home.  

At Laura’s Home the other group did a lot of similar stuff taking care of the outside of the facility. Some of the boys got the privilege of playing Wii with some of the kids.  I also got to see Jaime’s office and catch up with her a little bit.  

We wrapped things up in the afternoon and came back to the Nehemiah Mission. We had a Chicken Parmesan dinner and then one of the other guys at the mission gave a devotion. He emphasized how we are bringing hope to the hopeless just like Jesus did in his ministry. 

After that we headed off to Huntington Beach in Bay Village.  We had a blast together swimming.  It was a beautiful night.  It was slightly cloudy so the sun would peek in and out of the clouds.  You would see some amazing clouds lit up by the sun; the sun breaking though the clouds sending down beams of light onto the water; little pockets of rain out on the water.  There was also a lot of wrestling, dunking and Marco Poloing going on.  We had fun.  We returned to the Nehemiah Mission and had our team meeting. The worship team lead us in music and then we talked about how we were impacted throughout the day.  In the midst of doing odd jobs there were some interesting stories of interacting with people and hearing what God is doing in their lives.   The teens are getting along great and having fun with each other.  It is awesome to see how God is using them already to grow together.