The Harvest is Plenty But the Workers Are Few: Matthew 9:37

Monday December 20, 2010

Today was one of the longest days. I am soo tired but at the same time, I feel incredibly blessed and extremely humbled. It was sooo worth it!! I’m so incredibly thankful and sooo sooo soooooo incredibly grateful that I got to be part of this experience. It was so extremely humbling to once again, in some small way, get a glimpse into another world. It makde me appreciate now more than ever how privileged I am by being able to receive a college education and how thankful I should always be, even for the little day to day things that I often take for granted. I know I said in the blog I wrote a few days ago that I would update it. I plan on doing that but I also felt that this was something that needed to have its onw page or blog or whatever. (I’m such a blog-virgin!! Hahaha!!)

But in all seriousness, it’s time for you guys to get a glimpse of a day in the life of a Toys for Tots volunteer at John 3:16 Mission. Okay, here it goes:

Last week, I was assigned 2 days at the John 3:16 Mission Warehouse.

Let me tell you…the first impression I got from the outside of the building as I arrived last Moday…

I thought “God, where in the hell have you sent me?! Hmm…I guess this is what You meant when You said “The harvest is plenty but the workers are few”…

To be perfectly honest, I felt very uncomfortable and extremely out of my element but a few seconds later, I heard God say “Suck it up, Buttercup. Realize now that if you go into the Third World again, the conditions may be worse than this. Get over yourself and realize that this is NOT about being ‘comfortable.”

I went into the warehouse and quickly realized what God was saying.

To be perfectly honest, the warehouse at first glance looked like something you would see in CSI or Law and Order…y’know…where the murder always takes place. I was very…almost culture shocked…and felt very intimidated and I guess you could say…a little scared.

Although I was only at the warehouse for only a few hours- it was still one of the most humbling experiences of my life. To go through all of the clothing donations and trying to figure out what goes on to be distributed and what gets thrown out, as tedious and mundane as it was…it was such an amazing feeling knowing that somewhere down the line, I was helping someone. Even if I was there to fold clothes or move boxes to be picked up and taken to the Family and Youth Center, it felt like such a tremendous blessing to know that I could have an impact on someone’s life. I thank God for that opportunity to give back to the community all the blessings that He has been so gracious with. It seemed like such an insignificant thing but what I would soon see in the following days made it all worth it.

The past few days, I have been working with the Family and Youth Center and the Toys for Tots program.

The first session of that was both physically and emotionally exhausting. Even though I did spend some time in another nation, I was quickly reminded with the quote, “Mission work begins at home”.

I felt very insignificant at the beginning because I was in a room wrapping the presents for the kids in the program and as I spent that time just focusing on that one task, I spent time praying and was just asking God how I could glorify Him by doing that when I felt it was just empty busy work. I prayed asking Him, “God, when I agreed to come here, I expected to impart some type of ministry to the people here. Why am I in this room just wrapping toys?” The room fell silent and He simply said “If you truly love me like you say you do, show it. You are so focused on the big picture that you’re missing the point of this whole thing. Remember first and foremost- you came here to serve. Do just that.” Like I said before, little did I know just how much impact the quote “Mission work begins at home” would have on my heart and will probably stay with me forever.

After I got all of the toys wrapped, I moved on to helping a woman find a skateboard her son would love. I got to help a man find the perfect winter coat for his daughter. As I talked with the people, it made me think about how grateful I am for the things in my life. It made me question just how much I thank God for the little every day things that I know I take for granted. As I talked with the people that came into the Christmas store, they made me realize what a Godsend Toys for Tots really is. Because it was my first time working with John 3:16 and Toys for Tots, I had no idea what to expect. I did expect to walk away with feelings of thankfulness. I just didn’t expect them to be so strong. Hearing that without this amazing ministry, there would be kids in our own community that wouldn’t have any toys under their trees. It made me realize just how urgent the need is for us to go out and share the love that is only found in God to these people. It made me realize how self absorbed I have become. It made me realize how much of a pampered brat I am. I helped the parents that came into the store to carry the bags to their vehicles and as I talked with them, even for the couple of minutes that we were together, I got a huge wake up call.

