I took a couple of days to recover and sleep after Easter Camp, but I also have a real life that carries on after Easter Camp. The last message on Monday was about being an outward focused youth group, and I have high hopes of my youth learning how to extend and share the Gospel with those around them. It's not going to be perfect, and we had some youth make some inward focused choices this past week. That's not the end of the story for my youth, though. Just like there were a couple bad attitude moments on Easter Camp that we saw turn around, I know that God is at work in the young people at this youth group. Plus we still have loads of non-Christian kids turning up who I'm praying for and hoping to see transformation in their lives.
Honestly, this past week I had to admit some of my own inward focused tendencies that need to be rooted out and transformed in my attitude and habits. I'm so grateful to be in a place where my own growth is encouraged and fostered. After sharing some celebration and prayer moments with other youth pastors on Thursday morning, my friend Hannah took me out to the beach. We got a coffee while I debriefed Easter Camp with her, and then we sat and watched the waves while talking about hopes and excitement for what God is doing in our youth group.
While I did have some margin for recovery, I also had life carrying on around me. And what a beautiful life it is. I had two meetings with my two different TeachBeyond teams, and I had some laughs and encouragements over my new hairstyle from different countries. I also had the privilege of reading a prayer over my friends Jenny and Fernando at their wedding yesterday. They'd asked me a few weeks ago, and I'd told Jenny that I'd be honoured. When she passed on to Fernando that I'd write a prayer for them to share in the ceremony, she didn't tell him I'd read half of it in his mother tongue. I really love my cross-cultural life, and it was so special to be able to use my Mexican accent to honour my Spanish friend. I had lots of compliments on my Spanish after the ceremony, and I had to clarify my Spanish is really rusty, but I was able to practice the pronunciation in advance and knew I wouldn't embarrass myself too badly in front of native speakers.
My life has all kinds of fun plot twists that little Laura would never have guessed while hanging out with the Marquez family and absorbing proper Spanish pronunciation. (Shout out to Ana and German who are the reason I had compliments on my linguistic skills.) The life I live also involves a lot of aches and pains and slow accomplishments because of my disability. I love being able to share the progress and celebration of growth in my youth, but I also feel it's important to be transparent about how my body really needed those recovery days because I spent so many spoons in the past month. I would love for prayers as I continue on with this beautiful real life I have with built in margin that I would be able to be physically healthy. The past month has seen a lot more insomnia, a lot more leg spasms, and a lot more annoyance with my physical limitations. Hopefully if you ask those around me, it didn't come with a lot more complaints. However, I do want to care for my body well, so please pray for me to honour my limits while stretching myself in healthy ways.