mission trip

Hey everyone
Just to let you know that for the last two weeks I have been participating on my mission trip to the Cowichan valley and Vancouver, and you can read all about it at the Kaleo blog.
Thanks,

Steve

a few things up

This past week we had another hunger for youth. It was again a cool time of getting to know the youth better and see God move and challenge us all. We also had a prayer time with many of the leaders and some of the youth. It was so cool to hear every praying with such openness and passion. At Godwalk on wednesday it was another goood time of hanging out and playing ridiculous games. we had a snowball fight with crumpled pieces of paper and made silly string hats! it was great! Then today we had a meeting with our church leaders to talk about the year and how everything had gone, and that was really good too.
Our India team leaves today, that scary and exciting, and our Vancouver team is having a planning meeting on Thursday so we'll konw much more about our first week after that.

boarding, Manafast, and post reading break

Alright, so, its been a busy time lately. We got back from reading break on wednesday night, had our last theology class on thursday. Friday was the Manafest concert, saturday was the youth ski day, sunday was church and much homework. Then monday started the "theology of missions" class we are currently in until friday.

So, starting with youth quake, it was awesome. Times that stand out to me are when i as a k5 got to hang out with and talk to previous kaleo-ers. we went out for supper with a bunch of them one night, and i spent a few hours into the early morning talking with some others. It was so cool to compare experiences and share memories. It helped me understand what i will go through when i leave in about 47 days.

The concert was really sweet to, first cuz he is a really talented artist! rap it up! but it was also cool to see kids from my youth group there and getting to hang out and talk with them in a differnt place than normal. (being our church).

The ski day was another sweet time of hanging out and talking. we had 5 hours on a bus in total, during which i go to hang out with some, but the best part was working wiht a few new boarders on the green hill and teaching them how to do this crazy and wonderful sport of snow boarding! it was really cool, cuz i've never had the patience to teach anyone. but i loved it a lot on saturday, so there's a cool little way God changed me in order to be able to do his work.

That roughly is what i've been up to though.

-steve

Jewel Heist!

This week in youth we played a sweet game, which attracted a huge amount of students, especially grade 7 & 8’ers. There were over 70 youth out that night and colin, one of the youth leaders lead a short devotional about treasures on earth. I’ve been finding lately that I have been getting to know more youth, but it has taken an intentional effort, and often me over coming my initial fear. After the game, the hanging out time and some clean up, the many of the leaders and a bunch of the gr 11 and 12’s went to Boston pizza. That too was a really fun and a good way to get to know people in a different way.
I missed God walk this past week due to snowcamping, which was also a good time. It was somewhat cold putting on wet socks and boots in the morning though.

This week we are leaving for our reading break, I will be attending youth quake with a bunch of Kaleo’ers and we leave at 4am on Thursday morning. It’s gona be a long bus ride, but a crazy sweet time!


But yeah, that's what has been going on with me!
Peace out!
steve

God moves, when God Chooses

Well, as the title suggests, God has been doing some sweet things in the ministries I’m involved with. Starting last Thursday at our monthly leaders meeting, and continuing since then, especially at youth on Friday, and even church on Sunday.
We have a new pastor, Shane, and having Shane and Tammy working together is amazing. Shane has come in, observed and now, we are all working together to help make necessary changes. The leaders meeting 2 issues were raised, Modeling and intentional relationships. As a Kaleo group involved in youth, there were issues we saw sometimes, but just never had the nerve/timing to bring them up. Then, on the day we were finally gona say something, God chose to speak through Shane. It is a feeling that is hard to explain, the it really the presence of God, felt by all. The term “raising the bar” held a lot of power throughout the meeting. We left feeling challenged, and also required to in turn, challenge the youth.
Friday happened, Shane went up to speak, and followed Gods calling and did not say at all what he had planned. It lead to giving the youth the opportunity to stand up, saying they were wanting something more. We got to pray with a whole bunch of them and it was such an amazing experience. I was with about 10 guys, and they were uttering truly amazing confessions, pleas… they were crying out to God, knowing they need Him to do anything. There was also some amazing discussion later on afterwards too. Again, we all say God come in and move!
Then, on Sunday, it was again about raising the bar. The challenge to the youth/young adults, that from now on, there would be a higher lever of respect during the service, specially during the speaking parts. Again, it was a neat time of us as leaders putting ourselves “out there”, speaking to leaders-the youth. (we’re all leaders really). But yeah, we were really nervous about Sunday, cuz we brought everyone to the back and just talked it out. But as much as we did not know what was going ot happen, it was because we did not know what God would do, we simply knew what he had called us to do.
I normally look forward to going to church/youth, and am now looking forward to it even more so now, as every day is a new adventure, seeing what God will do. I am excited about what is happening and loving the Greatness and Goodness of God.
I ask that you would pray that God would show as all at church what he is calling us to next and this includes the youth, young adults, youth leaders, and both Tammy and Shane! Thank you for that, and I will try to keep you updated!

