All These Firsts

Recently I’ve had a slew of firsts. And they’ve all been bad.

Two weeks ago, I got pulled over for the first time while I was the one driving. And I was doing 61 in a 40. And I got my first ticket. But I have yet to get a speeding ticket because what I wound up with instead was an “air freshener ticket.” That was confusing because I hadn’t heard of that rule before, but it was $54 instead of $200 and the insurance company won’t hear about it so I guess that’s pretty nice.

I looked it up later and the infraction was technically a “Windshield Obstruction” but I’ll forgive the cop for his error because he saved me a lot of money and also responded well when I started throwing papers at him from the glove compartment, sobbing, “I don’t know what I’m doing, this has never happened before!”

Also, I got poison ivy for the first time. Last Tuesday, I caught a glimpse of the sunset between some buildings during date night with Jesus and resolved to get an unobstructed view before the scene ended, so I raced South down the island in my car and wound up hiking through some brush before ending up on a beach next to a huge, open field.

The sky was lit up in every direction and it was magnificent and seemed totally worth the work to get a good vantage point until about four nights later when my feet broke out with a smattering of incredibly itchy bumps that leaked gobs of clear pus when popped. Never had that experience before.

Since then, the bumps have spread to places on my thighs and arms and I caved and bought some ivy spray but they still won’t go away. Plants suck.

In that vein, I also got ringworm for the first time – at least the first time that I remember. Perhaps I was a fungus-ridden little child, but it seems like a first to me.

A staff member’s kids wound up with ringworm a couple weeks ago and he warned us to avoid hanging out with moldy towels to avoid a similar predicament. Once the staff left, the alarm faded. But a bump on my hand that I attributed to poison ivy formed a ring of blisters yesterday, confirming that our fungal friend is still a member of project.

Today another ring crystallized from the mess of poison ivy all over my ankles and I’m now on the alert and smattering my limbs in antifungal cream in between dousings of ivy spray.

Fun times on summer project!

On a more spiritual note, there have been some other firsts and I’m going to rescind my initial statement that all of the recent firsts have been bad.

On Monday night, I was discipled by someone my age for the first time. His name’s Jake and he’s from UCLA and let me explain. The staff that were running project left last Thursday, turning the reins over to the students (we were all given roles to keep things functioning, like I mentioned before). A lot of roles were practical, like running finances or planning the weekly meeting or keeping the house intact (my role) – and then there’s also Action Group leaders who work on Bible studies and disciple other students which is sort of a weird dynamic, let me tell you, but also really neat.

I feel a bit naked without a wise, experienced staff member at my beck and call to give me advice on a situation or call me out on sin in my life, but it’s been humbling to see what a fellow student has to offer, which is a lot more than I expected.

And it’s also been neat to just talk about sin in my life with other students – or things that I’m struggling with in my relationship with God, like a consistent drive to prove my worth to God and other Christians by my own effort – and to see how much experience they have dealing with similar things and the great advice they have even though they haven’t been formally trained or whatever. It’s a good reminder that growth happens even absent of older, more mature Christians intentionally pouring into me.

So I guess it’s the first time that I’ve been on Summer Project in Ocean City without staff around and have seen growth in my life nonetheless.

And this is the first time that I’ve written a blog post in a Wendy’s in Ocean City, New Jersey.

And that was the first time I used the word ‘Wendy’s’ in a blog post.

I’ll stop there.

God’s good and I forget about him a lot in the midst of trying to be spiritually disciplined and I have a lot of things to learn, but I think I’m in the right place to learn them.