A Week of Hope: Charleston, SC 2017

Saturday, July 15th We arrived at the church a little bit past 2:3o I think and unloaded our stuff from our white van we pulled up in. Numerous others were unloading things, but there was no sign of Matt so we weren’t quite sure what to do. We were directed to bring our stuff into the gym, check in, and turn our phones in if we had them. Two separate piles were created for “day bags” then all the other stuff we would be using the rest of the trip. Parents were dispersed between their children talking to other youth or adults while we awaited further instruction. Hunter was congratulated by at least 20 people for his accomplishment of entering college as a sophomore due to his AP credits. From the gym we moved to the sanctuary where we all prayed over the trip. Some of the other youth and adults who were not going joined us as well. Matt called out each group that would be in each van, with my van being last. There were three colored vans: blue, black, and white; mine was white and was giving the name “The Kidnapping Marshmallow”. Pictures were taken of each van group in front of the sanctuary where the flower bed is and we loaded up into the vans. Naturally, I already goofed and put my stuff in the wrong van, so I had to move it. The seats we sat in changed almost every stop, but I think I sat next to Lara and Callie most of the time. Our chaperones in the van were Mrs. Harris and Mrs. Jones. We wouldn’t be driving all the way to Charleston this day, though. I couldn’t imagine if we tried to do that. There were attempts at playing “mafia”, but every time the townspeople would discover who the mafia was instantly. Maybe it was because we were so close together, but the rest of the ride consisted of either talking, sleeping, or singing. Mrs. Jones downloaded Spotify just so we could listen to Sarah Dee’s playlist she created for the trip. For dinner we stopped in Newport at a central location with multiple food options including Taco Bell, Arby’s, and Burger King. I chose Burger King along with Stephen, Jeremy, Delaney, and Lara. I ordered some chicken fries as per the norm with fries and a Dr. Pepper. We were supposed to meet back at the vans at a certain time, yet with no watch or phone it became very difficult to stay on time wherever we went. This would become a reoccurring theme of the week. I’m not sure what time we ended up getting to the first church we were staying at, but it was not far from where we stopped for dinner. It was a quaint building that looked slightly eerie as the blackness of the night surrounded it. Thankfully we did not have to unload the trailer, so we just grabbed the belongings we had with us on the van and came inside. We sat up the sleeping quarters first, created “warm fuzzies” bags, and had a devotion led by Jimmy and Brent over stress. Matt briefly went over some ground rules about the building then kicked off the beloved tradition of “Bucket of Doom” for us. The night concluded with all of us singing happy birthday to Delaney as the clock struck midnight. I ended up sleeping with Anna to my right and no one to my left, as well as on the ground since Matt forgot to grab the extra air mattress I asked if I could use. Sarah Crace let me use her sleeping bag as a support for my pillow, though. It wasn’t too bad, honestly, especially since the ground was carpeted. It took a fair amount of time for the girls to wind down. Talking, laughing, and everything else in between carried on for at least another hour even as the lights went out. I didn’t mind it, though. In fact, I’d come to miss that feeling later on because not until the end of the trip did all the girls get to be in the same room at night.

