The Theme Night Experience

Monday night’s theme night was an extraordinary experience.  Boom Goes the Dynamite was in charge of the night, and they had excellent execution.  The “hype” was dancing to the hit song “Apache” and using John Bonnett as the lyrical parody of “jump on it”. Next they perfomed a game/skit which was loosly based on the Who’s line is it Anyway game “whose at the party?  This skit was instead who’s on project?  Four students played the roles of four movie characters interacting with each other, and a couple students were selected from the crowd to guess their characters.  The team chose to portray Gandalf the Grey, Dori from Finding Nemo, Buddy the Elf, and Repunsel from Tangled.

In addition to the team’s great performances, Eric Lonergan spoke a great message about God the sanctifier.  I was really impacted by how he talked about us not focusing on what we should do, but instead focus on what we will become.  Sanctification is a confusing process, and I think that the talk was very contrary to my thoughts: we do not earn sanctification.

Sundays Mornings

Life training, team time, and church are all scrunched into the morning. Life training is a series of talks given by Charlie Brooks (check out the links online).  It focuses on important parts of our walk with Christ.  This morning all about knew the will of God.  I was really impacted by the misconceptions I have often had about God’s will.  In 1 Thessalonians 4:3, we learn that God’s will is our sanctification.  God is ultimately less concerned with what we will be doing, and more concerned with who we will become.

Team time was important for my team; boom goes the dynamite, this week.  We are responsible for planning the theme night, choosing the project meals, and planning the project social.  I wish I could go into more detail, but most of these things are surprises.

Project is split between three churches: Pine Drive, Garden City Chapel, and Garden City Baptist.  I attend Pine Drive, pastured by Okey Landers.  It is a small church, but Okey preaches the Gospel.  We are currently in three weeks in a series on Ruth.  It is amazing to see the faith demonstrated by Ruth—I find Okey’s sermons increasingly insightful.

Fun Fact:

Sunday is the only day where we are not expected to study a passage.  Instead it is encouraged that we memorize one of the passages studied during the week.

Sunrise Prayers

This past Friday morning at 5:30, there was an optional sunrise prayer.  A bold group of students courageously abandoned sleep and dragged themselves out of bed to witness the awesome colorations of an indescribable sunrise as they gathered together to speak to their creator.  For just over half an hour, we split into groups to pray over the ideas mentioned in three separate passages. After this intentional time with each other before the Lord, the majority of students slipped quietly back into bed to catch a short nap before bible study training at 9:00.

Fun Fact:

Every week a different prayer focus is chosen.  This past week we prayed for the Cross Cultural Project (the CCP team).  This is another project offered by campus outreach where the team goes over to India for a month to the ends of spreading the Gospel on a college campus internationally.  The CCP team will be coming down to South Carolina and stay with us for about a week before they head off to India (this will be a fun week).

Other Happenings...

The weather has been strange this past week – a lot of rain, some cool days, some extremely humid days, and a couple days of “perfect weather.”  It was definitely a week of thankfulness for the large tent in the hotel lawn, air conditioners, and sweatshirts!  

On Friday, the weather was finally nice enough to take the Project picture.  This picture is used on promotional materials and is, as you’d expect, a picture of all Project participants and staff.  Group pictures are also taken of the participants from each campus (Michigan State, the University of Minnesota, St. Thomas, Augsburg, and South Dakota State respectively).

Fun Fact:

“Getting in the Word” is the lingo commonly used among Campus Outreach students and staff to refer to studying the Bible.

Group Dates: the Social Means of Meeting Other Genders

Wednesday nights are free nights, but most male rooms take advantage of this opportunity to ask a female room on a group date.  The “ask” is of vital importance to securing a group date.  Brownie points are awarded for creativity.  The servant guy room, composed of 7 men, asked both the leader girls and the servant girls room through the musical rendition of “Group Date Maybe” (a fully committed parody of the pop song “Call Me Maybe”).  Other rooms opted for less dramatic means, such as poetry and note writing. After securing the attendance of our female counterparts, a room must follow through with a planned date.  Ideas vary as much as creativity allows, and group dates always successfully help the guys get to know some gals (and vice-versa).

What about people who are in relationships?

A group date is not comparable to a one-on-one date.  It is merely a social gathering of two rooms planned in advance.  It is an opportunity for guys and girls to mingle, not a match making system.  Therefore, those already in a relationship are free to enjoy the evening—it is merely a get together.

What is a D-Group?

Every Tuesday night at 8:00, each of the rooms split off into discipleship groups (D-Groups).  This is a time where each room spends time under their room leader studying scriptures, updating each other on their lives, and being invested in as people.  The first D-Group was a time for each member to share their testimony, and it is always a pleasure to hear of how Christ has changed the lives of others. The purpose of D-Groups is to set aside time to allow the room leaders to intentionally invest in the lives of their room.  It is one of projects greatest blessings for first time students, and it is one of the times of largest growth for the room leaders, as they realize their failures to lead well.  This is one of my favorite things about project.

Fun Fact:

In addition to normal rooms, there is also a room of “servant guys” and a room of “servant girls”.  These rooms are responsible for helping the success of project’s logistical matters.  These rooms help to “grease the system” and allow room leaders, team leaders, and the project directors to spend more time investing in others, and less time focusing on little things.

