After a great five days, I have returned from Orange Beach, Alabama. Breakaway Beach Camp was great and I had an amazing time spending time worshiping and in God's word, and developing friendships. Got to play tennis for the first time in years. Body surfed in the ocean for the first time in years. Went to Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana for the first time in years. A lot of firsts in a long time.
The theme of the week was "Imperfect People Undergoing Perfection" and we talked about the origin of our imperfection, the process of undergoing perfection, and the freedom God gives among other things. Small group times after the messages developed the ideas more thoroughly.
Recreation was fun too. Dodgeball and pool relays followed by free time on the beach or in the condo.
The condos were nice. Ours was probably the most underdone but even with the lack of flash, it still was a very nice condo with a view of the Gulf of Mexico.
The water was cold but didn't take too long to get used too. Stayed out of it on Tuesday due to an amazing amount of jellyfish in the water. But spent a lot of time in the waves on Wednesday getting carried then thrown under the water hitting the sand hard followed by attempts to find oxygen as soon as possible. Good times :).
The weather cooperated with the trip perfectly with temperatures in the upper 70s and mostly sunny. A nice breeze accompanied the good temperatures.
I didn't burn in the sun beyond a little pink under the eyes on Wednesday.
We visited Pensacola, Florida on Wednesday night for seafood and pictures. I, of course, had chicken. I'm not a seafood eater...
You can view 114 pictures from the beach at http://picasaweb.google.com/kevincburns/BreakawayBeachCamp
In conclusion, I had a great time and can't wait to go back next year (hopefully :) )
On Wednesday I began to lose my voice. I didn't yell much at all but my voice started to wane. It got to where I could only speak deeply and it cracked a bit but it's almost completely returned now so that's good...
After sleeping til about 10 this morning (making it 11 hours of sleep last night :D), I started getting caught up on e-mail. After weeding through the spam (a lot of it), I occasionally read a message or two throughout the day (personal e-mails were read first thing of course). I worked at a Hot 96.5 remote for four hours this afternoon. Hot 96.5 is one of the stations owned by Archway which owns Spirit. I basically manned the table outside of a wireless store and listened to four hours of rap. Not really my style of music. I like Grits every once in awhile but Grits is positive Christian rap. I tried not to listen to the words of the rap music on Hot 96.5 since every CD they gave away had a parental advisory sticker. Anyways, it was interesting. I'm running the board tomorrow for my dad's remote. Pretty simple. I just take my laptop and surf the internet and such for about three hours and push a few buttons every now and then. Important, yes, but pretty simple and it's a little extra money on the side.
Speaking of money, my job search (pending a drug test) is completed. I will become a member of the Wal-Mart employee family as a cashier after I pass my drug test on Monday. Cashiering is a little outside of my comfort zone but maybe it will develop people skills I need for future jobs...and the pay is good too. Better than I expected at least and more than working at a fast food place (which I absolutely refuse to do, I want something that has some career advancement potential. Cashier looks better on a resume plus I can work my way up in Wal-Mart to the sales floor).
Speaking of people skills (liking the thought train? remote to working to people skills), I think mine have been refined after years of being an introvert. I am by no means an extrovert but I feel more free to be myself here at FBC Benton. I think in St. Louis I developed a mold for myself in the first few months and I confined myself to that mold even when that's not who I really am. Here I take more risks. I crack more jokes. I act more like who I really am. I still don't speak up unless I'm confident in my answer, I don't think out loud, and I try to subdue my lack of dancing skills (:D) but I do branch out and I think I'm a better person for it.
And I think it starts with how comfortable I am with the people at FBC Benton. The youth group is so welcoming and make it easy for me to be me. I feel accepted and I feel like I belong. Thanks to everyone at FBC Benton for that.
All that to say, I am quite possibly in the best time of my life thus far. I have a great youth group, I'm developing great friendships, I'm about to have a consistent, well-paying job, and school is going well. It kind of has me fearing what's coming next but I have no need to fear. Because God will be with me through the best and the worst of my days. He never lets go...
I believe this blog post is long enough. I'm tired, have some laundry to do, have to empty the dishwasher, and get more sleep. Have a great weekend.
-Kevin C. Burns
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Maybe that's why God moved us here, for you to decide who you really are and live it out. I'm proud of you! Glad you are home!
Glad you had a great time! One of these days I'm gonna have to meet some of these wonderful people at FBC Benton. . . (or one of them at least ;))
Post a Comment