Do Something you Love Doing!

I always wondered what I would be when I grew up.

To tell the truth I still wonder about that very question. Maybe it was because I was adopted. Maybe it was because I had 4 parents all with different and interesting jobs. Maybe I am like Curious George the monkey, just a little curious.

Some of my earliest memories of work were around the house, doing laundry, dusting, vacuuming, doing dishes or outside the house, pulling weeds, edging and mowing the lawn.

I also worked down at my Dad’s paper, The Herald Advocate, doing odd jobs. Inserting advertisements, delivering papers, rolling quarters that had been collected from the machine, picked up trash, until  I was older and able to do more.

As I entered my teenage years I learned how to work a little harder. I learned how to pick cantaloupes and grade watermelons and make it through a12-14 hour day. I learned how to fix micro jets while crawling under orange trees and I learned how to plant orange trees in mass numbers.

I also learned how to paint entire buildings and how to be creative in the newspaper business too. I learned photography and how to develop pictures, how to layout ads before there was such a thing as a computer program. I learned how to sell ads, collect bills, and lots of other useful skills.

It was around this time I also fell in love with writing.

So you can see I was quite busy as a young man, maybe that is why I was so busy wondering what I wanted to do when I grew up. I also played every sport I could dream up. My favorite was football, but due to a blood disorder I only played three games of little league football under one of my all time favorite people Mr. Barry White.

My friends and I used to make up sports left and right. Some I’m not sure would be considered legal today. We played a game called tennis ball tag. I won’t go into details because I don’t want to influence any young minds. We also had a game that included a spotlight that might be considered again unlawful.

So we also played homerun derby at the little league field with tennis rackets and racquet balls. I think coming up with games has been a huge influence on what I do now. Now that I am a youth director you are always expected to come up with the next  latest and greatest youth group game. Whether it is an icebreaker or a large group game or an up front game you need to have something that isn’t going to disappoint today’s teenagers. The problem is today’s teenagers have even less of an attention span than I did. Which I now some of my high school teachers like Mrs. Orwig an Mrs. Vance may find hard to believe.

So how did I exactly come to be a youth director? Well, all I can say is I feel that’s what I’ve been called to do. That sounds so weird or out of the ordinary to some of you I’m sure. I think we are all called to whatever it is we are doing. Some of you are teachers, some  coaches, some store owners, some grove workers, some car salesman, some utility company workers, some work for the state or local government and some well God bless you are youth workers. The Lord has put you were he wants you to be or is trying to get you there whether you know it or not.

So as I ponder what I’ll be doing 20 years from now, I have a feeling it will be a lot of the same. Trying to figure out where I can buy 20 pumpkins for $40 or less for tonight’s game of pumpkin bowling. Yes, that’s right pumpkin bowling in the church parking lot, real pins and real pumpkins. It was a blast. We also played balloon master, where one person on your team is taped, sticky side out with a role of tape and everyone else is blowing up balloons (20 to be exact) and sticking them to the taped person, then there is an obstacle course and a race to the finish line. The person with the most balloons left wins. Neither idea was mine originally although I did throw in a couple of my own individual wrinkles.

Well I better get back to my other job, no not being a youth director but a Dad and a husband. That’s one I never really thought about much growing up, it is also one I can’t ever stop loving. It’s my favorite thing to be. It brings me so much joy and so much happiness, so much stress and craziness too, but I wouldn’t trade a second of being a Dad and a husband it is so much fun.

Hope you are doing what you were called to do.