Retreat Number 2 (Middle School Remix)

So this weekend, we had the middle school retreat. As far as craziness goes, the weekend was a lot less exciting. We didn't loose any keys and we didn't have any serious injuries. Despite this lack of craziness, we had a great weekend.

We went to the same place for the retreat, Camp Berea in NH. I will certainly miss that place, because of the beautiful view. It's one of those views that is beautiful no matter what kind of weather it is.

For the most part we did all of the same basic things that we did last weekend, only this time with middle schoolers. It was a fun time, and I think I laughed a whole lot more. The middle school students are a handful, but are definitely fun and funny.

We had lots of great times with carpet ball tournaments, knock out competitions, and two-hand touch football in the rain. Thankfully, it was relatively warm this weekend (I know, Maine warm in November, crazy) because I soaked my shoes and only had flip flops for the rest of the weekend.

This weekend I also had a chance to teach during the retreat. It was a great experience, mostly because everything you say stirs up questions among the students, and they really want to share. We focused on what it means to change the world from the inside out. It was a great weekend. Retreats wear you out, but it is well worth it to spend the weekend with awesome students.

There are now pictures from both retreats on my Picasa account (see where I've been section on the right).

Retreat Number 1

This weekend was, as the locals say, a wicked crazy weekend. On Friday, we began our trek to Camp Berea in Hebron, NH. We drove for a few hours when we stopped at McDonald's for Dinner. While there we lost the keys to one of the vehicles. So we looked for keys for around an hour, and we didn't find them. So we packed up the stuff in other vans and left the suburban there.

Eventaully, we wond up at Camp Berea (also after getting lost due to faulty directions). We had a great night there settled down and got ready for a crazy weekend.

The next morning was pretty normal. Actually, the morning itself was beautiful. There was a beautiful sunrise over the hills across the lake from where we were. We had a worship service and then a lesson time. I taught about the Bible and the reliability of the scriptures. The class went really well, even though I felt like I bored the kids to death, they seemed to enjoy it however.

That afternoon we did a challenge course.
It was a good time, the hardest part was trying to cross the tight rope wire. It took my group a while, but we had a great time doing the tight rope. We also did a thing where we balanced on a wooden raft thing, but that wasn't as hard as the wire.

It was a great time. That afternoon I played football with the guys and the missionary/speaker for the weekend proved to be a great quarterback. He lead us to victory.

We practiced for the worship service that night, I played drums that weekend. The worship service that night went really well. Afterwards, we had the first ever Fusion olympics. It was hilarious for most of it We had fencing with noodles, we had 3 legged races, discus throwing with their mouths, and weight lifting with chairs. It was a really great night. The only bad part was when one of the students tried to flip and gave himself a concussion on the concrete floor. That was a rough end of the night.

Luckly, the student was ok. The rest of the retreat was pretty uneventful. After getting back from the retreat, I had to lead middle school fusion. Which, even though I was tired, was fun. We played dodge ball for a while. Then Chris, one of the Seniors, gave a lesson and did a great job.

That was my wicked crazy weekend. Hopefully the next weekend (the middle school retreat) will be just as fun but with less complications.

because you know you want to know what interns do.

I am just about to rap up my first week of regularly scheduled ministry. I am sure that some of you want to know what I've been up to, so now is the time to find out.
Last weekend was awesome. It was one of the craziest weekends I have ever had. I went on a retreat with 6 awesome high school students and Jared (the youth minister) and Rachel (his wife). We went camping in Conway, NH in the shadow the white mountains. During the retreat Jared took us to Mt. Chocorua and we went on a hike up to the top. So far this is a pretty normal experience. I have been camping before. I haven't actually hiked a mountain, so that was a first, but I've seen mountains before. So mountains are not a new thing to me.

I didn't realize how hard it was really to hike up a mountain. I am certainly not in the type of shape that it requires to do that again. I need to work-out before I do that again. Eventually however, we made it to the top, and it was amazing.
The real adventure was on the way down. We began to come down, and the first hard part was finding the trail again in the fog (I say fog, but that far up it's really cloud). We found the trail and began to descend the mountain. Except, when we were about 1.4 mile from the top, we realized we took the wrong trail about 1 mile back. So we went back. It was either this or come down on the wrong side of the mountain. So we went back up and found the trail we were supposed to be on. On the way back up it began raining. This was TS Hanna coming to join the party. Hanna began pouring down on us like crazy. Long story short, we finally made it down, in the dark, in the rain, about 5.5 hours after we had started. It was quite the experience and I'm glad to have been apart of it. More Pictures from Elevate Retreat

The Sunday that we came back, Fusion started. Fusion is the Sunday night service for Middle School and High School. I am leading the Middle School this semester and they are a great group of kids. We played ping pool and the classic balloon stomp. Ping pool (blowing ping pong balls into cups taped to the table like pool pockets) turned into students dizzy from blowing so hard so fast. From there we gathered the students and Jared welcomed them to fusion and told them what it was all about. After Fusion, I took two students home and watched the Colts game with them. They had lived in Indy for a few years, and their dad had season tix to for the Colts while he lived there. We were all disappointed to watch the Colts lose to da bears. But I had a great time with the Rossiters and especially since their son Colton is in my d-group.

Wednesday, we had our first d-group. I was a expecting more than I got, but the group that I got was awesome. 3 really solid guys. They participated well and I enjoyed getting to know them and I am sure I will have lots of fun getting to know them and hang out with them in the future. We talked about what we need to do to "Shine the Light of Jesus." This is the first of the 5 different pieces of a Christian's identity that we will talk about.

That's all for now, I'll try to post regularly (at least once a week) so that those outside of Maine can know what's going on.