A Wedding & A Funeral
A Wedding
Our confirmation class and several older youth went to serve the meal at Church Under the Bridge Sunday morning. CUtB ministers to the homeless in Waco and sets up under the I-35 bridges between 4th & 5th Streets right next to Baylor University. It feel like a cross between a traveling revival and a carnival. There are some interesting people there and it is truly a blessing to worship there.
The younger students & other adults had the serving line under control, so the older ones and I went around to the convenience stores nearby and bought a bunch of gloves to give out since it was a cold morning. People eagerly took the opportunity to warm up their hands. We also brought plenty of peanut butter & bread to send with people, who may not have a regular food source.
At the end of worship, a couple came forward to get married. The pastor, Jimmy Dorrell, who also founded & directs Mission Waco, stepped off the trailer that serves as stage for the band to unite the couple. He was wearing a red "Troll" hoodie. CUtB started 16 years ago when Jimmy and his wife, on a walk one Sunday morning, came upon a small group of homeless men having a bible study there under the bridge. They asked to join the group and brought more people the following week. It just grew from there.
The bride was wearing what was very likely a thrift-store prom dress and appeared to have lived a pretty tough life so far. The groom had a nice cowboy hat & western sport jacket and also carried the look that comes with a life of hardship. Jimmy gave the usual vows of loving each other and sticking together through the tough stuff. An extra collection was taken up for the new couple and there was a big round of applause & shouts of well wishes.
There was so little pretense to the material side of things. If it were some strange version of Bridezilla she might have thrown a fit to make sure they had the trailer lined up perfectly between the bridges. She might have demanded that the folding chairs had been arranged in pretty semi-circular rows or that the porta-potties had been set further away or that they paused when the traffic noise got too loud. But instead the bride was drenched in tears of happiness and they just seemed so glad to have found each other and to just have each other.
And A Funeral
Our church van died.
It was a slow death.
People thought it was old 3 years ago when I first started at Woodway FUMC. But I've had older vans and I've had vans in worse shape. But this thing kept falling apart on us, sometimes in the middle of trips. The first problems I noticed were the lack of interior lights and the sliding door trim that was duct-taped on. But it ran fine. A big truck ran into us on a mission trip. I don't get shaken up very easily, but that scared me. But still it ran. Brakes needed work, tires needed to be changed, a running board fell off, more trim was lost, the radio wasn't much good. And it still ran on. The door handle broke and the sliding door didn't close properly for a while. We would take it to the shop, and it just ran. Mission trips to Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, even a trip to a youth workers convention in Nashville last November. It took us camping, to play paintball, to retreats, meetings. Picked up kids after school. Hauled stuff to our storage building. Pulled a trailer whenever we needed it. It was our humble servant.
So we had a funeral for it Sunday night.
We all climbed inside one more time. We lit a candle and said some prayers. We told stories and laughed. Nobody cried (because it's just a van), but there was a sense of sadness.
RIP Big White Van, you will be missed.
Our confirmation class and several older youth went to serve the meal at Church Under the Bridge Sunday morning. CUtB ministers to the homeless in Waco and sets up under the I-35 bridges between 4th & 5th Streets right next to Baylor University. It feel like a cross between a traveling revival and a carnival. There are some interesting people there and it is truly a blessing to worship there.
The younger students & other adults had the serving line under control, so the older ones and I went around to the convenience stores nearby and bought a bunch of gloves to give out since it was a cold morning. People eagerly took the opportunity to warm up their hands. We also brought plenty of peanut butter & bread to send with people, who may not have a regular food source.
At the end of worship, a couple came forward to get married. The pastor, Jimmy Dorrell, who also founded & directs Mission Waco, stepped off the trailer that serves as stage for the band to unite the couple. He was wearing a red "Troll" hoodie. CUtB started 16 years ago when Jimmy and his wife, on a walk one Sunday morning, came upon a small group of homeless men having a bible study there under the bridge. They asked to join the group and brought more people the following week. It just grew from there.
The bride was wearing what was very likely a thrift-store prom dress and appeared to have lived a pretty tough life so far. The groom had a nice cowboy hat & western sport jacket and also carried the look that comes with a life of hardship. Jimmy gave the usual vows of loving each other and sticking together through the tough stuff. An extra collection was taken up for the new couple and there was a big round of applause & shouts of well wishes.
There was so little pretense to the material side of things. If it were some strange version of Bridezilla she might have thrown a fit to make sure they had the trailer lined up perfectly between the bridges. She might have demanded that the folding chairs had been arranged in pretty semi-circular rows or that the porta-potties had been set further away or that they paused when the traffic noise got too loud. But instead the bride was drenched in tears of happiness and they just seemed so glad to have found each other and to just have each other.
And A Funeral
Our church van died.
It was a slow death.
People thought it was old 3 years ago when I first started at Woodway FUMC. But I've had older vans and I've had vans in worse shape. But this thing kept falling apart on us, sometimes in the middle of trips. The first problems I noticed were the lack of interior lights and the sliding door trim that was duct-taped on. But it ran fine. A big truck ran into us on a mission trip. I don't get shaken up very easily, but that scared me. But still it ran. Brakes needed work, tires needed to be changed, a running board fell off, more trim was lost, the radio wasn't much good. And it still ran on. The door handle broke and the sliding door didn't close properly for a while. We would take it to the shop, and it just ran. Mission trips to Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mississippi, even a trip to a youth workers convention in Nashville last November. It took us camping, to play paintball, to retreats, meetings. Picked up kids after school. Hauled stuff to our storage building. Pulled a trailer whenever we needed it. It was our humble servant.
So we had a funeral for it Sunday night.
We all climbed inside one more time. We lit a candle and said some prayers. We told stories and laughed. Nobody cried (because it's just a van), but there was a sense of sadness.
RIP Big White Van, you will be missed.
posted by McHonza at 1:12 AM
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