Never a Dull Obligation

ABIGAIL LOPAS

Over the summer, I always look forward to GoGive—a time when middle schoolers gather together for three days and tangibly meet needs in our communities through service projects. I think kids my age need to see that service is not always a dull obligation, but it can be joyful and fun!

We can laugh with our friends as we pull weeds in a community garden and talk about how weed-pulling relates to stories in the Bible and pray that God will pull the weeds of sin from our life.

We can race in an assembly line to box meals for the hungry and talk about how grateful we are to be able to help.

GoGive also teaches us perseverance in serving. When we were all covered in sweat in 100-degree weather, we learned not to let that dim our joy. When we weeded that community garden that grows thousands of pounds of food for food pantries, we saw how 40 kids who cared could really make a change in those extremely overgrown beds. At Mission Arlington, as we stocked a free store or cleaned medical supplies, we saw people coming in for care who would use the things we helped put out. It was so encouraging, reminding us that our service mattered.