coney island lighthouse mission

day 1 (june 21): what a physically draining day it was. check out the pictures because you will think i'm lying about the next sentence. we walked into a 60x20 backyard covered in weeds that were waist high. miss denise, the program coordinator, asked, "is this too much." reluctantly we all answered no but we knew we had a task in front of us. i have to tell you how much grace the Lord poured into me because there were tiny spiders crawling all over my legs and biting me and i kept working. that was God right there because if you know me, you know that i HATE bugs with a burning passion. they're one of God's creation that i could definitely live without. from 9 to 12 we pulled most of the weeds (that, praise God, were actually really easy to pull!) miss denise sent us off to a much needed lunch break. we were absolutely covered in dirt. in our ears, on our legs and arms, in our fingernails, in our hair, on our faces, between toes, in our eyes... covered. the think that makes me chuckle is that i specifically told God i wanted to get my hands dirty for Him while i was in ny. i meant it in a metaphoric sense but God answered my prayer in a literal way. praise Jesus for that because it was awesome to see that transformation. it was palpable. coney island is so incredible diverse. us 5 white girls were the odd ones out for the first time (for me anyway...) it was incredibly challenging to confront the stereotypes i didn't even realize i held. the people there trumped many of them within the first day. after lunch we came back for another couple hours of yard work. there was so much trash underneath all of the weeds, it looked like a landfill. i was so full of praise to be provided with this job though because we saw just how much this church needed this chore to be done. we were exhausted... and sweaty... and dirty... but the after school program was still another task on the list. i think we perked up when the kids came in and we saw how great they were. Amoyea, Jesus (DJ), Amaya, Jennifer, Wei Lon, Adolfo, Jarrell, and Miriam were the kids that came in today. please pray for these by name. they are such urban kids. they have grown up seeing more than kids in longmont, colorado will ever see in their life. amoyea told me the story of the gospel. i don't actually know if she knows what it means or believes it fully but there was a light in her eye when she told it to me. after telling me the story of the gospel and reciting john 3:16 and psalm 23 to me she sang some psalms of david to me. she is a little diva. look for her on american idol in a couple of years, she could make it. the influence of living in the city is so strong for these kids and their parents.
day 2 (june 22): another busy day! i think my joy level was a lot higher, God definitely renewed my energy. it seemed as though our team leaned more on the Holy Spirit that the day before. we relied on Him to provide us strength and joy. we had to use our muscles a lot today; we unloaded boxes from the food trailer into the church. after that we packaged bags for pantry distribution that happened later that night after we left. this mission has food distributions every tuesday and thursday. on thursdays they also have fresh produce from a farm in new jersey that donates his crops to the cause. i pray that he will help the mission plant their own garden in the newly cleaned yard! we got to eat lunch on the boardwalk and walk on the beach. the ocean has never looked more tempting. new york is so hot and humid that the second you step out of the ac, you're already sweating. we felt so gross all week. when we came back we got to meet Reverend Fusco! what an awesome man of God. he is so calm and gentle. he has such a passion for the community of coney island. we also met winnie... i think she's another program coordinator. she's only a few years older than us so we connected with her quickly. we headed back into the yard to clean up the weeds along the building and start picking up all the trash. we have found 4 needles in the yard... 3 of them had insulin labels on them but still, it is very possible that these needles were used for intravenous drugs. please pray for that. instead of just staring at us through the fence like the day before, people started coming up to us and asking about the yard and us and why we were here. we got many compliments about how nice it looked. one girl walked by asking if the mission needed volunteers. in a way i think we're helping cultivate a sense of community by doing this yard work. see, many people on coney island are on welfare and seem to mull around all day. they have probably walked past this yard for a while thinking nothing about it. then we come and show them that their community is worth it and there is a new sense of worth developing- at least, i pray. we actually got most of it cleaned before the kids came for after school. again- we were dirty and sweaty but the kids didn't care. they were so open to us- not shy at all! there were 3 new kids today... the twins ( i cannot for the life of me remember their names) and Marcel. Wei Lon has a lot of catching up to do on her reading. she doesn't know how to sound out words. i think mandarin is the language spoken at home but still- she didn't know how to say the word 'him' and she's in second grade. she doesn't like reading at all either. amoyea on the other hand loves to read! she read out loud most of the time and i really enjoyed listening to her enthusiasm! saying goodbye was even harder than the day before... uh oh!
