EMASS

Sorry the blog has been quiet for the last few weeks. This is all down to EMASS! First, I was busy running things there, and then I had a week off to recover! But EMASS was an amazing week and a fantastic experience. There is so much to write about, I’d be here all week if I were to tell you everything that happened, but I will draw out a few highlights from each day!

Sunday – Arrival day! We had beautiful weather as the students arrived, ready for the busy week ahead! The school was filled with talk of parents saying goodbye to their children, meeting up with old friends and making new ones, and music flowing around as auditions got underway.

The evening worship focused on ‘Boundless Hope’, looking at our hopes and expectations for the week. As the theme of the week was ‘Boundless’, each day focused on a different aspect of that theme.

Monday – The theme of ‘Boundless Hope’ continued, looking at hope in times of persecution or adversity. We looked at how we all face difficult times in our lives, but we need to remember that God is there with us. He continually gives us hope when we ask for it, and our eternal hope is found in Jesus. He brought us hope when he died on the cross. As a response, we each wrote down the persecutions or adversities we were currently facing as a way of asking God to come into those moments. Once we had done this, we created a cross from the sheets of paper as a sign we were giving them over to God, as can be seen in the

 picture.

In the evening, we had team activities! This consisted of the small groups completing a scavenger hunt and four tasks to try and achieve the most points; including a paper aeroplane competition, tower building, penny tossing, and pea moving. Everyone could get involved and enjoyed themselves.

Tuesday – Up for a laugh anyone? We had two workshops during the day; very different in style and content. One workshop was about ALOVE’s Cut It Out Campaign – a campaign designed to enable young people to bring an end to human trafficking to meet the demands of the sex industry. The students all got involved in making posters and film clips to help spread the message.

The other workshop was about comedy! Tony Vino, a comedian, ran this workshop, teaching about public speaking, improvisation, and getting the students (and staff!) to have a go! Tony and a couple of the other comedians from his company put a comedy roadshow event for us in the evening, making Tuesday a day filled with laughter and smiles.

The theme of the day was ‘Boundless Outpouring’, focusing on the Holy Spirit and how he works in our lives. Students were encouraged to ask for prayer so they could be filled with the Holy Spirit and know more of him in their lives.

Wednesday – Mini Olympics! The whole school walked up to the sports centre ready to take part in the mini Olympics! Five teams competed in a number of events to see who would be EMASS Champions 2012. Games included javelin throwing, three-legged and wheel barrow races, and an egg (or tennis ball) and spoon relay. The most competitive race was, of course, the staff race. Once all the scores were tallied up, the winning team received ‘gold’ chocolate medals, presented by our own resident games maker! Unfortunately, a thunder storm set in just as we were heading back, so everyone got drenched!

The teaching focused on ‘Boundless Salvation’; salvation is for anyone and no one is beyond the redeeming love of God and the saving blood of Christ.

Thursday – The Big Lie In! It may not sound like a big deal, but this lie in is definitely needed; helping both staff and students get a bit more sleep and restoring energy levels ready for the final few days.

The theme was ‘Boundless Adventures’; with Jesus, we start the greatest adventure of eternity. He gives us life, and life to the full, and he will never leave us; journeying with us every step of the way.

The evening ended with a superb talent night. Students and staff revealed their talents, from animal noises to dance, juggling to puppets; ‘Smelly Cat’ to vocal performances of band pieces, EMASS had it all!

Friday – ‘Boundless Communities’ encouraged the young people to think about all they had learned during the week and start making decisions about how they could take it back into their communities.  It was amazing to hear all the ideas and passion the young people had developed during their time at EMASS.

Friday also featured the Big Night In. Everyone got dressed up into their glad rags and sat down to a curry before the partying began. About 45 minutes into the disco, the music went down to allow the awards to be given out. Winners received a ‘gold medal’, again from our games maker, and a rose. The photo booth was also a great hit, with lots of pictures snapped to help everyone remember the evening.

Saturday – Time for goodbyes, but not before the last teaching and final celebration. The theme was ‘Boundless Action’, and, after the teaching, the students and staff shared words of encouragement and testimony with one another. This was a great way to end the week, many young people sharing something for the first time in their lives, and being encouraged by all.

And finally, the celebration. It was amazing to see all the young people work so hard to make the evening such a success. Every option shared what they had done during the week, and the guys from art produced a fabulous item, live!

That’s about it from me about EMASS. If you went, what were your highlights? Did I miss them out? Be sure to leave your thoughts in the comments!

Attack or Defense?

Well another week has come and gone, and I’m sitting here wondering where it went. I’m guessing the reason it has disappeared is due to preparing for EMASS, now only 2 days away! I’ve also not worked a full week – I was lucky enough to go to the Olympics on Monday.

