Today was my cross country kids first day of competition. We took them (all 33 little middle school kids) to the 59th Annual Mt. Sac Invitational. This is one of the biggest cross country meets of the year. The competition has separate races for Elementary school, Middle School, High School, Jr. College and regular colleges. Hundreds of schools from around the country (specifically high school and college) come to compete with the best. Being a brand new school, our kids are not the best, and pretty much have zero experience. But they did great! I was soooo proud of all of them… some were having a real hard time at practice, many not completing their workouts (they would walk if they got tired). I am pretty sure all of the kids ran the entire race without giving up. Some students even suprised us! We teamed up with a middle school in our district to save money on bus fair and help unite the middle schools in our area. We had a great area set up for the kids to rest in, and for the most part they were very well behaved. We had an unfortunate event in which a student stole money from one of their teammates, and they are being removed from the team. I was really frustrated about this, but this student has had several chances and keeps making the wrong choices.
On the upside, the parent of the student that had the money stolen was very supportive and is going to take care of the incident with the school.
When I got home, for some reason I had TONS of energy. I sweeped and wiped down my entire kitchen floor, (on my hands and knees) I cleaned up the living room, vacuumed downstairs, cleaned the bathroom upstairs and did 3 loads of laundry. Then I showered and now I am a little tired.
While I was in the midst of cleaning… my neighbor from across the way rang my door bell. She is an older woman that lives right across from me that we have chatted with several times. Their son owns the condo they live in and they were staying in it for the summer. They are moving back to Canada for the winter. They are trying to sell their dinning room table and asked if we knew anyone that needed one (let me know if anyone is interested in buying it). Out of the blue as we were walking to look at it she asked me if I was a Christian. I said yes, and we briefly talked about church and how bummed we were that we had not talked about it before that. She also told me that a lady in another condo was a Christian and hosts a Bible study close by. She asked if I would be interested in coming and I gave her my information! Ok, yes it was 2 entries ago that I asked God to help me develop deeper relationships at school and wherever he wants me to. How funny that today I would do a little of both. I stepped out of my comfort zone with my neighbor and I am a little nervous/excited of what may become of it! Plus, I met two coaches at David A. Brown that are pretty great too. And, I work with a really cool PE teacher at my school. He and his wife are pretty great. They really care about kids and enjoy what they do.
How amazing it is when you ask God to make you grow and it actually starts to happen! I have always been shy and scared to talk with people I don’t know that well. I am always nervous that they will not like me or think I am fake or something. My friends and pastor have really encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and serve and love people. Lord, please help me to step even farther out of my comfort zone to love people even more!
