February 2011

JH Boy's Retreat - 18th

We headed to Keystone State Park to enjoy some quality timen with the JH Boys. We rented a cabin and started our out on a wood collection adventure, of course the hard-working boys of the group got to work on it and brought in a massive pile of wood for the fire. We enjoyed our massive wood pile by burning it into a gigantic fire and stuffing our faces with whatever we could find, after dancing and playing around the fire for a while we decided to head into the cabin and eat some dinner. Lasagna was prepared by our amazing cabin cooks and we delighted in stuffing our faces even more. Afterr our meal Nat put together some activities for us, including Transporter, which had the boys doing everything they could to fit everybody in their group on a single block, including stacking themselves on top of eachother, and standing on the backs of other JH Boys. Next up was a great trust activity called wind in the willow, where the boys gathered in a circle and somebody in the middle of the circle crossed their arms and legs, being passed around the circle by their brothers, after some hesitant attempts to fall into their comrades Nat gave the boys some encouraging words and really drove the guys to trust themselves and eachother, they gave everything they had to keep their brothers out of harm's way and even supported Dom and Nat as they took turns falling around the circle. After a good cabin rest we decided to try and defeat the helium stick, which of course was a very impossible task seeing that the helium stick was being a cheater rather than being put into submission by our big group of men. Before the trip home we conducted a trust fall experiment and had each of the guys in the group do a trust fall off of a bench and into their fellow men, displaying such intense care and trust for one another they supported every single man that fell off of that bench and let them down safely to their feet. Nearing the end of a great trip with the JH Men we arrived back at the church safely and so much more bonded than ever before.


Winter Jam - 19th

This amazing experience started off by enjoying some delicious pizza, stuffing our faces with saucy goodness is always a favorite. Afterwards we headed out to the Winter Jam, where we danced around like crazy people and sang along to amazing music. They had performances by numerous extremely awesome bands like Newsboys, one of my personal favorites The David Crowder Band, Kutless, Red, Francesca Battistelli, Newsong, KJ-52, Tony Nolan, Sidewalk Prophets, Christ August, and Chris Sligh. The high energy music encouraged us to worship like never before as we jumped around in fellowship. After our amazing experience at The Winter Jam we departed to the church with open eyes and open hearts as our thirst for god was quenched.