Sunday, July 16th Seniors had to wake up early (at 6:45 a.m. to be exact) to “prepare” and serve breakfast, but truthfully it was nothing too serious. There were donuts, poptarts, and some fruit I believe. It was indeed now the day of Delaney’s birthday so we started the morning out by singing happy birthday to her once more as she enjoyed her huge donut cake that her parents apparently got Matt to carry in his truck on the way down. We put everything back to the way we found it at the church and packed ourselves back into the designated vans. Now we were back on the road. But for how long? Well, since you asked, I know we made at least three stops at gas stations on the way there. At one of them the church credit card was declined for reasons I can’t really explain because I know nothing about credit cards. In addition, Sami and Baker both lost and found their wallets, as well as Chandler’s blood pressure got low so we stopped to get him something to help with that. Since we were running behind schedule, we ate the lunch we had packed at a rest stop in North Carolina rather than at the Angel Tree. It was still very nice and the devotion we shared there was the classic “armor of God” one that I’ve heard every year. It never gets old; the only difference is they didn’t have kitchen supplies or a kid’s costume to wear as armor. We arrived at Northwood Baptist Church within the time frame set aside for registration and were greeted by one of the “red shirt” staff members named Mike holding a welcome sign. They informed us not to grab anything since we’d only be taking a group photo then could come back. Well, that was an incorrect statement. We went from a group picture in the gym to a brief meeting in the chapel to dinner. During dinner I asked Mrs. Harris if I could get my camera and drawstring bag out of the van and she tossed me the keys. The meal of the night was pizza, and boy was I excited to start out the week that way! Each participant was given a wrist band to wear all week that either said “adult” or “youth”. Although my wristband said “adult”, the only meaning behind it was that since I was 18 I got to shower inside rather than in the showers outside meant for anyone younger than 18. They split the age groups up for obvious reasons, but also there was only two showers in each inside bathroom so it’d be impossible to get almost 100 people to shower between 4 showers every day. Programming that night we walked into the chapel to find pieces of paper taped to the walls underneath a laminated sheet of paper that had a number on it; that was our work group for the week. I examined each sheet searching for my name hoping that I’d be put in a group with someone I knew. Once I got to the group labeled “3”, I found my name along with Matt, Stephen, and Veda’s. There were two other names I did not recognize- Benjamin and Raegan; they were from another church in Brevard, NC that joined us on the trip. After playing some introductory games and performing a skit (and singing happy birthday yet again to Delaney) we were able to get into the groups we were assigned, meet each other, write example “care cards”, and delegated who would get what roles. I was the “progress reporter” for the group, meaning I would have to be the one everyday to report to a staff member what we accomplished on the work site that day. Ben was the “break maker”, meaning he’d gather all of our lunch stuff every morning. Stephen was the devotion leader while Veda was the “work director” who would oversee that everything necessary was being done. The churches separated into their own spaces for a church devotion. We decided we’d just stay in the chapel. The night proceeded in a normal fashion with Bucket of Doom and last-minute announcements as we headed off to where we would be sleeping the rest of the week. The girls were divided off into different rooms named after Disney princesses: mine was “Belle”. I placed my stuff next to Meg’s and settled in for the night. Our room also included Sami, Sarah Ensey, and Mrs. Redmond. It was another night of basically sleeping on the ground, but Mrs. Redmond let me use her cot cushion until Matt got me a mattress (which would be the following day).