There was one man that came in and was looking for a doll for his little girl. I was helping him choose from 5 or 6 that were on a table and we started talking. He commented on how young I looked and asked if I was married or if I had kids.

I told him I was in college and he looked at me dead in the eyes and was like “I was young like you once. I have also been around the whole college thing. I don’t know where you’re at in your life but I want you to know this. No matter how bad you may thing it is- stick it out. Don’t quit. Don’t give up. Don’t skate your way through. I fell into a bad crowd my first semester and messed my life up. You have no idea how much I regret it. I think you said you were thinking about going into education. Always strive to be the best you can be. Not because anything less is acceptable but because anything less is pure misery. Always remember that and you can accomplish anything you set your mind to accomplish.”

And just like that- our conversation ended, and he got what he needed and was gone. It’s so funny how a total stranger that seemed like he had the wisdom of the ages gave me the most valuable advice I think I will ever hear.

At another extreme, I saw things that I pray to God I never have to experience.

II pray that the situations a lot of the women had to endure are things that I NEVER have to endure.

I pray that God will have the perfect man in the perfect time for me to spend the rest of my life with.

When I saw some of these women come into the store to choose toys for their kids, my heart broke from seeing them in the obvious varying degrees of the living hells they were in. I cannot even begin to fathom what being in an abusive relationship is like and I pray that I never will experience that. My heart broke as I watched them move about the two classrooms that were set up with the selection of toys and games for them to choose from.

As grueling as it was and knowing that all I could do was pray for them, it just made me put a lot of stuff in perspective about how good I have it and how often I underappreciate it and as much as I take it for granted.

It also made me realize that if it weren’t for my Cherokee Nation scholarship, I wouldn’t have been there in the first place.

We had some down time in between people coming in and I was in a corner by myself thinking about the past couple of weeks when I uploaded those really old pictures of Grandma for my cousin. It made me think about how I pretty much disown my heritage to the ground. It made me think about how that day when Wilma Mankiller hugged me  and said, “Remember that you are a bright Native American woman. Keep that and God close to your heart and you will go far in life. Please remember that in this male-dominated world- Never allow being a woman, a Christian, a Native American, a minority…stop you from going for what you want out of life.”

It’s funny how all of those tied into each other with what I’ve been doing the past week.

If it weren’t for my heritage that my grandmother was so proud of and was so adamant about me being aware of, I would have never had this experience.

Cherokee Nation, thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to give back to the community. It was my earnest prayer that during my time there, I hope I represented the wonderful Cherokee people and ultimately- the love of Christ well. Even though I take my heritage for granted and I tend to not appreciate my heritage as much as I know I should, I really appreciate them giving me this chance to give back all the blessings that God has been so wonderfully gracious with.

Ultimately, I thank John 3:16 Mission for opening my eyes up to another world like this and giving me this awesome opportunity to serve.

It made me so excited to go back for my second (and last) session of Toys for Tots.

As I walked through the doors again into the place that has become very close and precious to my heart, I became very excited about what I would be doing.

From being there and experiencing several aspects of John 3:16, I feel like I am getting kind of a ‘well-rounded’ idea of just how wonderful this ministry is.

Today I got to help out with making food baskets for the food distribution.

It felt so amazing knowing that this is what God has called me to do. I could not imagine doing anything but that for my community service.

After that task was completed, I got a brief break to transition into helping with the Christmas store.

Again, it felt so wonderful to see how welcoming and accepting the people that were there to choose gifts for their kids were to me.

It was amazing!!

It was so wonderful to see how grateful and thankful they were to be able to come to this wonderful ministry.

In turn, it made me even more thankful that I got to help out with it.

To be honest, I tend to doubt the whole “Divine appointment” thing, summing it all up to coincidence.

I can honestly say that these doubts are gone.

I know now that this experience is coming to an end until I can pick it back up during the summer – this really was a true divine appointment.

I know that it wasn’t an accident that Kara just ‘happened’ to call me first.

I know that it wasn’t an accident that this just happened to tie in perfectly with what I feel God is calling me to do.

All that I have left to say is:

“God, thank You. Thank You for giving me this wonderful experience. I hope that I made You proud.

I love You, Daddy!!

Love you,
Sarah