Ministry & Youth: PYV 2018 Summer Camp – Day Five (New Year’s Eve)

Well, it’s certainly been a long day at camp today, and it’s been a great day. Again we began with a good breakfast and again while the study groups were meeting, the pastoral care team met to pray together.

Our worship session today focussed our thoughts on the resurrection of Jesus. Toby spoke clearly and powerfully about the resurrection of Jesus and the importance of this for our lives today. Earlier in our service I had the chance to speak about the experience of God not answering a prayer and how we cope with that. God is sovereign and that means that sometimes he chooses to answer a prayer in a way that is very different to the way I would want him to answer. How do we cope with an unanswered prayer, particularly when it relates to the death of someone we’ve been praying for? Toby brought us back to the resurrection. It is the resurrection that helps us to deal with grief. It is the resurrection that brings certainty to an uncertain world.

After lunch we had another round of our workshops. Good to have a second chance to talk through some of these issues with the campers. In time, we might have a recording of these available at our website – www.pyv.org.au – and we’d encourage you to listen to these as well.

Duan and Natasha leading a workshop

After a bit of free time, people changed into their costumes for our Summer Camp Photo. I love the colour that is seen in these costumes. We enjoyed dinner in the costumes and enjoyed some more good food.

New Year’s Eve is always a key moment at PYV Summer Camps. In past years we’ve had loud music and dance. Last year we decided it was time for a change and again this year we did something different. This year it was “The Amazing Race”. It was long and it was amazing.