Step 1...membership class

One of the steps in joining the Nurture program at my church is becoming an official member. Its a great step to take, but its a little awkward when you have been going to the same church for 13 years (attending since 3rd grade) and already know about everything they are talking about. It is a 3-week class and at the end will be an official member of Stonebriar Community Church! I am very excited!

I also got all my stuff turned in for the Nurture Program which is a mentor ship with a "retired" missionary, meaning no longer serving on the field. I am very excited about this. I also have to read some biographies, and required books. I can't wait for this to officially start.

3 YEARS!!!!

Monday, I sat down with my Missions Pastor, Tom Hayes to discuss the plan of me moving to Ireland, for missions.

The plan is this; to go through a program at my church called Nurture. Nurture is a mentorship between a retired missionary and I, and then there are some seminars and books to read. This will all take about a year, to complete. Then Tom and I will start looking into mission agencies. Right now, we are looking at World Venture, because the missionaries I would be working with are through this agency.

Tomorrow I will turn in my application and we will see what happens from there!

 

The process is starting!!

I said before I left for Ireland this summer that I would move there in the next two years. That is still the plan, that I believe God has set for me.

Monday, I have a meeting with my Missions Pastor. We will be talking the logistic part of me moving to Ireland. This process is crazy and confusing.

Please be praying for our meeting that we would get a lot done.

I will update the progress here as often as I can 😊
 

I am home

Hey everyone!

I am sorry for not updating while I was in Ireland, but we had limited WiFi and so I kept my Facebook page updated.

Here is kind of what my 16 days in Ireland looked like after I got on the plane to Atlanta.

After I landed in Atlanta I had trouble getting wifi on my Ipad and my phone service was really slow, therefore I couldn't figure out what terminal I needed to go to and the screens at the airport weren't helping. haha! I finally figured out what terminal I needed to be in and that was the very last terminal and I was in A. You also had to go underground...I had no knowledge of this...I now know Terminal A VERY well.  I was lost in terminal a for about an hour, because only Sarah can get lost in the airport. I eventually found my terminal and gate, then called my mom to tell her how I got lost and I wasn't even to Ireland yet, LOL! After a 2 1/2 hour delay, (2 of those hours were on the plane) I was on my way to Ireland!!



DUBLIN!!!

Once I got to Ireland, because of the delay, I missed my train and had to catch the next one.

On the train to Galway!

Athlone is where we held our church retreats (on the trips with stonebriar)

My friend Claire and her daughters met me at the train station! I got to help with Youth club at Galway City Baptist Church  as well as go to one of their ladies events. So I was able to do a little bit of ministry in Galway! I had a blast! Claire and the girls took me on a "cruise" in Kilary and it was beautiful!

I surprised 3 of my absolute faveorite kids! Claire and I picked them up from Irish learning camp 

Kilary Cruise( county mayo on the left and county galway on the right!)

On Saturday I left my family in Galway, a very sad day, but also exciting because I got to see friends that I had made over oovoo in person and I got to go to a new part of Ireland.

I got to the train station in Dublin and realized I had no euros so I went to the ATM and my bank card wouldn't work, so there I was stuck in the Dublin train station and needing to get to the airport. After crying in the SuperMac (mcdonalds), having an armed officer (very rare in Ireland) look at me weird and trying my card at several places, I was finally able to buy a leap card which is basically a bus pass and made it to the airport on time.

Now I have made it to the airport and met everyone, we find our bus and are on our way to New Ross!!

New Ross has about 7,000 people and I walked the whole city in about 3 days

New Ross is actually a famous town. New Ross is the home of President Kennedys Great-Grandparents.

Patrick Kennedy is President Kennedys Great-Grandfather

It was fun living in an Irish town with some American history!

Like I said New Ross is a small town and it took no time at all before everyone knew that we were the Americans that came to run the Rock. If a group of young Christian Americans were in New Ross that meant the Rock would open soon, and the teenagers started coming around.

We attended church in New Ross at the Grace Church. This is a little Non-Denominational church started by an Irish pastor named Miles McKee. This church is maybe 2 years old and has about 25 attendees ages 2yrs-50yrs ish, I'm not quite sure, but its really small and also a great church! I got the pleasure of helping with Sunday School, all 4 kids.

Monday started with setting up the YMCA which is where The Grace Church is held and meeting Frank Burder and Connor (I don't remember his last name) who are two of the missionarys that help with the Rock in Kilkenny and are helping start the one in New Ross. They are great guys! You can learn more about what they do at www.aheartforthenations.com/. The point of the Rock is to provide a safe place for the youth in New Ross to hang out. Eventually it will be open every week through out the year instead of just 2 weeks out of the year like it is right now. Most Irish youth in Ireland are searching for something out side of the Catholic church and somewhere to hang out, with out the smoking and drinking.

So on Tuesday we opened the Rock and started meeting the teenagers of the town. These are fantastic kids! The names that stick out the most are Aaron, Brian, Kyle, Keri, Laura, Josh 1 and Josh 2. Then my special girls Mollie and Shakira, who were 9 and 11 years old and too young to come into the Rock at night, but needed some where to go. Shakiras dad had just recently passed away and her mom was not well enough to take of her, so she was currently living with Mollie her cousin. My friend Casey and I would take the girls out for chips (French fries) or ice cream in the evenings and would try to direct the conversation toward God, creation and see what happened.

