October 29th: A week of interruptions (Original Link)
Today is Friday. Here is what has happened this week:
I took off some time to celebrate my daughter's first birthday on Tuesday, then some more time Thursday to attend a MOPS (Mothers of Pre-Schoolers) field trip with my other daughter that my wife was not able to go to.
I arrived early for work on Wednesday to get some extra things done, but ended up spending the first hour talking with a student's mother and then his small group leader about how the student had run away and is still missing.
I stayed late after our Wednesday mid-week gathering to talk with a student about a traumatic experience, then stayed later and hung out with three new-ish students who have been coming regularly but almost always arrive late and leave early.
I counseled a family on Thursday night, then frantically tracked down a local police officer and fire chief who both go to our church to make sure that a body that was found was not the student who had run away. It was not. I then came home to find out that my wife had food poisoning and had been throwing up.
I stayed home this morning to be with our two daughters while my wife recovered and rested from food poisoning.
After I put our girls down for their afternoon nap, I headed to church to take care of a few crucial things while they were sleeping. I arrived at church to find a student waiting for me, because he's been working off the fine we paid when he discharged a fire extinguisher at our fall high school retreat. His mom did not let me know he would be coming today.
There wasn't much work for him to do, so I had him alphabetize books in my office. We ended up having an hour long conversation about evil, the nature of Jesus, karma, and whether Jesus was really sinless. He does not have a relationship with Jesus, but he does have tons of questions.
I finished a print job for my lesson on Sunday, and headed home. I still have a budget to work on, a leaders retreat to plan, and lots of reading to catch up on. But those things will have to wait until next week.
This week, I meant to catch up. I really did. But there was just too much ministry to do.
