2025 Youth Trip to North Carolina – Day 2-3
Days 2-3: Building Community at Camp & Service Projects
By Andrea Frey & Julia Miller
As we sit to reflect and write, it is late into the evening on our third full day. The opportunity to travel as a group of adults and teenagers together is full of unexpected joys. We’re filled with gratitude for the gift of time to be together and grow in relationship with one another as a Good Shepherd community. If you are reading this, Thank You! Thank you to our prayer partners at home, we feel strengthened and encouraged knowing you are praying for us all. Thank you to the 38 incredible people who said yes to coming on this trip. Thank you to all of you at Good Shepherd who helped support us all to get us here to journey on this trip filled with service and growing in our faith together. Thank you to the other members of our families taking care of life at home, and a huge Thank You to Sarah, who has worked so hard to plan for this trip, and is leading us all daily in prayer, reflection, intentional conversations and connections.
It feels challenging to put into words the depth of experiences we have had already, and to truly do justice in writing to the beautiful changes happening in all of our hearts as we take this time to intentionally be together, serve, and grow in community. We’ll do our best to share what we’ve done over the past two days!
As Sarah taught us when we gathered back home, we approached North Carolina and Camp LutherRock with reverence. On Monday morning at breakfast, we were eager to learn where we would have the opportunity to serve. We enjoyed a hearty breakfast, packed our lunches, and were divided into work groups.
Staff from camp helped deliver us to our different work sites. We’ll share a little bit about each, gathered from the stories shared by our fellow travelers.
Avery County Habitat for Humanity house building: This group has done painting, cabinetry staining and hardware, drywalling, caulking, and bathtub installation. Learning new skills, sing-a-longs with fellow workers, and meeting the children who will eventually be the home’s inhabitants have been joyous moments for this crew. The construction manager is a young man in his 20s with a deep faith, and we’ve enjoyed hearing about his church and faith journey. We were delighted to learn that he is also his church’s choir director, and he joined in on our sing-a-longs!
Habitat ReStore: This nonprofit store in Newland, NC helps fund Habitat for Humanity Projects and has many items for building and furnishing a home for sale. Our groups have enjoyed working alongside the store manager and other volunteers to help process, sort, organize and clean donations and beautify the store by cleaning and merchandising.
F.A.R.M. Cafe: “Food All Regardless of Means” This is a cafe that provides pay-what-you-can high quality, delicious meals from local sources and served in a restaurant where everyone eats regardless of means. It is similar to Good Shepherd’s Holy Cow ministry, but with sit-down meals. Patrons can also volunteer hours in exchange for a meal. Our crew helped prepare meals and serve them, and a highlight of this job was sharing in a meal with the FARM Cafe community.
Lutheran Disaster Relief: This organization pairs the needs of the community with volunteers. At this site, our crew helped clean up and empty out a storage unit that experienced significant water and resultant mold damage to items from Hurricane Helene. Mattresses, a couch and many household goods were loaded and taken to a landfill. The crew also helped clean up debris from a yard and rebuild a fence. The group enjoyed working together and learning to use new tools.
Foscoe Home Team: Our crew helped unload goods at this nonprofit storm relief store that provides groceries, supplies, heat & more to those impacted by Hurricane Helene. They also learned a little about how non-profit organizations operate. The group learned about being flexible, as there was unexpected water damage so they couldn’t do everything that was originally planned. The director told the group that they could go on their phones while they waited for an hour, and then was shocked to hear that none of the teenagers had their phones with them! The group happily self-directed to find other tasks to help out with, and built community amongst each other.
Camp Lutherock: After suffering damage from Hurricane Helene, Camp Lutherock became a hub for volunteer-driven recovery. It is our home for the week. We had a group stay on the property and help with stick and log removal. It was extensive on the over 750-acre grounds, 518 of which are under permanent conservation easement with the Blue Ridge Conservancy. The group enjoyed learning to use power tools to split the large logs!
Hospitality House: A community centered space that empowers people to rebuild their lives. They provide essential services with respect, compassion, and integrity, striving for a sustainable impact across rural North Carolina. Our crew helped clean up the grounds by pulling weeds, and harvesting vegetables from the garden that will be served in meals in the Hospitality House. They also laid mulch on the new playground to prepare for the grand opening of the new playspace today.
Each afternoon after we return to the campgrounds from our job sites, we do “walkie-talkies” with a child that is not our own! Building these cross-generational relationships has been a delight as we walk and talk together, processing the day and sharing what we’ve done. It has truly been enjoyable to get to know other children besides our own.
Our evenings back at camp have been just as meaningful as the work we’ve done during the day. We’ve enjoyed yoga on the deck, led by our summer college intern Kayley. We have also enjoyed hiking the beautiful camp grounds, and relaxing on the porch. While the kids were playing camp games, the parents met together for “parent youth group.” Led by Sarah, we reflected on and shared where we’ve experienced “the sacred” in our lives. We are all enjoying getting to know each other this week and sharing our stories. Time here at Lutherock sure feels like sacred time and space.
Each evening ends in closing worship, led by a different group of 3 families, who have worked together to prepare and lead for our entire group. A highlight was ending our evening tonight in a conga line as we all sang, “May the Lord Bless you and Keep You”.
May the Lord bless and keep each one of you. Thank you for taking time to read, and for your continued prayers for our journey!
