If I stop to think about it enough, I realize how much I write that people see, and I get a little self-conscious. I write a weekly update e-mail to about 40-50 people each week, I write on here for everyone on the world wide web to read...it seems a bit much at times.
Below is something I wrote for our fundraising banquet last fall, which about 200 people attended. It is now on the inside cover of the DVDs of the banquet we hand out. Since it's already out there, I might as well add it on here! The theme for the banquet was Connections, and it was held at a train station in Toledo.
"I remember my first solo train ride very vividly. It was the summer after my freshman year of college, and I was taking the train from Toledo to Chicago, IL to meet up with a friend to begin our journey by car across the U.S. to Santa Barbara, California. My father dropped me off at the station, and as I was a little nervous, waited until I had boarded the train to leave. Throughout the 6 hour ride, I discovered my friend was no longer going to be able to meet me at Union Station and said it would be "no problem" for me to "catch a line" to her suburb station. Panicked, I called my older brother who lives in Chicago and begged him to meet me at Union Station. He agreed, only to call back later and explain he had been called in to work. As I sat there, writing down step-by-step instructions for where to turn and which ticket line to enter and which color line to take and which color line NOT to take and asking, I'm sure, a billion questions of my brother, I began to get more and more nervous. Would I take the wrong line? Was it yellow or was it blue or even green? And if I did take the wrong line, would I even know how to begin explaining to anyone where I was and where I needed to be?
Well, I did it. I eventually made it through my first solo train ride to Glenview, Illinois, and I even did it on my first try!
When I think about the ministry, I think about my first train ride. I think about my journey, my struggles and my fears. I think about the people who helped me along the way- English speaking family members who lived close by, train station ticket booth workers (may God bless them for their patience), and my close friend waiting for me at my final destination. My connections are what made my journey easy. As I think about the women I interact with on almost a daily basis, my prayer for them is the same. I pray that my connection with each one of them will help make their journey a little easier, that they will never feel alone in Toledo, Ohio, and that someday I will be able to introduce them to my close Friend who is waiting for them at the end of our journey together."
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