Monday, July 17th Since I had spent most of the summer sleeping in, waking up at about 6:30 all week was quite the adjustment. At least I wasn’t on breakfast crew nor did I have to fight others to take a shower. I slowly got out of bed and walked over to main meeting building for breakfast. I played a little bit of “9 square” before we started to eat. Breakfast consisted of an English muffin smothered in apple jelly, half of a banana, and milk. There were round tables and long, rectangular tables set up for the youth and adults to eat at. I sat with Baker, Keri, and Hunter that first morning. Each day has a theme, too, and Monday was “Mustache Monday” so many people showed up to breakfast wearing fake mustaches on their faces, shirts, socks, etc.. Morning program at chapel included breaking down some safety rules for the site and getting directions for where we would be working. Something that did take me by surprise was the second song they played during that morning for worship was “How He Loves”. I saw the title flicker across the screen and I let out an inhuman noise. I had just got done explaining to Matt that I was so tired I could barely say my own name, and BAM. There it is. The first sighting of the song that connects our whole youth group. But we didn’t just wrap our arms around the people we knew, we invited everyone to join us. And they did. Anyway, although the previous night we were informed we’d be working outside doing yard work, due to the rain we had to shift locations until it cleared up. Stephen, Ben, and Veda helped us get the water and food coolers into the back of Matt’s truck to head to the location. We got to the Salvation Army before the other group that was supposed to meet us there. It was a struggle to find the right door to go in, but a kind man ended up helping us figure it out. My initial thought was what could we possibly be doing there? Would we be stocking shelves or sweeping floors? I guess I had the wrong impression of that organization, because we did far more than that. We entered the building and were met by a woman who asked what age group we’d like to volunteer to help with. I picked 4th and 5th grade along with Veda and Raegan, because, you know, not too young not too old. She led us to the room where they were at and opened the door for us. As we entered, the gaze of children shifted from the adult who was at the chalk board talking and writing things to us. We hurried to the other side of the room and leaned against the wall doing our best not to be a distraction. The letters “DYB” were sprawled across the board, written by a man I’d come to learn was named Chris. He was wearing a Clemson hat. “Do Your Best” is what that stood for, and he asked all the kids what thought they should do their best at. Some of my favorite responses were that a kid wanted to do his best a football because he wanted to play in the NFL and other wanted to be the best big brother he could. Chris answered the question, too, by stating he wanted to be the best father he could for his child since he did not have a supportive dad growing up. Afterwards each kid introduced themselves and one thing they enjoyed doing-- like all of them mentioned sports. We moved to the gym to play some games and interact with the kids. Veda and I threw around a frisbee for a while until we were asked to play a new game called “bunker ball” which was a combination of basketball and soccer; when the ball was being dribbled you could shoot it like a basketball, when you missed a shot or it was rolling you had to kick it as if you were playing soccer. For some reason, though, no matter who scored the team with all the children got the ball every time. One of them actually called me tall, which was a first for me. We went back to the original room we were in and they pulled out the Wii for some of them to play bowling, while others played school or just talked to each other. I decided I might as well interact with the kids so I dragged up a chair and played school with them. One of them assumed the role of teacher and asked us questions about multiplication and addition. We counted by fives and I taught many of the girls how to use my camera. Lunch followed this free time where I sat at the end of one of the tables with the kiddos. I got asked often to peel oranges for them, but I just didn’t have long enough nails to peel them adequately. A girl across the table offered me some fruit snacks that I gladly accepted. We weren’t supposed to eat our own lunches until later, anyway. Chris dismissed us to eat our own lunches and that was the last I saw of those kids. We met up with the other group that had finally joined us and shared in food and fellowship with them. It was the meal of champions: sandwiches, chips, and cookies. Matt left to go pick Caden up from the airport and in the meantime we had our daily lunch devotion led by Lincoln and Stephen and helped tidy the place. They asked us to organize the ball closet (including the fridge in it), clean the kitchen, and mop/sweep the gym floor. Caden showed up as we concluded our tasks and one of the staff members offered us some leftover popcorn that the kids did not finish. Then it was time to head back to the church for free time and dinner. There was usually at least a good two hours between when we got back from our work site and dinner. We were always the first group back! After almost forgetting to, I reported to Nathan about how our day went and went back to my room to hang out for a while. I played some “nine square” leading up to when we ate dinner. I don’t remember much that followed dinner that night, but I do remember we all prayed over Ethan who was sitting in the front row deep in prayer. This was only our first day doing God’s work in the Charleston community, but so many of us were already starting to see His work within us and around us.

