Well, I’ve never heard that said to me before. During this past week, as a meeting was winding down, I had a coworker say to me, “Next time, follow what the CDC says.” It was said in jest, but I also know that there is a touch of truth in all humor.
She was alluding to me taking a bunch of youth on a Spring Break trip to Virginia. Now, understand that this was not a “bikinis on the beach” kind of Spring Break trip, this was our annual mission trip. I say “annual” but it actually didn’t happen last year. Last year, we were just starting to wrap our heads around the COVID situation and despite my desire, we had to cancel the trip. None of us understood the year that was ahead of us in 2020!
This year, the COVID numbers were on a steady downward trend. Mary (the director of the community center where we go) said that we had a green light for coming down. We made reservations at a large log cabin by Hocking Hills for an overnight stop on the way down to Virginia. Everyone got a COVID test before we went since we would be traveling in vehicles and couldn’t realistically social distance from each other. Our plan was to be one big happy family. Then, right before we left, the British variant of COVID reared its ugly head. Unfortunately, upon our return, we found out that many from the team contracted COVID. Which inspired my coworker’s CDC jab.
Although it is a sad fact about our trip, it is not the total story of our trip, nor is it even an accurate evaluation of our trip. There was so much other great stuff that happened on this trip! Here’s the rest of the story.
We had sixteen youth and adult leaders that traveled down to Virginia. Everyone was chomping at the bit to go because so much had been shut down for so long. It was a mix of eighth-graders, high-school youth, a couple of college-age youth who still can’t get enough of going, and adults who love the mission down in Virginia and have a soft spot in their hearts for youth.
We were able to work on two homes out in the community. We repaired a rotting porch on one house and repaired a handicap ramp on another. We did some plumbing and concrete work at an apartment that the Community Center owns. The bulk of our work was at the Binns Count Community Center itself. There we repaired two spots in the roof that were leaking, created a culvert to keep a hill from washing out, organized and repaired a storage barn, unloaded several trailers of donations, organized the donations and the tool room, and probably a bunch of other stuff that I forgot to list.
We did a morning devotion every morning and a long Bible study every evening. The theme was “Garbage” where we discussed the garbage in our lives and how God transforms it into things of beauty. After each Bible study, we each journaled about the study, and we also had a prayer partner that we prayed for throughout the week. Dennis was my prayer partner and we had many long talks as we applied the Bible study into our daily lives. Our studies were enriched by Landon and me leading everyone in singing praises to God. One particular study that touched the group was on death. After the study, many from the group watched my dad’s slideshow. There were many tears around the group and then a youth also was able to share about her parents passing away recently. It was a moving evening! It wasn’t the only time that sharing went deep, however, because Pam shared about her automobile accident and all that came after that under the theme “Why Do Bad Things Happen to Me?” For me, Bible studies were the highlight of the trip.
We had a lot of fun on the trip as well. We hiked the trails in Hocking Hills and also The Breaks Interstate Park. Normally, we go to Pound for a night of music and clogging but because that was shut down due to COVID, we did some in-house line dancing. One evening, Jimmy and Keith came to us and performed some Appalachian music and told us stories about the culture. There were card games, a record number of puzzles completed, a Nerf dart gun to shoot people with, a “fashion” show, and numerous opportunities to laugh so hard that tears rolled.
I am extremely grateful to the adults that help make this trip possible, Mary and J.R. who let us come, to the youth that gave up their Spring Break to serve others, and to God who extends his grace to us and calls us his servants. I am sorry for those who contracted COVID, but I am glad that we got to go to Virginia. Oh, and by the way, it was Holy Week…in more ways than one.
gregarnett 