God Bless

steve

Kaleo Kapers 1.0!

So, this Friday, the four kaleo guys involved in youth lead the whole night. it was a sweet time of planning before hand and i was surprised at time it took to plan the whole thing. we planned an hour-ish of games, followed by singing and then a short talk thing. Every thing came together well in the end and it was a very cool night. With the games we tried focusing in on teamwork, ppl working together and also games that would involved ppl getting to know others. we also made sure all the games had a bit of a "twist", for example, we had 4 legged races. we also played a group pictionary game where the ppl with the words ran around hiding from the teams. after games we all moved to the chapel to do some singing. we got to involve dan (not from out church) and lewis, another leader in the band, so that was really cool. the energy levels were really high which the singing difficult at first. for the devotional everyone was really attentive. as a group we brainstormed what we though might help them. i talked about reaching out of the sweet community they have and including others and just making God time a priority. it was a very new format for the youth group and so it was difficult at times, but as a group we feel it was a good thing.

As "Team Vancouver" we also did another fund raiser bottle drive and raised another $170.00.

So, thats my last week, we're in class this week and thats going well. In other news, only 16 days till we leave youth quake! woot woot!
im out!

steve

just hanging around

†This week we missed youth because we went to missions fest. It was a good time of learning about missions both around the world and locally.

Church wise we were able to help New Life by cleaning up after a ladies night. we took down all the tables and set up the chairs in the church. it was neat because they were so grateful and it was almost like we were more blessed than they were. Just because they gave us cake and praised us and thanked us, it was really cool to be able to help out in that way.

Here's an update

the time was 630
and we had just got back
from the trip up mt wash'ton
which no fun did it lack!

we had little time
and busy it was
to shower, eat and drive
to youth! (avoiding the fuzz)

youth was delightful
and it usally is
a carnival of sorts
handing out the candy "fizz"


ok, so enuf rhyming, and i mean it!
(does any one want a peanut?)

Friday was youth. it was a fundraiser, a carnival for the kids. lots of sweet games and prizes. we got there late because we had just gotten back from Mt. washington from a week of snowboarding. it was so amazing! a beautiful place filled with lots of fun and great times of hanging out!
At youth we were able to help clean up. It amazed me again how great the youth are. everyone was cleaning up and working super hard to get the church ready for sunday again! i just love getting to be a part of it!

One change in my week will be that i am going to start helping out at church on wednesdays now too. i dont know what i'll be doing but i feel called to give a little more of my time, and also i think it will help me feel more apart of the church and the youth groups. Just another way to get to know the youth!

Looking ahead, we have missions fest this comming weekend, so that should be great. we have a class on tuesday. a paper due wednesday. an a gym night on tuesday. The next friday after missions fest we as kaleo boys are in charge of the youth night, so that should be exciting too.

But im out, gota get some work done!

First week after Christmas!

So, i've been back in bc for 12 days now, and im slowly getting used to it again. We have had a Pentateuch class, gone skating, had youth and church, and done a lot of just hanging out. The class was good, but long. We did a sweet project for it too, we made a infomercial for "The Bibleland Game".
Being back has taken some getting used too, its just different being around everyone again, on the island.
Being in youth and church was so good though. Seeing all those people again was fun, and it reminded me how many people i have gotten to know through this all. In youth it was dinner and a movie so we had an italian meal and watched Ratatouille. Church today was about tithing and was also a sweet view on it.
As a kaleo group we are also all preparing for our mission trips, and as team vancouver we have a meeting coming up to learn some more about our trip. But first, tomorrow at 530 we all leave for Mt. Washington for 5 days of snowboarding and hanging out together. So im gona get ready for that!