Tuesday, July 18th Another early morning for a day of service. The weather had cleared up so the first house we went to was for a named Eugene. Eugene went blind two years ago, designed battle ships, and is a huge history buff. I didn’t get the chance to talk to him but Matt did. I mainly trimmed bushes and trees at that house with Veda and hauled things to the front for them to be picked up. Matt talked to him for a good hour or so as we ate lunch. Eventually it got to the point where we didn’t know what to do without his instruction so we just hung out. We had some visitors in his absence: the mail lady and one of his friends. The mail lady asked us how he was doing because she hadn’t seen him in almost two years. Maybe she didn’t know he had gone blind. His friend salvaged some of the stuff we pulled to the curb and carried it off. It was a sight to see this super long PVC pipe hanging out the back of his truck with a red shirt wrapped around it as a “flag” so drivers didn’t miss it. We loaded up our tools into Pete’s trailer (he was the one who gave us the mowers, weed-eaters, and trimmers to use since we were doing the work through the mayor’s office for code violation purposes). The second house we visited was nothing out of the ordinary, a much smaller yard. But on the way to the second house, “How He Loves” came on shuffle. I quietly sang along as I looked at everything surrounding me. I glanced to my left and saw a real estate sign that said “Connie” on it and I automatically thought of my mom. We quickly changed once we got back to the church into our bathing suits to head to the beach. It was time to go to Isle of Palms! The drive was about 40 minutes and everyone was anxious to get to the beach. One of our youth, Jeremy, had never even been to the beach before! I mainly hung out with Riley during the beach time. We jumped over waves together and just let the ocean wash over us on the shore as we talked about anything and everything. Sooner than I imagined Matt asked us to help him get the pizzas out of his truck for dinner. You’re probably asking yourself: Pizza.. again? The answer is yes. With a group our size pizza was the only way to accommodate all of us. We ate at the picnic tables we moved closer together and chilled together. We didn’t get to go back to the water after that since it was getting late, but we got a group picture, changed clothes, and moved to the next stop on our journey. We were all allowed a cone or cup of ice cream at Island Joe’s, so naturally I got birthday cake flavored. It was kind of hectic with so many people in line and many of them not paying attention, but it ended up being alright. To my surprise we went back to the beach for a devotion led by Sarah Dee and Kendall. It was the perfect atmosphere: the ocean, the pink sunset, and being surrounded by people I love. I felt at peace and happy. We got back a little late and went to bed, most of us still with sand in every crevice of our bags, towels, etc..

Wednesday, July 19th Wednesday was the most physically, mentally, and spiritually exhausting day of the week. The first house out of three we went to was for a blind woman named Dolly. Her shirt said “I Love Jesus” on it and she was walking her guide dog and struggled to pick up the mess he left behind so I assisted her. I trimmed some more and pulled out vines from fence. The second house was a breeze; we finished within 30 minutes due to the fact it was a small yard. Little did we know, though, what we were about to see. We were only supposed to finish two houses but since we were done early we moved on to a third. Based on the paper with the addresses we were given at the beginning of the week, that house didn’t exist. It was a moment of relief until we called our coordinator and she told us she typed the address wrong. The house we pulled up to had at least three-foot tall grass and a rotting palm tree on its side in the front yard. All of our jaws dropped. Yet we persevered through it and did as much as we could in the time given. At any given moment two mowers were probably running, a weed-eater whacking down weeds, and rake gathering the cut grass to put into bags. It might as well have been a jungle. The owner of the house had apparently been living with her sister due to health issue so we did not get the chance to meet her. We ate lunch on the back porch in the shade to cool off. Fast forward to programming that night, because I think for most everyone that was the “mountaintop” experience of the week. The staff read off some verses and asked us to pick up a rock that was underneath the cross and head to our youth pastor so they could pray over us. I let out a laugh because I couldn’t help but logistically think about Matt praying for all 40 of us. Regardless, we lined up and waited our turn. Slowly more adults like Trent and Baker joined him to make the process go faster. When it came to my turn, Trent prayed for me. I handed him my rock and he drew a cross on it. It was cool because these rocks weren’t just any rocks, they were rocks that were brought back from people’s work sites or near them. I was kind of disappointed that I couldn’t hear everything he was saying, but I knew he was saying it with the best intentions. I headed back to my own seat and bowed my head in prayer thoughtfully. Youth had already started to cry feeling so overwhelmed by emotion, but surprisingly I wasn’t. I wasn’t until I feel a hand on my back and voice start talking to me. It was Ethan. I don’t remember how exactly he put but he talked about how although our youth group is crazy and rowdy, they loved me and would always be there for me. That’s when I lost it. It’s not that I didn’t already know that, but something I had struggled with all trip was feeling as if I fit in on this trip being one of the older kids. Once I finished talking with him and hugging him, I moved to the stage near the cross where I knelt with tears streaming down my face. I wasn’t even praying to myself, I was saying my prayer out loud. I didn’t care if someone else heard. I could barely or talk or breathe through the sobbing. I felt another hand rubbing my back, and I noticed this time it was someone I didn’t recognize. It was a girl with medium length blonde hair and blue shirt on whom I am pretty sure was from the all-girl group from Massachusetts. I had never talked to her before nor did I know her name, but there she was comforting a stranger. The tears were off and on after that. I went around and made it a point to hug every single member of our group. It felt good to not have to hold back and just be held. It took a while, but it was worth it. Riley told me that my mom would be proud of me, and Blake told me stories about geese as my sister and I hugged him. It got to where we were the only group left in there, and they still had thoughtful background music playing. No one really took notice of it until “How He Loves” came on. No one asked them to play it, no one could have made that happen except for God. I’d like to thank whoever made the suggestion to circle up rather than form a line, because that made such a better visual. We motioned for literally anyone left in the room to join the circle and wrap our arms around each other, whether it be the Group Missions staff, adults, or other youth group members. It was the largest amount of people I had seen united by that song on a mission trip. Lately I’ve liked to do this thing where when we sing the song I look around to see everyone’s faces and close my eyes to soak in the moment. This was my last mission trip as a youth, and I wasn’t about to forget my last “sloppy wet kiss”. I did cry and struggled to get out the words when I was reminded of all the times before when we sang the song. We sang it my first senior high mission trip when my mom died, we sang it when I felt lost in my walk, we sang it when it was the first trip without Matt Sands. Since that first summer, the people I wrapped my arms around as they ached during the duration of the song (since I am short) have changed, but the feeling has not. There may be no Thomas, David, or Micah, but there are new names and faces that still mean just as much. After that Matt shared his own thoughts on the night. Some of us would smile every now and then because the paint on his face from “Wacky Wednesday” made it seem like he either had a unibrow or no eyebrows at all. That night was the closest I felt to my youth group and to God in a really long time.

