CentriFuge

I'm back!!! I have been absent from Blogger for about two weeks, and I'm sorry to all my dedicated fans! Lol. I've been doing lots of fun stuff- I went to CentriFuge in North Carolina two weeks ago and last week I was at Lake Gaston with my church staff retreat. Both of these events deserve their own posts, so this one will just focus on CentriFuge. Let's catch up!

CentriFuge is a camp that focuses on personal growth with Jesus Christ. Fuge also hosts MFuge, which is missions, and XFuge, which is a combination of both. This was my first Fuge event, and I really hope to participate in MFuge at some point. Sydni and Daniel got to go to Nashville, Tennessee on MFuge with Dana's church, and it was a wonderful experience for them.

Back when my dad was a youth pastor in Ohio, he took his youth on various Fuge adventures, and I always looked forward to being able to go on one when I was old enough. Well, it finally happened, even if it was a little differently that I expected. I went with my dad's church from Chester, and I was a little nervous. His church is great, and I really love it there, and his youth group is awesome too, but I have always been a little uncomfortable. There was a strong dividing line between "the cool kids" and the "not so popular kids" in the youth group. It was my families turn to be the "new kids", and after being a prominent part of my youth group from PCC for the past couple years, it wasn't something I was all that used to. My dad has been at Chester Baptist for about a year and a half now and I still felt like a bit of an outsider. My sibs and I usually ended up hanging out with each other at any events we attended, and even though we would talk to the other kids and have a good time, it still felt kind of awkward. Basically, we didn't feel very welcomed. A couple of the girls from the youth group were really awesome and it was fun hanging out with them, but the overall feel wasn't very hopeful. Even after spending time with these kids at various events, I didn't really have the desire to get closer to them. This was mostly because some of them angered me, because I looked at them and all I saw was Fake, with a capital "F". They came to church and youth group, but didn't really want to be there. I could see it in how they acted and spoke. I just knew their lives outside of church would not be pleasing to God. I am not judging, because I know that I do some less-than-pleasing things, but I do try. I could tell some of these girls just didn't want to be anywhere near the church.

CentriFuge pretty much changed my entire perspective. We were going to be staying in two rooms with these girls, and I was pretty nervous, but I thought I would give them a chance. I thought that they didn't like my sisters and I that much, because they had never really made it a priority to make us feel welcome. God set all of our priorities straight that week!

Happy Llama, Angry Llama, Crazy Llama, Dead Llama, Retarded Llama!

I had the best camp experiences ever that week, and there is no doubt in my mind that those girls had something to do with it. Their were nine of us in all, plus Dana and Jewel, our chaperone's. Sydni and Sarah shared a room with the girls in the above picture, the girls below were my roommates!

The girls I shared a room with weren't very close with the other girls in our group, and I'm glad I got the chance to get to know them better. Relationships started between these three girls and the girls in the other room. The gap between the "more popular" crowd and the "less popular" crowd lessened a little.

I'm sure now that all we needed was a chance to get to know each other better. We all opened our hearts to each other, and stayed up pretty late while doing it! God worked in all of our hearts that week, and quite a few tears were shed. A couple of us got a slap in the face from God and realized that He had a certain path he wanted us to take. The speaker we had was awesome, Nic-I-can't-remember-his-last-name. He was young, hilarious, and really knew how to hit us hard. God really used him to speak to me and his message's were great. The music was less than stellar, but towards the end of the week I was really able to have a true worship experience. We learned about the Roma people and how desperately they need people to come share Christ with them and show them love. God set my sister Sydni's heart on fire for the Roma people, and she is now planning on going to Poland next summer.

The Z on my hand stands for baby Zachariah, a little boy living in Poland. His parents have had two children before him that both died of a lung disease. Zachariah is battling the same disease. We all prayed for him, and I am continuing to pray for him. Then we all raised our hands with the Z's and they took a picture, to send to his parents.

The majority of the week was spent trekking up Rec Hill! Seriously though, this hill was so incredibly ridiculous, you don't even know. It was so boosie. It was about a mile long hill that wound through the mountains, (because that's where Ridgecrest is-the mountains!) Everybody had to walk it at least twice a day, for Recreation. You did Rec with your devotion group, which was represented by a country. Mine was Burkina Fasos, (yeah, I know, I had never heard of it either.) Man, were we awesome! Each country had to come up with a cheer everyday to try and win a cheer chicken and the Spirit Cup. You got the Spirit Cup if your team represented Teamwork, Unity, and Encouragement! We won it twice, and a cheer chicken once!!! We were seriously awesome. My leader's name was Cat, and she was sweet. On Friday, we had the ultimate team thing- MEGARELAY. You get to put on face-paint and go crazy and cheer yourself hoarse in this spectacular event. (The pictures are from after the fact.) All the teams gather and compete in various different relays, and Burkina Fasos placed third in our heat! We were amazing.

Now the other main part of our week was Tracks. We picked two tracks, for the first part of the week, unless you had a four day one, then two more for the last part of the week. My A track was a four-dayer, Christian Leadership. I loved it. I'm a leader in my youth group, and I really want to grow into a better leader not only at church, but at school and in normal life as well. My favorite part was probably learning about leaders in the bible and how exactly they led, and how we can be like them. We learned that in being a leader, the most important part is service. The most influential leader of all time- Jesus- came to earth to be a servant. That was how he lead, and that is how we should lead as well. My other tracks were outdoor games and Witnessing. I got to do witnessing with my younger brother Daniel, and it was great. He really has a heart for God, and I know he wants to be an example to his friends and witness to them about Jesus and his love. That class was really good for me because it confirmed my need to share God's love to my friends this year and just be a light.

It was an awesome week. I met a lot of cool people, made some new relationships and made some old ones stronger, and became closer to God. It helps that I had a ton of fun doing it! Two of the kids in my dad's youth group accepted Christ, and a lot of others realized the calling that God has for them. I feel as strong as ever in my faith and my desire to know God more continues to grow. Only one word can explain this week- It was so BOOSIE!

We had to get a group shot that Sarah was actually in, our little photographer! So we set it on the table!