SYATP

Have you ever thought it was a great idea to sing karaoke and once you pick the song and go on stage you get a crazy feeling in your stomach like "What was I thinking?" Well, we had a little of that this morning. Last night our Student Pastor, Matt and area youth pastors put on a rally called Ignite, to get the kids excited about the annual See You At The Pole. I have to admit I had heard about SYATP but never thought much about it since my kids were too young. This is the first year that anyone has really talked to the kids about it at all and they came home last night really excited about doing it and wanted to go this morning. You are supposed to go 30 minutes before school and gather with other students, faculty and parents to pray around the flagpole. The problem is that there was no flagpole at school. Lindsey was certain there was a flagpole behind the school in the parking lot and sure enough, on the side of a different building, was an extremely ragged, very small flag sticking out of the building. It was the building next to the school (the school is actually in a church building so I think its connected) that seems to be some kind of half-way house for men. There was a man outside taking out trash and I asked if we could use his flag. I could tell he had no idea what I was talking about but was receptive. He went inside and got the gal in charge. We explained again what we were looking for and they graciously agreed.

All the while, many of the other students were arriving in this parking lot to go into school, teachers too, the principal. It seemed as if everyone was looking over towards us to see what was going on but nobody seemed to be looking for a SYATP group. It became more and more clear that it was just us, and I could tell that the kids were disappointed and possibly ready to run. Maybe just becasue I was there with them and that is so not cool! But we hung around for awhile and finally decided to go ahead with just us.

I had asked them to each pray and I would finish up. I figured I would need to say the prayers that needed to be said in light of the circumstances that we were supposed to be there and that was fine, I figured the fact that they still wanted to do it was good enough for today. But Lindsey started and said just a perfect, beautiful, to the point, prayer to our Heavenly Father. And Kurt followed up much the same. I stood there with my teen/pre-teen children and was thrilled to hear how much the get it. They prayed for their friends, teachers, families... everybody else but themselves! It was awesome. I did wrap up, only to reword some of the things they had already said and thats it, we were done.

I am so grateful for the people in their lives that stirred this event for today. God is at work through the people in His church and I appreciate all of the efforts that were put in to last night. It was crazy, I think I heard there were about 150 students there and many adults who are involved. Very, very cool.