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We left Faith on the morning of Saturday, July 22 for the first leg of the journey, stopping at a Lutheran Church in Kansas City to stay for the night. By Sunday afternoon we were in Arlington finding our rooms and realizing what Texas heat was really like.
Monday morning proved to be our first real exposure to the mission at hand. We arrived at the church at about 8:00 for breakfast and bible study. Then, at 10:00, about 100 children who had been filtering in since 8:00, gathered together for opening. They were paired up with the Can-Do’ers and the camp began.
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Therefore
go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name
of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” (Matthew 28:19)
With this command from Christ in mind, 18 youth and 2 adults served
in Arlington, Texas at a Can-Do mission event from July 22 to
July 29. 
Sunday
evening we ate dinner at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, the church
at which we were to serve. We then went to a bilingual, contemporary
outdoor worship service the church has one Sunday night a month
which is aimed at the surrounding non-white population. After
the service, we assembled with the roughly 40 other Can-Do’ers,
all from Texas, to find out what the week was going to encompass.
We met Vicar Dave, the vicar at Our Redeemer, and Pastor Mark,
a Pastor who goes from church to church setting up inner city
ministry programs. 
They
explained that Our Redeemer was a 99% upper-middle class white
church which had become surrounded by an unchurched, poverty stricken,
mostly non-white population. It had become apparent to the congregation
of the church that outreach to this group needed to become a priority.
They called Pastor Dave to their church and the ministry began.
It was soon decided that the best way to reach these families
was through the children, thus, the idea of holding a sports camp
was born. Any child ages 5-10 would be able to attend this free
camp from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., with free lunch at noon. The
children would become comfortable with the church, learn the good
news of Christ, and have fun playing sports with their friends
in the process. 
Most
of the Can-Do’ers would be given two campers as their “buddies”
for the week, while a few would given the job of helping with
sectionals in football, soccer, dance, basketball, computers,
or bible study. If you had buddies, you were to stay with them
wherever they went, becoming friends with them and telling them
of the Gospel throughout the week.
Due
to the original culture shock and due to being completely foreign
to the kids, Monday was a quite frustrating day for most of us.
Many of the children had very little discipline in their lives,
and were therefore hard to control. As the week went on, however,
they got to know us better, and saw us as friends who actually
cared about them. As this happened, it became easier to share
with them the good news of Christ, and to talk with them about
baptism. 
By
the time the week was over, everyone involved had a whole new
idea about outreach. It strengthened our faith and showed us the
importance of being witnesses of the gospel as Christ commanded.
On behalf of the 20 people from Faith Lutheran who had this opportunity,
I would like to thank the congregation for your support both monetarily
and with prayer. Each of us has different stories to tell and
different ways in which we were affected, so I encourage you to
ask any one of us about our experience.