Lessons From an 8th Grader

This morning, my group served at Food and Friends. For the afternoon, we were scheduled to be downtown as they do the Urban Plunge. There was an awkward amount of time between Food and Friends and the Urban Plunge, so I decided to quickly bring my group over to the National Cathedral. I knew we would only have about 20 minutes at the Cathedral...but I think it is absolutely breathtaking and really wanted my group to be able to experience it.

When we got there, I pulled my group aside and explained to them that they were going to have to be focused and quiet. This may sound like a small request, but for this group in particular, I may as well have asked them to climb Mount Everest...because it would have been easier for them. They are mostly middle school kids and they are exceptionally chatty.

To my surprise, when we walked into the cathedral to tour it, they were absolutely silent. When we entered the main cathedral (there's multiple cathedrals within the one building), they all started booking it to the front, silently...while a service was in session. I wanted to kill them. Fortunately, because there was a service in session, I had to be silent and my only choice was to follow them. As I followed them, they all abruptly stopped in front of a small prayer room. They got into a single file line and they entered into the prayer room, knelt down and started praying. I was so blown away, I was speechless...which is quite a large fete. They slowly and quietly rose from the altar they had been praying at and regrouped. Except Jacob. The rest of them waited, but after a couple minutes had passed, they eventually left and I stayed outside the prayer room waiting for Jacob. I also sniped the picture of him that is in this post :) When Jacob was done, he rose, walked past me and out of the prayer room where we went to go meet up with the rest of the group.

The part that blew me away was that this week, Jacob has shown himself to be the leader of the pack. He is frequently making decisions for the rest of the group, and when Jacob talks, the rest of the group always listens. To watch a leader ignore the presence of his peers as he entered into prayer absolutely blew me away. Jacob's concern, as a 13 year old boy was to kneel before God in the middle of his day and to pray before him. I don't know what he prayed for, I didn't pry. I just know that he acknowledged the presence of God when a situation was presented to him...and that is a lesson I can definitely afford to learn from the example Jacob set for me.

Needless to say, even though the Cathedral was a bit out of the way on our quest to the Urban Plunge...it was well worth my time :)