What?! 90 Teens, Fruit, and Adoration!

Hello, it's Shayla from Team Five-Alive. We've had another great week of ministry. We had a successful Edge night that still attracted a large number of young teens. We also attended the Confirmation of the teens that we did the Confirmation retreat for. And finally, we had an open Lifenight on the Eucharist.

Edge was full of so much energy once again, but this time it was more controlled. Our location was changed to St. John's High School in Perth from the Elementary school. That made a huge difference for us because we were able to set up a microphone. Those things work wonders when you have 90 energetic young people. This night was on a call to holiness and Sainthood. Basically the teens learned about the saints, and how they too can all be saints. I had two highlights from that night that put a huge smile on my face. The first was when the young teens started to cheer for Jesus in a slideshow that we had. We had made a slideshow of a whole bunch of Saints and just really holy people. We showed it to them at the beginning of the night, and again at the end, but at the end we took pictures of them and added it to the slideshow. As they were intently watching the screen, Jesus's picture came up, and the teens broke out into a huge cheer! That touched my heart so much. The second highlight was when I was teaching them the songs 'Just Like You' and 'Shine Like the Son'. The teens got so into it. I've never experienced such enthusiasm for singing like they did. I remember at the end of 'Shine Like the Son', I encouraged them to sing their hearts out...and they did. They sang at the top of their lungs. What added to this was when i was done teaching, some of the teens came up to me and were asking if we could do just one more song. As music leader, those moments are so uplifting.

Sunday was another special day for us. We went to a Confirmation in Lanark. The Bishop was there and all the teens that we did a Confirmation Encounter Day for. They were so excited to see us there. It was cute because I saw a huddle of them talking and they were looking at us saying, "Look! There's the NET team!". The beauty of a Parish team is that you get to see the fruits of your ministry.

This Sunday we had an intense Lifenight. It was on the Eucharist. For this Lifenight we decided to have it open to the community. We had a pretty decent response from the adults. They came out and participated with the night. I think they really enjoyed it, and were happy that they were able to see what was being done with the youth. It was also an opportunity for the community to see the importance and beauty of the Eucharist. The best part was Adoration. There was such an air or reverence among the teens and adults during Adoratoin, and they all participated with singing...it was just beautiful. That's the only word that can really describe it. I hope that the community will be really involved once we start up XLT (monthly Adoration) because I think they loved it.

Well, that concludes Team 5's week. We're praying for all you other teams out there.

God Bless,

Shayla