day 3 (june 23): today was an EARLY day! we got to the mission at 8:00 means that we left manhattan at 6:45 which means that we got up at like 6:15.... sleeeepy! but working outside woke us up and guess what? we got the entire yard cleaned and weeded out! it looks incredible... healthy... a place that can be made beautiful. there was one corner that took us from 8 to 12 because it was so filled with trash and vines. the bugs in this corner were huge and actually, believe it or not, we found a possum skull. yuuuup. it was kinda cool actually but we couldn't help but wonder how and why and for how long? haha. we ate lunch at the original nathan's hot dog stand on the boardwalk. it was sooo good, a much needed treat! more of God's grace pouring out into us because we all wanted to quit. it was His strength solely that was my strength today. none of it was me. we are really starting to see how these people live day-to-day now. it is slowly breaking my heart. there are so many young mothers. unmarried. on welfare. i can't help but see just how vast the work is ahead of us. the cycle just continues. i start to wonder if i am cut out for this. i pray that i am not. as stupid as that sounds. but it scares me, just how overwhelming it is. i want that burden, but i don't at the same time. i ask myself and God if i am strong enough to stomach this for more than 5 weeks? there's a part of me that wants to run away from this and just pretend that it doesn't exist. just put it out of sight out of mind. but thankfully, God has burned it into my mind so much so that if i try to run, it will haunt me. i trust completely that God will reveal the answer to me in time and that if this is what He is calling me to, He will give the strength and the stomach to do it according to His will. i have to keep reminding myself that my life is for His will, not my own. please pray for that.
day 4 (june 24): here comes the fun part.... hear the sarcasm. today.... today... oh, today.... was a challenging day to say the very very verrrrrry least. but i cannot describe to you how very thankful i was for it. today was a big food distribution day. sounds harmless right? piece of cake is what i remember saying to myself during the first one before lunch. it went smoothly. although we had to turn a few away, my heart was still completely intact. but after lunch the day quickly turned dark. somehow the mission received a food order they weren't expecting. because of this there wasn't enough room in the trailer for all of the food we had to do a second distribution. this time there were perishables like chicken and yogurt and franks and green peppers. it was an incredibly hot day and the distribution was held outside. people started lining up about an hour before and we were still waiting for the truck to fully unload. people were getting so hot and impatient. our team really had no clue what we were doing so when we got conflicting orders we were so confused and just started letting people grab what they needed and go. for this, we got yelled at... and people got angry. we really saw the desperation of these people. all they wanted to do is to provide their families with real food... chicken must be like gourmet to them. once we got the truck completely unloaded we let the volunteers and the handicapped people have first dibs. there was one woman in a wheelchair that had to have weighed close to 300 pounds that would just not move out of the way. she just kept complaining... about what, i could not tell you. i asked her to stop yelling at us, leave us alone and that i didn't know what else i could do for her and she just looked at me with such disdain. it was like a game to her, which i didn't understand and it hurt. we started distributing to the line but nothing we gave them satisfied them (generally speaking- most of the people were thankful but it only took a select few to make the experience difficult). they kept demanding more. it was like they thought we were trying to rip them off, like we were purposely withholding from them. one man got so angry he threw down his bag and stomped away. a chinese woman wanted a package of meat that was intended for big families only she kept motioning for me to sneak it into her bag. i had to say no to her and her face will be burned into my memory for a very long time. she looked crushed. she didn't understand why i wasn't giving her something she needed. i had to yell at a french woman to leave. i had to yell at someone that has to fight to bring food home to her family. do you know how heart wrenching that was? i have this very vivid picture in my head of this day that i both want to forget and remember forever. it's not fair. the gap between rich and poor. nourished and suppressed. strong and weak. it's not fair. it was such a dog eat dog experience, seeing the desperation for food that WILL NOT SATISFY. i prayed for ability to be like Jesus in that moment because i felt so hopeless in my own skin. i knew the only thing that would satisfy their hunger was to know the love and power of Jesus Christ. but i couldn't give it to them at that exact moment. i was me. insufficient. weak. powerless. hopeless. meek. small. and that was a very dark feeling. time with the kids was rehearsed and shallow. i couldn't pull my mind away from what had happened, what i had seen at the distribution. i kept replaying it over and over in my mind. on the way to the subway i tried to call my mom and larissa. thankfully neither of them picked up because i was trying to run away from the one i knew i had to talk to first... God. so on the subway i let Him have it. i told Him how angry i was about the situation. how helpless i felt. how unfair it was. and do you know what He did? He allowed me to rest in Him. He summoned me into such a peaceful and calm place, He told me just how much He was in control. He reminded me of His sovereignty. He provided me with scripture that healed me emotionally and spiritually. He brought me from a place of turmoil to a place of contentment. He brought me joy in the midst of this and reminded me of all the good things about today. and then i was ok. and then i saw the bigger picture and that is that Jesus already defeated this. He promised us one day He would be back and on this day we would all take part of a kingdom so high and mighty there will be no more tears, pain or fears. when the burdens of this place will fall away and we can spend an eternity with our creator. it was also comforting to know that even though my heart hurt so much for these people, God's heart hurt even more. and unlike me, He has to power to fix this. He already knows how He will do it and if that's not comforting i don't know what is.

if one thing is certain about coney island it is that the Lord is already very much alive and working there.
God Bless.