Spiritual Flexibility Required!

WRITTEN BY ALEX IELASE

Serving Jesus requires flexibility. You don’t have to be aslimber as a gymnast physically, but we must be flexiblespiritually. We must be able to handle the curveballs lifethrows at us. Sometimes God allows things in our lives to testus: to see if we will stretch, flex and still maintain Christianlove, mercy and compassion. The reality ofCOVID-19 has caused all of us to have to be flexible andadjust our expectations. This is not easy, and sometimes itmakes us downright angry. Yet God is faithful even when weare not.

The Winter Retreat at the Castle for Student Ministry isdefinitely one of the best parts of our year. Students, youthleaders, cooks—ALL OF US really look forward to this time!However, this year we decided to make an adjustmentbecause of the reality of Covid.

We didn’t want to put a bunch of people into the same place for an extended period of time in close quarters. We decided to change things up. Serving Jesus requires flexibility!

This year we decided to do a one-day event where we spent most of the time outside. We took a group of about 50 people to Boyce Park for some snow tubing and there was actually snow! The students had a great time of fun. We returned to the church building for some food, fellowship, games, and time in the Word. We played the human version of the game “Hungry Hippos,” with the winners getting Chick-Fil-A gift cards. Our other game involved a student transferring an Oreo cookie from their forehead to mouth without using their hands…talk about flexibility! We ate some pizza and wings together. Then, we looked at the story of the prodigal son in Luke’s Gospel. It was great to share of the love of God and how compassionate He is to us! All in all it was a fabulous day. I am so thankful for all of our youth leaders and how they continue to be flexible no matter what the situation has called for. God is good!