After a less than perfect night's sleep, I woke up on the floor of the host church's Sunday School room to start my first full day with my students in Vermont.  This was our slowest day of the schedule, so the cooking team, under the supervision of my wife, prepared eggs and English muffins for the whole team of 23.  After this, Chloe led the eighth grade devotional by simply having us go outside into the field adjacent to the church  and have silent prayer time.  What a great idea for our first morning.

Then the day truly got under way.  First stop was Champlain Valley Christian School in Vergennes.  This is an annual commitment, and they re always so welcoming.  Dillon did his eighth grade solo.  Although he forgot his ripstick at school, he did his full repetoire of juggling from balls to axes.  (He will be doing it again at awards night complete with ripstick.  If you don't know what this is, it is like a skateboard but has only two wheels and is controlled with leg movements.  He rides back and forth across the stage on it while juggling.)  We did our full hour program, and the CVCS audience was enthralled the entire time.

We packed up from that gig and headed north to Milton, Vermont.  Here we met up with Elevation Christian School.  This is an alternative school for teens who are struggling in traditional high schools in the area.  These are kids who have been bullied, have truancy issues, been expelled, etc.  We got there in time to have lunch with them - a pizza party, which is always a safe bet when bringing groups of teens together.  I really stressed with my team the importance of mingle with our guests instead of interacting only with each other. This is hard for a lot of kids, but LOL really stepped out of their comfort zone and by the end of lunch, an outsider could not have figured out which kids were with which group.  

The Elevation kids then went back to classes while we set up our show in the sanctuary.  Once we were ready our new friends arrived, along with some parents and other guests.  The show was almost perfect.  Here Killian did his solo.  Being arguably one of the two best jugglers in the clss this year, I knew I could count on a good performance, and he did not disappoint.  The highlight, though, was in our closing routine, "Beautiful Scandalous Night".  This is a high visual routine that would be hard to explain with words, but I can say that  we presented it in a way there that allowed their students to be involved alongside ours.  One of the dads in the audience was moved to tears, as were some kids from both groups.  It was the show form this year that the kids will be talking about for a long time.

From here we went souvenier shopping, then to a local gym for showers (Praise God!).  Eventually we ended up back at the base for supper, free time and chapel.  But God wasn't done with us yet.  Kids opened up about a lot of things throughout chapel, and there was a strong sense of healing and redemption in the air.  Later that night, while the chaperones were in our meeting - a prime time for the kids to fool around in the rooms instead of go to bed, the boys all decided to...pray together for each other!  

We grow as we serve, and we grow together as we serve together.