Butterflies.  One of the most amazing of God’s creations, if you ask me. 

Caterpillar…caccoon…chrysalis…butterfly.

A caterpillar begins life on the ground then soars to new heights in life as an butterfly.  Incredibly symbolic.  God knew what He was doing in the creation of such an amazing creature.  He knew we needed something concrete to visualize the stages our life and spiritual life would take.  And breathtaking it is – both a butterfly’s journey and our own.

June 1998.  I had been a Christian for about a year and a half.  I had moved to South Carolina to graduate school, away from my family, and that initial fire for God had burned down to embers with the distractions of school and a social life.  Nevertheless, I committed to go with my family and my home church in Kentucky on a mission trip to Oklahoma to a Native American region to work at a children’s camp.  I was excited as I had never done anything like this before.  I think it was determined I would help with music and maybe some storytelling now and then.  (I had experience working as a storyteller at Kentucky Down Under during summers while in high school and college.) 

We arrived to a region that I can only describe as something akin to a Third World country right here in America.  It was desolate and poor.   The motel we were staying at was not one I would choose on my last day with my last penny, but when the kids asked where we were staying, the reaction we got when we answered was as if we answered with “The Waldorf-Astoria.”  Boy, was THAT an eye-opener!

The culture shock continued.  Let me continue to paint a picture for you.  We arrived at the camp to a run-down fellowship/gathering hall, camp buildings and a couple of port-a-potties.  Yup, that was it.   As a woman, this is NO fun and those leg muscles get kinda tired o’hoverin’ all the time.  We also arrived to a culture all its own.  Clocks were of no consequence and hence, neither was time.  We quickly learned to adjust to a “-ish” kind of schedule.  Noon-ish meant give or take an hour or so…  

And it was hot.  Hot, dry.  And very hot.  To this young lady who doesn’t take too kindly to hot weather, it was very hot and I got overheated pretty easily.  Yes, go ahead, picture me as a Southern Belle who would’ve fainted dead away in the oppressive heat if I had lived in the height of the 1800s.  There is a reason God ordained me to live in the here-and-now of creature comforts that include the wonders of air conditioning.  I digress…

All this to say that I was miserable.  Uncomfortable, sick with heat, my heart not in the right place to be ministering to anybody, pretty far from God…all in all, I had no business being there.  But what amazes me is how God uses us despite what we should or should not be doing and usually works best in our weakness, huh?  Always baffles me, but how else is He undeniably God?  He gets ALL the glory that way.  I deserve and got none – as it should be.

These kids were hard to reach.  They lived in broken homes, surrounded by broken hearts, living with broken hearts and broken dreams.  Drugs, alcohol, abuse – you name it, it was there.  The little ones just wanted to be loved on so badly.  They clung to us all week long with every bit of strength they had to soak up as much love as they could in the short amount of time we were there.  I can still picture their faces.  I often still wonder where they are now.  Broken?  Whole?  Hurting?  Loved?  Please, Lord, take care of them…

Two incidents from that week are imprinted upon my heart; two times that God used me that I did not expect and in hindsight, it was an amazing power of the Holy Spirit that my young Christian heart did not recognize but praise God, I went with it. 

Besides the music I helped with, the only thing I knew how to help with and the only other skill I had was storytelling.  Kids love storytelling.  Its fun for me, the kids can get involved, it can keep their attention, and it can embarrass adult volunteers and oh, the kids LOVE that.  The only stories I knew were Austrialian Aboriginal stories and I told one or two to get them used to me and to have fun, then I adapted some Bible stories for audience participation and used those as well.  The week was going by pretty well with the occassional challenge and minor near-heat-stroke for me…but wow, these kids were hard to reach.

Our pastor’s assigned group were the middle school kids.  It was a large group and a challenging group.  We were chatting about how to teach these kids how to pray.  I had just read that story about the man on his death bed – you know the one where he’s talking to an empty chair, praying to Jesus, his son walks back in and the man has died, but is found hugging the chair – hugging his Jesus who he had been talking to.  (I think that’s how it goes?)  Anyhow, I thought maybe I could do a one-woman-who-is-not-nearly-worthy-to-be-teaching-these-kids-how-to-pray skit based on this story.    Pastor agreed.

We gathered the kids under a shelter and they sat around the edges.  I grabbed two chairs – one for me and one for Jesus and set them in the middle of the shelter.  I sat down in my chair, closed my eyes, and started to “pray”…

(to be continued…)