Is it Disrespect or a Devine Appointment? It Depends

Tonight was awesome, I wish I could have been there for more of it. During worship, I had tell a couple of the middle school girls behind me to quiet down. I then spent the rest of worship time looking at a side screen, so that I could keep one eye on the words and the other one on them. Then, it happened. I turned my head for a second in the transition to Jeanne speaking and the girls were gone, like lightening. Somethings in youth ministry never change, do they? I checked all the bathrooms, upstairs, downstairs, the elevator ... eventually found them outside with one of the boys playing basketball ... go figure. However, it lead to an incredible conversation with one of the girls at the end of the night I would have missed had she not skipped out.

Then, Cherry and I took another student home. I was asking him how his first couple of days of high school had been going. He said his mom was thinking about putting him in private school because of the gangs and the Dekalb schools not being the best. I asked him if he thought that would be a good thing for him from his point of view. He said "for his education, yes ... for his friends, no." I asked him what he wanted to be when he got older. He said an architect. Cherry then ask if he ever sketched, he said "yes, but not on paper." I said, "On the computer?" He said, "no." Turns out he is a graffiti artist.

I think sometimes when kids goof around or fail to have a ride home, it's not so much their bad, but God's way of nudging us to listen a little closer and take a few precious minutes to speak into their lives things we wouldn't have thought to say if they hadn't messed up.