Thursday, July 20th This was the morning the upcoming college freshmen were in charge of preparing breakfast. After that long night, obviously I was thrilled to wake up at the butt-crack of dawn. To make it that much better, the adult in our room Mrs. Redmond lost her phone so she couldn’t set an alarm for us. We were straight up winging it. Meg and I ended up getting to the main building like 15 minutes early so we just hung out in our room until the rest of the group got up. Setting up breakfast mainly included putting things on a tray to put in the oven or laying things out on the table. I served the cheese part of the egg, cheese, and sausage biscuits as people went through the buffet-style line. We went once out to our work sites for the final day of serving the community. We knocked out three houses again this day but it was drastically less demanding than the day before this one. Every person we helped was so thankful for the work we did, and some were even embarrassed that they couldn’t keep their yard in shape. The first lady at the house we worked on was scared that she wouldn’t be able to pay us for what we were doing, so I explained to her that it was for free and how we were there on a mission trip. By Thursday I had learned that weed-eaters are not my friend and you should always wear gloves. The band-aid on my thumb from the previous day kept falling off. Since one of the houses we worked on was so close to another group’s work site, we met them there and ate lunch in addition to doing a devotion together. The devo called for the group to get into pairs and pray for each other which was possibly one of the coolest things we did during a devo time. I chose Rylee, whom I had always known but we had never really gotten the chance to grow close to. After praying for each other we just talked about each other and life. It was awesome. It was also awesome that afterwards Matt finally took us to Chick-fil-a once we finished the last house. Those Chick-fil-a nuggets had never tasted so good until after craving it all week. Another notable part of the night was the lip-sync battle. We were by far the most unorganized group, but part of the reason is because we didn’t know our whole group had to participate. The “red shirts” “rick-rolled” us, the MA girls slayed “Wannabe” by the Spice Girls, and the Brevard group was jammin’ to “Party in the U.S.A.”. Our song was “All I Want For Christmas Is You” since the theme for the day was Christmas in July. “Bucket of Doom” that night was iconic, but I’ll let you see what it was once I post the video of it rather than explaining it. Overall it was a good conclusion to the work week. I spent the night gathering and packing my things so I wouldn’t have to worry about it in the morning.

