So it has been awhile since I've written in my blog, but I haven't been doing much but prepping the last few weeks. Nothing exciting has happened up until this past week. I just got back from Niagra Falls, New York. Never been there before but I loved the city. It was pretty sweet. I participated in Early Bird which is a week that two Youthworks site teams, team up together for a week. So it was my first week having kids and experiencing a Youthworks week. The kids were awesome. My main job this past week was just to interact with the kids and get to know them. The Niagra Falls Program Coordinator did all the other duties that I will be doing at my site so I got to see him in action which was cool. While at Niagra, I was able to see the kids really work hard at their work projects sites and dive deep into God's work. For some of the nightly activities, we went to see the Fall's in Niagra which were cool, also, we went and saw one of the sites of the underground railroad. It was pretty sweet. It was sad to leave Niagra, but my team had to leave a day early from the site to get back to Ohio and finish up a few preparation tasks. So far we have gotten a lot done, their has been some construction in the basement of the church, so it has put us behind a little bit but were getting closer every day.
This past week however, I really was able to see God work. One night our staff was able to pray over one of the youth girls who had a very traumatizing past. Keep this girl in your prayers. She confided in us and told us she was a victim of sexual abuse, more than once and she is only 13 years old. The night that this happened I really saw God in our staff. We all decided that we wanted to go and pray for her. Each and everyone of us had a completely different denominational background, but It was so cool to hear everyone praying in a completely different way over this girl. God was definitely present that night. The very next night, this girl accepted Christ during footwashing, (a very spiritual experience that we do every week), Isn't God good!
Anyhow, that is just a little update on me now, I will be having my first group of kids here in Steubenville this coming Sunday and I'm getting super pumped. Thank you for taking the time to read my blog, until next time!
Be true in Christ!
-Joe
P.s. I am posting a few picturs of the falls that I saw, I didn't use my camera much last week, I'll work on that!
