A few of you have sent emails (that have, unfortunately, not been answered yet) asking if our programs have started back up for the fall. Even though our local schools started back yesterday, our programs won’t start until the beginning of September since we use college students as our volunteers and they don’t arrive back on campus for another couple of weeks.

Once they get here, we have to recruit new volunteers, reconnect with our old ones, do training sessions for all of them, get background checks on all of them and place each of them in a program.

Just writing that last line makes me want to go back to bed.

I get questions a lot about how we decide who gets to work with each age group; that’s the part above about “placing each of them in a program.” Let’s say we have 100 volunteers to place this fall since that’s an even number. We’ve got ten schools that we have programs in for the fall, so naturally, you would think that we’d just put 10 volunteers at each program.

Um, no.

First, we have to look at the school and work schedules of all 100 volunteers and begin figuring out which program they have time for in their schedules. If Volunteer Valerie has a class until 4 p.m. on Mondays, that will disqualify her from doing any Twinkle program. She’s got an opening on Tuesday afternoons, but Thursdays are definitely out because she works that night. So, we’ll put her with Glow on Tuesdays — until we realize that 60 of our 100 volunteers only qualify for Glow leaving 30 for Sparkle and 10 for Twinkle when Glow is the program that needs the least volunteers and Twinkle needs the most.

Tired yet?

This process goes on and on and on… in the midst of all the regular stuff: trying to get together invitations for nearly 10,000 students (we give invitations out to every girl in every school we serve); revising training manuals for all three programs including getting them printed and in binders; getting the last minute financial support so we can buy more processed nacho cheese; interviewing and selecting new members for our leadership team and so on.

All this to say that now would be a good time for ya’ll to start offering up some sweet prayers on our behalf. There is so much that we can’t do ahead of time that gets lumped into August and September. By the time our actual programs start in September, we’re usually exhausted from just trying to get them up and going. And so, with the help of my friend List Format, here are some specific things you can pray about for us (if you should feel so inclined):

(“feel so inclined” — does that make me sound smart?)

(I hope so.)

Ahem:

1. Unity – as much as we love being an all-girls ministry, anytime you put a bunch of girls in a room that all of leadership callings on their lives, there will sometimes be, um, differences in opinions. My biggest prayer for our group is that everyone will know their role and step into it without trying to grab for more power or have everything their way. That, of course, goes for me (and Allie) as well.

2. Finances – Um, basically, we still need ‘em. So please pray them in.

3. Favor – Each week, I’m communicating with the administrative staff at ten different public schools in our area. God has given us incredible favor to be where we are and I want to make sure that we’re excellent stewards of it (as well as everything else He gives us). We want to be a blessing to the staff at the schools we serve, not just the girls in the schools.

4. Joy – On some days, you will not find a more joyful office than the Starlite one. On other days, that isn’t the case. I’d like to see us experience lasting joy versus momentary happiness this semester even when things are rough.

I’ve got more things for you to pray about, but I’ll just throw them in as we go along… I think this list is pretty solid for now.

Similar to the solid state of the PNC until we begin scooping it out for the girls.

On second thought, pray about that, too.