Week Two: Ministry in Kilkenny
The second week in Ireland was terrific. The whole team took a bus from Drewstown, which is near Dublin, to Kilkenny. 2 hours away from where we were the week before. As soon as we arrived at the church we were staying in for the next 2 weeks, I could tell that God had blessed us immensely. Starting with the church that we were going to be staying in. Richie, the man that was living there, had graciously given up his own home for the next 2 weeks so that we could live there, what a blessing that was! Then we got to meet Pastor Andie, who was just a wonderful person for inviting us there.
After settling in, our team had a quick meeting and talked about what the week was going to look like. 2 of the main things that stuck with me that week was helping out at the kid’s club, and going to the Butt’s Center (even though no one ever calls it that). For the Kids’ club, we split up into groups and decided what we were all going to do. Me and my friend Rachel were in charge of the songs, so we picked out songs for the week, then we had a group working on games, a group working on Bible story time, and a group working on crafts. The ta-da, we were ready for kids club!
I have to tell you, the kids at kids club were awesome! Granted, we only have 7 or 8 kids come for the 5 days that we had it, but still. They were so sweet, and seemed really interested in what was going on. It was really sad to see them go the last day we had it.
The “Butt Center” was a very fun and exciting place to be. Even though I only went there once, and some more of my team members went there almost every day, I really enjoyed hanging out with the kids and just learning different things from them.. I even played football (soccer) with them! Even though I wasn’t very good at it, I still enjoyed just spending time with them. That night, we all decided to go to the local park and just hang out with some of the kids. Even though I didn’t play basketball or soccer with them, I still got to have a great conversation with a few girls. That just made my entire day.
Those are just 3 of the things that we did in that week. I can’t even describe how much I loved those kids, or how glad I was that I got to meet them. I just thank God that I got to, and that I was able to have some sort of impact in their lives.
