Katie's prayer: Sarah Hart's "Make Me A Channel (Prayer of St. Francis)"

It is so easy to get discouraged in this job. I think I’ve gotten past the point of being discouraged because only a handful of kids show up to youth group. But now I’ve gotten to that point of “so and so didn’t show up, I wonder why” “so and so hasn’t been in a while.” Of course, no matter what the reason, my first thought is because of my failure. Because of this, it’s always nice to be reassured every once and a while. I got a glimpse of that reassurance last Sunday, and a whole bunch of it this Sunday.

One of my families wrote me a thank you note for all that I do for Confirmation, Youth Group, and PSR. Saying that everything I do DOES get noticed, and they appreciate it. They also thanked me because their daughter wants to become a youth leader now because of my example. Later that night, another one of my kids told me he’s thinking about becoming a youth minister because of me. The same night, I was approached by one of my kids to be his proxy sponsor because his sponsor can’t make it. This is the same kid that did a complete 180 in his faith life, and went from hating youth group, “I’m never going” to loving it, “we should have this every week!”

Now the problem, with all this reassurance, it’s really easy to not be so humble. Yeah, it’s all because of me that these kids are doing so good! The more I thought about it, and the more I prayed about it, I realized it’s not all me, probably not even me at all.

Make me a channel

That’s all I really am. I’m God’s channel. God is the one moving in the hearts of these kids. I just gave them the room and the knowledge of how to listen to God. I just gave them a place where it was safe to talk about their faith. I just showed them the love of God through my interactions with them. But God is the one moving, moving through me to them and then moving through them. So while it’s nice to be appreciated once in a while, it’s even better to realize that the thanks really belong to God.