First School Year = Over

So I have now completed my first school year w/ Club beyond.  HS graduation is tonight, last night was MS graduation, the night before was HS Baccalaureate, so fairly busy week with stuff to go to.  Last week we had our end of the semester clubs for both HS and MS. We had mid 60 hs students show up and a number of family members, so it was a good way to end the year.  We grilled, played some games, and spent some time saying good bye to those who will PCS this summer and to our graduates.  We did something similar for the MS. 

So now we are on to summer.  The biggest thing immediately is the service project to Romania. We will be gone for about a week and a half early on in the summer (can't get more specific than that in a public forum).  We have been doing a lot of prep work for this project, collecting supplies and taking donations and doing training with the students we are taking. We did an overnighter last weekend where we did team building exercises, did a Bible study on being a servant, spent time in prayer, and talked about expectations and what we all felt we needed to be successful. This will not be an easy trip. It is going to be long days and hours of tough work in extremely poor areas. This trip  has the potential to push some of the participants to the end of their rope.  But as I like to say being at the end of your rope is a bad place to be but a good place to have been. It is not fun in the moment, and very tough, but those are the times we see the most growth and development.  Those are the moments when God does amazing things and changes lives.  So please pray that we are challenged and pushed in such a way that it is only through God that we accomplish anything. 

Back to the end of the year thing. This is something I am slightly torn about. I am really looking forward to summer and a change in routine.  But I am torn about PCS season.  We have a lot of students who are moving, and it will be really sad to see some of them go.  It has already been sad saying good bye to some who have left already.  But at the same time it is exciting to think about the new students who will be here.  Part of this is out of selfish thought.  With this last years group of students, I have felt more like "the NEW club guy", which is true and what I have been.  Now, I will just be "the club guy." I am not new, and will have been here longer than a third of our kids.  It will just be a different dynamic that I am looking forward to.