The Ultimate Guy Night

Last Sunday night the guys split apart from the girls and played ultimate Frisbee—this was a good way to release some energy and enjoy friendly competition.  We were split into four teams, and each team was able to play another team once.  My team had the outstanding record of 0 wins, 3 loses.  Although, I think that the teams were a little stacked (I can’t think of any other reason). After the games, Charlie Brooks gave us a talk about how we, as sinners, try to find comfort, significance, and satisfaction in things that ultimately cannot fulfill us.  We then split into rooms and talked about what these things were in our life, and how we might go about seeking these things in God.  I am constantly amazed by the openness and vulnerability that my room, as men, has with each other.  Things are shared that my upbringing would tell me to not speak about.  Project is a great opportunity for all of us to go beyond our comforts, and see ourselves for what we truly are, sinners.

Fun Fact:

Our time here in Garden City, SC has faced many rainy days.  When I asked a local about it, I found out that they don’t even consider this summer yet; it is still spring weather.  He talked about how he was sure that by the time summer came; everyone would be ready for it.  When will summer become a part of our training project?

Saturdays

Athletes in training (AIT) are the only students who are required to wake up early on Saturday, they have to be somewhere for their workout by 8:00 am.  The rest of the students are free to do with their morning as they please.  Some students get up early to study the bible, catch some morning sun, or go out on a run; other students like to use the time for much needed rest—the week can be draining and sleeping in is considered a blessing.  Then it is off to work in the afternoons. Fun Fact:

Project is divided into three teams to help students to get to know each other.  The teams have quirky names. This summer, the team names are: Boom Goes the Dynamite, We Are Who We Are, and The Outsiders.  Each week a different team is put in charge of organizing the social, starting off theme night, choosing project meals, and choosing a prayer focus for the week.

Tonight was Bigger and Better

For the project social tonight we played the game bigger and better.  Every guy room was teamed up with a girl room, and we dispersed into the city armed with nothing more than a paper clip.  Our objective was simple: trade up.  We were to find something bigger and better than the paper clip, and keep moving to try to gain the biggest and best thing of all.  There was even a list of bonus items that project could use for this summer: some Christmas lights, bicycles, lawn chairs, surfboards, refrigerators, and the ever-desired golf cart.

It really is curious to see what groups end up with.  People end up just handing over their junk instead of trading with you, so between all of the groups there was a great pile of interesting items ‘donated’.  Among the spoils were many lawn chairs, two refrigerators, a futon, countless Christmas lights, a basketball hoop, light saber toys, and not only a bicycle, but also even a tricycle.  Not a bad haul for one nights work. Let’s just say that the project students successfully convinced pack rats to lighten their load.

-Michael Urch

When do we start work?

Parents, I come baring good news.  The majority of students already began working on Monday.  I am placed with a large group of students at Wal-Mart.  In addition students have jobs at Piggly Wiggly (a grocery store) and McDonalds.  Most students will be working around 40 hours for the duration of STP.

What is known?

This year’s theme is known, which is taken from John 1:18: “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known”.  This summer is all about getting to know God through knowing Christ. Monday night is listed on the schedule as theme night.  We all scrunch into cars, and head over to Pine Drive, a church only a few miles from the Garden City Inn.  When we get there the evening starts out with some silliness.  The room leaders performed the well-known Y.M.C.A. song and dance, told funny stories, and other assorted things to “hype” everyone up.

After the period of silliness, there came a time of seriousness.  Linda Sandager came up front and shared a portion of her testimony.  Then Eric Lonergan spoke to us about “Yahweh”, the name of the LORD (this talk should be available online shortly for those who would like to hear it).  It was a great message speaking to the profoundness found in God’s name, that he is who he is.  If you are taking the time to read this blog, you should think about checking it out.

Memorize, Meditate, and Apply

The bible study training this week was about applying biblical truths to our lives.  Michael Wikenheizer (Wiki) has been leading bible study training in place of Matt Reagan since the staff left.  In order to really talk about applying scripture, Wiki mentioned first focused on the importance of memorizing and meditating on scripture. Application is difficult because we want to focus on internal application, and not just external application.  For example, the concern is not so much being able to show patience toward others, rather we want to have an attitude and mindset of patience.  The hope is to not be constantly thinking “patience…patience”; instead we want to have an attitude so focused on patience that our outward patience is only a manifestation of an inward reality.  We don’t want our patience to be a façade—we want to be truly patient.

Therefore, memorizing and meditating on scripture are important in the application.  In order to allow our hearts and inward sinfulness to be changed by the sacrifice of Christ (apply scriptural truths), we have to meditate on scripture.  In order to meditate on scripture, truly chew every morsel of truth from the bible’s pages, we have to memorize scripture.  These things are all related, and all important.

Parents Packets

We have posted the parents packets for the 2012 Summer Training Project on our Parents Page. If you have questions about project or want to know more information about parents weekend (June 15-17), then you should download the parents packet.

If your child attends Bethel University, Northwestern College, or University of Sioux Falls: Download the 2012 STP North Project Parents Packet here

If your child attends University of St. Thomas, University of Minnesota, South Dakota State, or Michigan State: Download the 2012 STP South Project Parents Packet here