sixteen hours one summer

Oh, how God has blessed me over eight Wednesday evenings this summer in the Walnut Neighborhood. On June 30, I started to meet kids in the local park of the Walnut Neighborhood in Waterloo. The park is a gathering spot, and so I invited some friends, and each week, a group of folks from Harvest and Orchard Hill went to hang out with kids. Below are some of tonight's highlights from our time together as we close out the eight weeks in the park and look ahead to consider what God might have for the future:

- Brion and Judy, both talented in the drawing field, made unique chalk tracings of each of the kids on the dead end stretch of Walnut St. tonight. It was a gallery of masterpieces by the end of the evening!

- We gathered toward the end of the evening, and I shared with the kids how Jesus's love for me, for the other friends from Harvest and OHC, and his love for each of them has compelled us to come to the park this summer. Jayda, a regular over the past eight weeks, piped up and said, "Ya, we didn't even know you were coming. You just popped up one day when we were already here!" We also talked about their chalk masterpieces and how God has made each one of them a masterpiece as well.

- Brion shared about being a kid who got into drugs and stealing and fighting and whose life was changed when he met Jesus. Several of the kids connected with being in fights, and so Brion called up one of the boys who admitted to fighting, and Brion did an amazing job using fighting as one example to share God's design for us, the sin trouble we are in, and the answer in Jesus. When Brion talked about being washed clean of our sin by the blood of Jesus, one boy raised his hand to ask if baptism washes your sin away, and a great conversation about salvation and baptism followed.

- We closed in a circle tonight, held hands, prayed about school this year, and listened as Dominisha was thankful that it's God's birthday everyday, even holidays :), and Jayda summed things up by saying thanks to God for these times of playing and making new friends in the park.

These eight weeks just emphasize so clearly that relationships are the key and the bottom line. God's plan is all about reconciling relationships between us and him and us with one another through Christ. I think that might be the ballgame.