well, it changed my life and my eyebrow.

It's over.
Our internship ended yesterday. I have mixed feelings. I'm excited to go home and apply what I've learned here to my actual life. I'm sad to leave such a great movement behind. MissionWaco is absolutely incredible in how it serves the poor and marginalized holistically. I'm so excited to see its future.

Sorry, my posts have been very sporadic and I've left you out of most of the events. It's mainly that the effort to drive out to a coffee shop or restaurant (usually meaning something had to be purchased for internet use) and endeavor to handle the plethora of internet needs just proved too much. I pushed it off until I could avoid it no longer.

So to make it up (and not bore you with all the details). Let's read a short list of things I've done since my last post.

1) Toured David Koresh's Branch Davidian Compound. (i.e. this was the cult from Waco and the second-most popular response to where I was spending my Summer - next to the heat) Here's a website explaining it all: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branch_Davidian_Massacre
It was basically a big deal....when we were 5. This is a long story, but the skinny is: I have this homeless friend who moved to Waco to investigate the conspiracy from Philadelphia. He moved onto the compound and was baptized into the church. Then he left after the new "prophet" got too weird. He offered to take some of us interns out there and give us a tour and tell us the run-down of what happened there. It was so cool. I love stuff like that.

2) Supervised the longest StreetCamps ever. Seriously. This camp called 'StudentLife' (which is like MFuge) was at Baylor and their day-service project involved MW's Street Camp. Instead of a two-hour thing, it was from 11-3. It was soooo long. But the youth groups seemed to enjoy it and I got a lot of reading done. Haha.

3) Read two more books: Under the Overpass by Mike Yankowski (which is about a college student and his buddy who decided to make themselves homeless and travel across the US through its major cities) and Theirs is the Kingdom by Robert Upton (which talked about his initial experience in Urban Atlanta and his organization FCS that is a community development organization like MW)

4) Helped more with Baylor Line Camp which this week was taking the students to nursing homes and homes for those with disabilities. This one was a little more difficult for the students to jump right in on. But understandably so. I can't imagine having to do that during freshman orientation...think it would've broke me. Haha.

5) The interns put on a party last night called 'Kathypalooza' for our director Kathy Wise who has been our shepherd in this internship. We made this giant dining experience in our living room with candlelight and good music, spaghetti, games, and fun. It was a great time.

6) Taught a lesson for the chapel at the homeless shelter. It was pretty heavy. I just talked to them about how I felt the church had neglected their responsibilities for caring and loving them. During one friday meeting, someone asked us the question 'Is the poor the church's responsibility or the governments?" And most people answered "Both". That stuck with me and I told the people at the chapel that if the church did what Jesus said, the government wouldn't have to be involved. I appologized for all the offenses I felt the church had commited against them. Here are a few from my notes:
"I'm sorry for the way the Church...
...neglects you.
...for any time we made you ashamed.
...for when we didn't feed you.
...for when we gave you no shelter.
...for when we told you to 'get a job'.
...for when we made you feel worthless.
...for when we ignored you.
...for when we oppressed you.
...for when we laughed at you.
...for when we made you a statistic rather than a human being.
...for making you a political issue.
...for lying to you."
I have read a lot of books, witnessed a lot of things. The Church needs to wake up.
"How can you worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore one on Monday?"
Birds have roosts and foxes have dens but the son of man has nowhere to lay down his head. Matthew 8:20
It was great experience for me to just talk with them. I'll never forget it.

7) Then a few days later, another intern had the chapel service (she came to mine and used it to jump off on her's and invited me to come along). She read the Scripture where Jesus washed His disciples feet and commands us to do the same.
¹²So when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments and reclined at the table again, He said to them, "Do you know what I have done to you? ¹³"You call Me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am. ¹⁴"If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet." (John 13:12-14)
Then with tubs of warm water with lavendar bath salts, she and other interns washed the feet of those in the homeless shelter. And in turn, they (their idea) washed the interns feet. It was beautiful and more like the "Church" than I have ever seen.

So now, we're done with our internship responsiblities. Everybody's doing little fun things today for our last times in Waco. We all go to Church Under the Bridge tomorrow for the last time together and then Monday night is the intern-appreciation dinner. Then Tuesday, Kaitlyn and I will hit the road...back to Carolina...oh how I've missed you.

Probably won't write anymore about my experiences here in Texas. This has truly been a journey for me. Thanks for reading along and I hope that God can reveal as much to you in the future. As always...
Thanks for reading, Peace to you.