The DC mission team experienced another great day of learning and serving as they engaged in many different forms of mission work throughout the city.
Our team is broken down into three groups for our pre-lunch work. Group 1 went to Food and Friends to prepare and deliver meals to elderly people suffering from various illnesses. This site provides our team with a beautiful picture of the body of Christ at work. The hands of the body prepare and make the meals while the feet of the body carry those meals to those in need. It is an amazing sight to see our team working in concert like this to take care of those who can no longer leave their homes in order to purchase food for themselves.
Group 2 also served the elderly population of DC, but in a much different way than group 1. They worked for an organization which seeks to provide some basic assistance to elderly people who are trying to stay in their own homes as long as practically possible. In order to assist this ministry, group 2 did yard work for several people. To see HS students joyfully doing yard work was a testament to God's power to transform our desires and give us the great joy when we serve someone other than ourselves.
Group 3 went to a rehabilitation home to visit with people who are far away from family and friends and who rarely have an interested person asking them to share in conversation. Our group split up into several different groups and was able to walk down every hallway in the massive facility to offer a visit to anyone who wanted to take us up on the offer. We learned life lessons from many octogenarians and gained valuable perspective on how God can use difficult circumstances to draw us closer to Him.
In the afternoon our three serving groups merged into two and we put on a vacation Bible school for over 100 children. The Student Ministries Summer Interns put together a great program for us before we left for DC. Their hard work paid off as these kids were welcomed into community, loved and taught about the love of God available to them through Christ. Our theme for the week is, "God Always Wins," and our theme verse is Luke 1:37 which states that "nothing is impossible with God." This is the first year we have done the VBS program and I am optimistic that this new addition to our mission trip will give Chapel students a greater relational connection to the work and ministry being done in DC all year long. We will be doing VBS every afternoon on our trip.
Finally, I would like to share one story that really stood out from today's work. There was one woman at the rehabilitation center who upon seeing so many young people serving with such passion said, "I want to go to this Chapel Church Williamsburg Community. What is this place like? Where is it? I would like to be a part of a church that sends people out to serve the world like that Chapel place." It is a joy that many of us reading this blog entry don't have to wonder what a church like that is like. We have the privilege of experiencing it each and every week. Your children are doing amazing things!
