First Outreach: Claremont, New Hampshire

Although we didn't go far, Claremont still felt vastly different from New London. We arrived on the main street a little after 8 AM to begin tent setup. Two ends of the street were blocked off while tents were beginning to get set up all around us, ranging from US presidential candidates to jewelery merchants to the Chili Cookoff tents. Mmmm, chili...

The chili cookoff tents

Understandably, the beginning of the day for us was slow for getting traffic. Around lunch time people started pouring in, and then we started having fun! For many of the interns, it was their first time attempting to give spiritual readings (our street terminology for prophetic words) or dream interpretations on the street, so there was some nerviness, but it didn't last long. The joy of being able to impart hope and new life into complete strangers quickly takes over! In one instance when a man sat in front of me and the other 2 members of my team, I got a picture of the inside of a Subway restaurant, with a custom sub being made. I interpreted that for the man as God telling him that he has a gift of "custom-making" people, in the sense that he can see their gifts and guide them towards their purpose in life (the "complete sub"). We found out at the end that he is actually a pastor...talk about confirmation of a prophetic word!

I got to have an hour break for lunch, so I decided to go participate in the Chili Cookoff judging. I had to pay $5 to get a "paid" wristband, a spoon and a large ticket. After passing through a booth to try their chili, that booth holepunched their name on my large ticket. I actually liked the first one I tried the best, strangely enough. There were over 20 to try, so it took quite some time. I found out just how picky I am with my chili taste! After voting for my favorites (3 categories to vote in), I headed back to the tents to work again.

Skater Zac with the chili cookoff mascot

For the last part of the afternoon I got to be the tent host. My job was to write down the names of people interested in a dream interpretation or spiritual reading, and tell them a bit about it. Close by our tent, teenaged skater boys set up their random props and were trying to do various grinds. One particular guy with them, CJ, wasn't really a skater, but knew them all and was bringing some of them to our tent! I found out he was raised Catholic and is on a search for his own spirituality, rather than what was "branded into him." Another skater, Zac, didn't end up coming in to the tent, but I did get to talk to him some between his tricks. He reminded me some of my older brother being 14 years old; Zac was the most talented athlete of them all, but was driven by a performance mentality. It was awesome to just be able to affirm him and relate to him; that to me is just as much ministry as anyone in the tents that I had words for or interpreted a dream for.

Next weekend we're off to the MetroWest Bridge in Natick, Massachusetts for the Eyes to See conference (we'll be working at it as volunteers). Biggies like Doug Addison, Jim Driscoll and Aaron Evans will be teaching/preaching...gonna be a blast!