It's 2 monthes since Philadelphia 08, a fort night of love, friendship, serving, discipleship and ofcourse, cheese steaks.

It's June 19th, I can't sleep. I'm going to America tomorrow, the so called country of promise. Where everyone makes their big break, where groups of friends with guitars become the next big thing, and a random 11 year old can be a movie star within minutes. The film industry really paints a pretty picture of the United States. But what we walked into was little like that at all. Philadelphia is one of the biggest city's in America, but the city of brotherly love doesn't always live up to it's name. Camden, a city in Philadelphia, was ranked 5th most dangerous city in America in 2006, just showing the high level of crime in some areas.

 Our aim for the period we were there, was to bring a small amount of light to this city. We taught, we cooked, we played, we sang, we socialised, we praised, we laughed, we helped, we worked. All for God' glory. Setting examples for the young kids who were there to be watched over by us, and to have a good time with us while being taught of the lord's love. I got the chance to get to know a few of the children on a one to one level,  and seeing some of them actually speaking freely about how much they love God was intense. Something that we don't see here at all. This one guy Asad had a parody of the famous "vote for pedro" tshirt on which read "Jesus died for Pedro". Anbother kid Malik caliming "No one can beat the Hulk, except God, God could beat everyone". Clearly not completly holy, but you get my point. The fact that he still see's God as a huge powerful being who looks after him, especially after on his last day he told me "Keep praying". Little kids can amaze you sometimes.

The american team, of ages of 13 to upwards of late 40's truly changed my life in a big way. The fellowship we got from our morning time prayer meetings, night time worship and bible study, and generally all working together along with our team for the ultimate goal of glorifying the lord, really touched me.It was like two groups of 30 that barely knew each other at all bar some exceptions, that bonded seemlessly over a period of 2 weeks. I still try to keep in contact and discuss my struggles and joys with them as much as possible. Keeping those relationships is amazing, breaking down the walls of position and time-difference to be one huge family in God's eyes is nothing less than spectacular. 

Outside of the School and Church setting, the host families showed us nothing but love. I stayed with a family called the Lesters, along with Darren Agnew and Jonny Hewitt. Mark, Jonathan and their parents housed us, fed us, and even cleaned our clothes, which was my main concern after a nasty oil incident. Oh yes, and they make officially the best home made breakfast ever. A house that you could tell everyone loved eachother, and there was little conflict of any, which I sadly cannot say my house is like at times. Brother's have been known to fight afterall... But they truly became like a second family to me, and we felt so comfortable after only a few minutes with them. To open your home to 3 completly random strangers, with the exception of Darren who had met Mark, seemed like a big deal to me, but they did it with no problem what so ever.

The trip was a big eye opener to me, we think Northern Ireland's a dangerous place, but some of the stuff I heard about made me think again. Luckily, I can see the city has been left in good hands of the people of Tenth Presbyterian. 

"greater things are yet to come, and greater things are still to be done, in this city"

 Stuarty.

Stuartmack08ce@hotmail.co.uk