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Bolstered by a Paper Angel

On a mission trip to NYC, she felt overwhelmed the tasks her church group faced—until a two-ply visitor gave her confidence.

An artist's rendering of an angelic paper napkin kept aloft by a breeze
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How could a few teenage volunteers and their chaperones make a difference in a big city like New York?

I’d flown in with our church youth group to clean streets, weed a local park and serve food to seniors in the borough of Queens. Standing on a street corner littered with trash, I found myself suddenly overwhelmed by the size of the job before us.

I looked up at the 50-story building towering overhead. I couldn’t even see the top. Lord, I don’t want these kids to feel my discouragement.

I tried to bolster my faith with memories of past trips. We had tended flower beds at a Charleston, South Carolina, nursing home in 90-degree heat. In Boston, Massachusetts, we taught Bible lessons to kids who had probably never even opened the book. We could do this, couldn’t we?

A wind kicked up and sent dust and debris swirling. A white paper napkin took off flying. It danced through the air, flapping like angel wings in the breeze. Eventually the napkin made a full circle around our little church group.

As abruptly as it came, the wind disappeared. The napkin dropped to the ground, but not before lifting my spirit with renewed confidence. “Okay, kids,” I said, “we’ve got this!”

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