Friday, July 21 That morning started out in a not-so average way. I woke up and went to the bathroom in the other building to change clothes and I witness a group of adults and staff standing around one of the showers. Apparently one of the youth passed out from dehydration in the shower. At the time I had no idea what was happening so I tried to avoid getting involved and to give them some privacy. We loaded our stuff up back onto the trailer and cleaned the facility. Matt took that certain youth to urgent care so they could be checked out and to make sure nothing else was wrong. All of HUMC said goodbye to their new friends until we also departed. The “red shirts” prayed over us and said farewell to likely the craziest group they’ve ever had. The next destination was the Water Mission headquarters. It was a small place, so we were packed in there like sardines. The group was split up randomly and my group had to go outside first for the activity portion of the tour. Each individual was given a bucket of water to carry around that was filled with water. We walked for less than a mile to simulate only a portion of the suffering most kids go through to get clean water to their families. The groups switched roles and then it was our turn to see the contents of the building. It was amazing to hear about and see pictures of all the lives they were changing. We got the chance to see what the first model they used looked like and what it looks like now. They’re still working so hard to make the water filtration and provider systems more lightweight and durable, which we saw them working on a prototype as we toured. Lunch was Golden Corral where Matt and the other youth joined us once more.
Subsequently, we explored downtown with our van groups. The marketplace was where we spent the majority of the time at the start. Somehow I managed not to buy anything there. We took in all the beautiful scenery. There was the waterfront park, the Pineapple Fountain, the Battery, Rainbow Row, and so many historic houses. I know at least for me my feet started to hurt after walking so many miles. The night did not end there. We topped it all off with a night at a Charleston RiverDogs game where our group got to sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game”. The seats were completely covered by shade and a firework show lit up the night sky. I got my chance to ride in Matt’s truck on the way to the next church we’d be staying the night at. I rode along with Caden and Ethan who discussed everything from the consistency of butter to the plot of “Aragon”. There was no “Bucket of Doom” or devotion since it was already so late, but we met in their small sanctuary for some last words before bed. All the girls set up their space in their room. It was like Tetris getting us all to fit our air mattresses in there. I tried to stay up to finish my notes to everyone in the youth group but 1) my pen kept dying 2) I was too tired to focus. I turned off my flashlight when I noticed the room was silent and was out just like that.

Saturday, July 22 It was time to head home. Breakfast was poptarts and juice boxes that were bought at the stop at Wal-Mart on the way back. My van slept a majority of the way back while I talked with Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Harris. I listened to “The City Harmonic”’s CD about three full times all the way through. McDonald’s was my lunch choice, while others chose Bojangles, Taco Bell, and even Krispy Kreme (cough cough Joel). As Sarah Crace’s final punishment which Matt had been building up all week she had to sing MTSU’s fight song in the parking lot while dressed in all blue MTSU attire. This was supposed to be ironic because she’ll be attending WKU. (Matt deems it not a “real” school.) We ran into heavy traffic right outside of Asheville, and we moved at less than 5 mph for at least 45 minutes. The AC was turned down to conserve energy so all of us were sweating and extremely hot. Mrs. Redmond even tried to make all the vans feel better by getting out of her own van to spray each passenger and driver with water in a spray bottle. It didn’t help much, but it’s the thought that counts. As it cleared up we inched closer to home. I couldn’t stop laughing at how delirious we seemed by the end with Jimmy and Grant doing Boston accents and explaining their imaginary family tree. After 13 hours if you factor in a time change, we made it to Hermitage United Methodist at around 7:20 p.m.. Parents were already waiting to pick up their kid. It was all a blur after that, people running everywhere, luggage being unloaded, cleaning out the buses. I was ready to go home and shower. I wasn’t ready for the week to be over.

I’d like to thank all of those who made this week special, it truly was something I’ll never forget. It was my last mission trip yet it was the start of a feeling of renewal quite unlike anything I had experienced before.

I’d also like to apologize for every grammatical or spelling error made. I just wanted to write it all out so I’ll be able to look back and remember even the smallest of details months or years down the road.

I learned to expect the unexpected this past week and to understand that what God has in store for you is better than anything you could comprehend. I love you HUMC. You’re my family.

Much love, Allison Winters