Andrew Howe's Blog
October's Newsletter / Nov 2, 10:31 AM
Friends & Family,
October has been a very full month. Having started our official service work, the team and I have battled a cold (as a team), met a whole lot of neighbors, played with the local kids, and started to understand what life in New Orleans is all about. Although a few setbacks have slowed things, our house is nearly ready for us to move in, and we’re eager to be able to spend more time around the neighbors we’ve been developing friendships with.
Our commissioning service was this Sunday—a time set aside to commit ourselves to one another and to the program we’ve chosen for this year, now that we have had a chance to get a feel for how much will be required of us. It’s really exciting to be living with a team of people who are willing to put themselves in difficult places along with me (even though we don’t know everything that is coming). We are learning that we each have our own way of looking at things, and thanks to our different service sites we’re all bringing different insights home every day.
My community development work is well underway, and most of my days have been spent preparing to hit the streets with both a physical building structure inventory as well as a study of the needs of our neighbors in the community. In about two weeks, we should be going door-to-door putting together a detailed picture of how a 31 block area of the central city neighborhood is doing after Katrina. The hope is that this information will allow Urban Impact and other organizations to do a good job of redeveloping the area.
Next Thursday, I will start teaching a digital media class to the students at Urban Impact’s alternative high school once a week. The school got the money to purchase a whole lab of new Mac laptops this summer, and they have barely had the chance to teach the students to use them. I’ve developed the first few projects for the students, and I’m pretty excited to see what happens when the students are charged with tasks like writing music and creating music videos.
While I have visible achievements to talk about and more to anticipate, there is something much more important going on behind the scenes. I am learning how to have conversations with groups of people I have never been able to relate to. I’m finding relationships with people who have endured far more difficulties than I, who in many cases have emerged far more joyful than I. Through these friendships, I’m finding God’s continual desire to grow me in many ways I could not experience in a more comforting location. There are certainly setbacks and difficulties I would not have chosen, but in enduring these distractions it seems I find myself closer to Christ; more clear about why I’m here. It seems incredibly appropriate that commissioning happened just this month, as I am now feeling the weight of what God is growing in me. While I still can’t say what precisely that is, I can feel the growth, see new gifts emerge, and am growing in my ability to trust the goodness of this call. I’m thankful for this journey, and I anticipate that I have not yet felt the full force of the ways I am growing.
There are quite a few prayer needs in my life right now, both here and elsewhere. While there isn’t enough time to go into detail, please remember these names in your prayers: Patrick, Greg, Aline, Willie, Joan, the Branch family, Hannah, Charity, Melody, Daniel, Rebecca, and of course the rest of my team—Jen, Matt, Ben and Lacey.
I am incredibly blessed to have so many who are behind me with prayers and insights—thank you for your continual support and encouragement.
1 Comments
Leave a Comment...
Read more of Andrew Howe's Blogs.
Hey Andrew!
Its exciting to hear about what you have been up to in mission year. Im in the application process right now for next year. We all miss you on campus. I’ll be praying for you :)
By Amber Sands / Nov 8, 08:10 AM / #