 One evening Casey and I were walking with the girls. Mollie looked up toward the sky and she pointed out a particular cloud that looked like Jesus. Strange enough it did. That moment led to one of my best memories of the trip. I asked Mollie and Shakira what Jesus meant to them. The first thing they said was everything, so we asked them why does He mean everything to them. Shakira said because He gave her mom food so that they wouldn't go hungry and that He protected them. It was an amazing moment and a real break through with these girls.

Shakira is in the middle and Mollie is on the right :-)

Throughout the week, we spent time with these struggling teenagers. On one of these days one of the guys came into the Rock drunk and he was 14 years old. We had been told that last year anyone that came into the Rock intoxicated, would not be allowed in because they wanted it to be a safe place. This year, because we wanted to protect him, we let him and others in as long as they weren't a danger to others in the center. This kid is depressed most of the time, so I hope that y'all would join me in praying for him.

We also did some park ministry and more often than not got caught in the rain. Nothin like tell in people about Christ while standing in the rain and cold.

By the end of our trip several of the teenagers found out where we were staying and would join us for our evening worship time or hang out on the roof with us until  1 or 2 am. We also walked down the road and sat outside a closed coffee shop at night for WiFi...we named it weefee,...anyway, most of the teenagers would come hang out with us, so we got to know several of them pretty well.

We survived 14 days with teenagers, moldy buildings and toilets that didn't flush and still had a blast!

I learned what it means to be a leader ( in the eyes of other people) and how important is to have good leaders who are not only organized, but know the culture.

Overall, I learned that I was definitely suppose to move to Ireland and to live in Galway City. I love New Ross and will be going back to visit several times.

PICTURES FROM THE TRIP!!!!

where we stayed

Irish potatoes. After I scrubbed the poop off 

I was able to celebrate Mollies 9th birthday with her :-)

Wheat/gluten, soy, dairy free and vegan chili!!

My Texas home-girl Megan. She lives south of Houston

(LtoR) Brian, Ben, Josh? and Kyle

(LtoR) Megan, Hannah, Emily and Casey

Laura (Mollies older sister) and Megan

By the age of 12....drinking, smoking, shifting, fighting and having sex, but why?

The percentage of kids between 12 and 14 yrs old who haven't had sex is much lower than those who have. By the age of 12 these youth are being sent out to the streets because most parents say they are old enough to take care of themselves. 16 year olds can be served fags (cigarettes) in a restaurant, but can't buy them until they are 18, so by the age of 11 they are smoking with their friends. Eight-teen is the legal drinking age, but like most teenagers (anywhere not just Ireland) they get it from their older friends.

Why do they do all this??

Because there is nothing for them to do and it rains 150 days out of the year on the South and East coast and 225 days on the West coast, so that is close to half the year and even though they are used to it, the youth especially, don't like it. Here in the states we have after school programs, after school jobs, after school sports ALL year long. Most of us are driving by the age of 16, but in Ireland you don't get your license until you're 18 years old. Ireland really doesn't have anything like the states for their youth especially in the smaller towns like New Ross, so the youth are left with nothing to do but run the streets smoking, drinking, have sex and shifting. Shifting was a fun one to learn about, basically two teenagers plan to meet, make out and then decide (based on the kiss) whether they will date or not. Oh, and they also like to fight and when you ask them why, they all say 2 things; I'm Irish that's what we do and there is nothing else to do.

They all want to come to America because they think life is better (even though in my opinion they have it better in Ireland). In a way you could say life is better over here. You can go where you please and worship as you please (for the most part), there is more for our youth to do. In Ireland 85% of the people are Roman Catholic. Even if they don't practice Catholicism, they are Catholic. Because to be Irish is to be Catholic and to be Catholic is to be Irish. I know several people who grew up Catholic and converted to Christianity 4 maybe 5 years ago and their family disowned them and didn't talk to them for 2 years. If they are Catholic than most are closed off to the idea of another religion, but they also can't understand going to church, but not having all the traditions that the Catholic church has. While in Ireland a lot of the youth we met were searching and asking a lot of questions. Seeds were planted so be praying for them.

It breaks my heart and this is why the Rock was started, to give them something positive to do. Right now the Rock is only open 2 weeks out of the year, but in September a team is going to New Ross to open it full time. Please be praying for them.

Made it through security!!!

My flight leaves at 12:15! 

Packing 101

When I pack for a trip I try to pack as little as I can. Especially when I am packing for 14 days with a sleeping bag, sleep pad and pillow, all 50 pounds or less.

What I use to pack are packing cubes, space bags and backpacking sleep pad and sleeping bag( that I borrowed from a friend)

This is the sleep pad. The sleeping bag is actually a little smaller than this.

My jeans and sweats

Thanks to space bags I am bringing my big fluffy pillow and extra blanket!

This is 10 shirts including a dress or two for Sundays.

I have another one like this for shorts and yoga pants. 

It also helps to take a rolling carry on bag like this

To help distribute the weight from your checked bag. I'm bringing this because I am making a pit stop in Galway to see friends. This will hold what I need for those two days so I don't have to mess with my big bag. 

I am just a little EXCITED!!!