Last month our children and youth traveled for a week to Passport Kids and Passport Missions respectively. While some of us have heard from them about camp already, I thought to share with the whole Mount Hermon community, walking through the Biblical themes they learned and put into practice. Perhaps we as adults can be refreshed to practice these themes with them.
The verses of the week were as follows: “Stay awake, stand firm in your faith, be brave, be strong. Everything should be done in love.” 1 Corinthians 16:13-14 (Common English Bible) These exhortations were broken up into four parts.
1) Stay awake. Our God is working in the world, sometimes in unexpected ways. Like Samuel hearing the call of God (1 Samuel 3), we must stay awake and listen for the call of God on our lives.
2) Stand firm in your faith. Our culture, politics, moral apathy, and even other Christians sometimes, can pressure us to compromise our faith. We heed the words of Paul given to the young church to grow strong and stand firm (cf. Colossians 2:7).
3) Be brave, be strong. It is easy for anyone to make decisions our of fear over what might happen. God tells Joshua to be strong and brave in the face of anything, for God is with him (Joshua 1). God is with us too, and so we all can be brave.
4) Everything should be done in love. God’s perfect love drives out fear (cf.1 John 4:18). When we discover fear in ourselves or others, our first response should be in God’s perfect love.
In putting these four challenges into practice, the youth went to mission sites every afternoon. In addition, both the children and youth learned about a refugee crisis in Africa, the country of Uganda that answered the call to care for over one million refugees, and a Christian organization (refugeandhope.org) that is transforming their lives in God’s perfect love.
Refugees have become a central issue across the world, even in this country.
Are we listening to what God is saying to us about them? Are we standing firm in what our faith calls us to do? Are we being brave, knowing God is with us? Are we responding to God’s perfect love? Our young ones demonstrated these qualities throughout the camp. May we continue to guide them in their young faith.
In Christ,
Pastor Rich