Updates and Challenge Day

Hey all!
We had a fun Wednesday night, playing some crazy running around games (final falling down total: Jordan 4 Cody 3) and talking about friendship. And hey, any night I get to pick kids up and throw them to the ground its a good night to me!

Sunday high schoolers and going to play some active games and begin our What do we Believe series by talking about baptism. This would be a great time to do something with water, but after last time I'm not so sure (a certain individual ran into the tub of water and broke it open). Anyhow, it will be a great night so see you there.

I wanted to talk a little about Challenge Day, a program that myself and two of our middle school team got to participate in at Clintonville MS on Tuesday. Simply put, it was one of the most amazing days I have ever been a part of. Challenge day is a day long program held at a school that urges students to Be the Change it their community. They pick 100 that represent a cross section of the school to participate, as well as about 25 adult facilitators and 2 pro leaders from Challenge Day in CA. The first three hours focus mostly on high energy games and some short presentations, but it's after that point that things get real. The speakers told their life stories, revealing some pretty major pain in their lives. They told us that we hold all of our pain and seemingly "uncool" thoughts and dreams inside, keeping 90% of who we really are "below the waterline" (like an iceberg). The speakers' stories were really emotional, and they got everyone starting to think serious about what they have hidden from everyone. Then everyone got into small groups with an adult leader and took 2 mins to tell everyone "if you really knew me..." Students and adults were revealing tons of pain: being made fun of, suicidal thoughts, drug use, discrimination, relatives in jail, hating their own actions, etc. It was so powerful. Then, after lunch, another powerful event happened. Everyone lined up across the gym, with a blue tape line down the middle. The leader would read something like "if you have been made fun of because of your body, cross the line." Then she would talk about it and challenge those who had crossed to not have it hurt so much, and those who did not to stop taunting/causing problems. By the end of this activity EVERYONE it seemed was in tears (yes, myself included). It was crazy seeing so much pain coming out in that room as people finally let out what was REALLY going on in their life and stopped playing perfect. The results were amazing: bullies were BEGGING for the mic to apologize, former friends were making up, and everyone was ready to make big changes. While this may seem like a long post this hardly summarizes the day. I'll write more on this later, but in the meantime out the Challenge Day site. Just know it was amazing, and we'd love to see this event come to Oostburg someday.