Although we applied for a number of different events, we only received tickets for two sessions of the women’s hockey, but we were still very happy to have received these! So on Sunday afternoon, my parents and I got in the car to head for London and the Olympic games!

We got to see four games of hockey; New Zealand vs Germany, USA vs South Africa, China vs Japan, and Belgium vs South Korea. I’ve not played hockey for a number of years, having only played it in PE at school, but it was very exciting to see the game played with such skill, and it reignited my interest in the game.

The way the teams played their games was also of interest to me. I’ll start with China vs Japan. China had been playing better than Japan in their previous games, and the crowd expected them to win. Of course, this would mean a harder team for Team GB, so the crowd was cheering for Japan. But the game was anything but exciting. Japan had a number of penalty corners, but they did not have the power in their shots to score.  China should have easily won the game, but they seemed too scared to move forward and attack. They did not push forward, or use the opportunities they had. This was the same with Belgium and South Korea. Belgium did not push forward, playing a very defensive game and not striking with any force at South Korea’s defence.

The most exciting game of the day was USA vs South Africa. We were cheering for South Africa, and they really delivered! I’ve talked about how Belgium and China played a defensive game, South Africa was the opposite. They were very low down in the table, and so they decided, with nothing to lose, they would attack and push forward as much as they could. It worked. The South African’s scored nine goals during the game, although only 7 were allowed (two were deemed unsafe), while America failed to score at all.

So why have I been writing about these games?

The three teams (South Africa, Belgium & China) were all in very similar situations. They all had nothing to lose from their games, but the way they reacted to their situations was very different. China and Belgium appeared to give up. They did not see why they should try. They were scared of failing, and that damaged any chance they may have had. South Africa played it different. They used the knowledge they had nothing to lose by giving their all so they could go home knowing they had given their all, and it paid off.

Often in life, we can feel dejected when things haven’t gone our way. We give up battling, feeling there is no point. We become defensive, not wanting to give away anything, but ending up achieving nothing.

But maybe we should follow the South African teams approach. With God, we are given the courage and strength to go out fighting. Things don’t always go our way, but we need to hold on to the knowledge that God is with us, supporting us. We need to put on the armour of God and who knows what greatness we can achieve?

Using One's Best Efforts

Today has been yet another busy week for this DYO. Monday started the week off slowly, doing general office work and preparing for EMASS (only 9 days left!). But that was not to last! Tuesday I spent visiting a number of new Corps officers to the division. This was a good opportunity for us to meet one another and spend some time in fellowship, but it was a busy day and required lots of travel time! Wednesday, I headed off to Peterborough for an EMASS meeting. Though the meeting was long, it was a good opportunity to sort out those loose ends. Yesterday I went to Stowmarket for the Divisional Welcome Meeting. Again, this was a good opportunity for fellowship with the officers of Anglia, and to spend some time in worship and prayer together.

With all this travelling, I have had the opportunity to listen to the radio and hear about the numerous Olympic controversies, disqualifications, and problems that have happened. If you haven’t been avidly following the Olympics and have switched off whenever they have been mentioned, let me sum up for you. So far there have been issues surrounding the empty seats in stadiums, and cracking down on ticket touts. There have been disqualifications in the badminton and cycling. American coaches have accused Chinese swimmers of using drugs. Plus much more!

The more shocking of these controversies for me have been the badminton disqualifications, where the Chinese, Indonesian and South Korean teams were accused of “not using one’s best efforts to win”. One of the members of the Chinese team said “We've already qualified, so why would we waste energy? It's not necessary to go out hard again when the knockout rounds are tomorrow”. Later, after they had been disqualified, one of them announced their retirement from the sport because her dream had been "heartlessly shattered".

How often in our own lives do we not give out best because we feel that it is a waste of energy? We feel that what we are doing is not worth giving our all; there may be something else we want to do, yet have to finish this first; the task may be menial and boring; and there are many other reasons we don’t always give our best. But do we ever consider that by not doing our best, there may be greater, unforeseen circumstances? The badminton players certainly didn’t. The players did not even see much wrong with their actions, and felt it was acceptable to ‘save their energy’.

God sees things differently. Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 10 that we should do everything for the glory of God, not causing others to stumble (verses 31 & 32). Whatever we do in life, we should do it as if we were completing the task for God himself – yes, even those boring tasks! And we should not cause others to stumble – the South Korean badminton teams admitted that it was the influence of the Chinese team that influenced their actions.

We never know who may be watching us, and so we should always do our best, knowing that we are not causing others to stumble and encouraging them, too, to work their best.

How much would thinking in this way change how you currently live your life? Remember to leave any comments and thoughts you have!