Merry Christmas from Encounter 2!

Ryan being epic

G’day! This Is the guest blogger Ben Walsh, for another awesome update on  Encounter 2’s life on the road.

We recently finished up a seriously awesome time in Kamloops and Kelowna in beautiful

British Columbia, kicking it off with a energy packed Youth Rally in Kamloops with over 50 youth attending the event, it was so great that by the end of the rally they were jumping up and down with excitement!

The past week or so after finishing up in BC we traveled to Winnipeg and again we were blown away by how open they were to God and a lot of the youth had experienced NET before, so it was great to see how excited they were to have NET in their town.

Our team was fortunate enough to have an awesome team day which involved seeing a live version of the nativity, along with big mascots and actors who played different parts, it was really cool and the team had a lot of fun.

Rianne and Emma baking!

Our team is now heading back to Ottawa for December retreat and our 2 week break, but thanks all for reading and catch you In the new year!

Blessings and prayers,

Ben Walsh,

 

Massive Worship/ Encounter 2

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

It is with joyful anticipation I write this blog. The smell of Christmas is in the air, probably from the CWL bake sale, and all of the youth are getting excited for the holidays! Before we bring in the new year, let's take a few minutes to reflect on our ministry here in Drayton Valley so far. I asked the team about their favorite ministry events. Here's what they had to say...

Joseph: They are all equal, but I like family Fun days and getting to know the families.
Colin: I like interacting with youth at school visits because we're hanging out with youth on their own turf.
Alex: Host home ministry. We build relationships with the families (we stay with) then we get to see them every weekend at Mass. It's really beautiful!
Rachel: We get to hang out with jr. high students at youth events and the schools and be a part of their lives.

Nic: We get to witness the slow transformation of the hearts of youth.

We're getting all packed up to go home for a few weeks. There is no doubt that this community has had just as much impact on us as we hope to have had on them.

Merry Christmas!

God Bless

Stephanie & iNFUSE 3

First Half: Finished!

First half the year: DONE! Wow, time has absolutely flown by down here in Medicine Hat! Maybe it's because since we're the sunniest place in all of Canada our Sun Dials just move faster cause we never have clouds getting in the way of it? I don't know but God is surly providing the graces to be able to do His will constantly in all that we do, even with time flying by. 

So Equip this past week has been a gong show and a half (in a really good way)! We started the evening with a Santa Clause Rely where the youth had to run around to multiple stations, doing such activities that Santa enjoys like Cookie Eating and Milk Chugging to name a few. After each activity they received a piece of clothing that Santa would fit into to fill up with balloons to make yourself look like the jolly old man. Then the rest of the team mates of the youth had to get down and be the reindeer taking Santa to the "North Pole." Good times were had by all the youth and they were very excited to see what we had planned next. 

Well, I'm sure you're interested to know what happened next right? So the grand finale was the teens got to go crazy with whip cream, candy, chocolate sauce, and a Netter. It was supposed to be a Gingerbread man/woman decorating contest but that got a little out of hand and lets just say many people found sprinkles the next day behind their ears and whip cream on their Q-Tips later that evening. Yes, our team and volunteers are amazing troopers and we say thank you for putting your hair and face on the line for the craziness we managed to come up with here in the Hat. 

With all this said, this is the last blog for 2012. We are all very excited to come back to Medicine Hat for more ministering in the new year. Thank you to all our family, friends, host homes, volunteers and community for making our first half so amazing and unforgettable. God bless you all and Merry Christmas! May it be filled with many blessing! We will be praying for you! 

From the Worlds Largest Teepee

Med Hat, AB 

Infuse 2

Matt ten-Bohmer 

Encounter 1 - Video Blog #1

Watch our First video blog here on YouTube

Time to Prepare!

Winding down to the last two weeks of ministry has had many mixed feelings before we head our separate ways for Christmas. Many are excited to be seeing family and friends while others just want to stay, to keep ministering to the amazing people of Medicine Hat. Everyone wants us over for dinner which is lots of fun and keeps the schedule jammed pack till we leave on the 17th of December (who doesn't love an amazing turkey dinner 4 times a week?! Ok, that was a bit of an over exaggeration, but our host homes do love to feed us and we say Thank You!!) Then there are those amazing Grandma's of the church, who just love leaving us 1,498,725 dozen tarts and cookies on any day to feed our youth after the nights and events (ok… that was a huge over exaggeration again but they do love making huge quantities of sweets for us! God bless their souls).

Medicine Hat has been getting ready now for the Christmas season and as the city does that we are preparing the youth for Unchained and Equip as well! This past weekend for the Unchained group we did a night on Advent given that it was December 2ed so there was no better time to talk about it! We talked about the 4 different weeks, the meaning behind it and all the ways we can prepare our own hearts for the Lord's coming at Christmas! We then finished the night with a game that Jimmy headed up. It involved 4 brave volunteers, 3 purple candles, 1 pink candle, a lighter and a couple water guns. Do I have to explain? Needless to say I (Matt ten-Bohmer) got soaked from the youth and my team mates trying to put our candles out! It was a hilarious activity that the youth and team thoroughly enjoyed! 

 

God bless you all! Happy Advent! Prepare your heart of the Lord's coming! 

Infuse 2 Med Hat, AB

Matthew ten-Bohmer





Yes, it's our photo with Santa. 

A typical office day starts at 9 am for us. We like starting our days off with team prayer, complete with music and often scripture. Most mornings include work time, where we work on our individual tasks, usually to do with upcoming events. This is where we make posters and videos, write talks and testimonies, choose games for our events and pick music for Mass. Sometimes we even squeeze in a team meeting or two.

Some afternoons allow us some creative time where we practice dramas and skits, or music for the worship band. We've now recruited some youth to play music with us! Evenings, after dinner, are when we hold most of our events. This is where all our time in the office is made worth it. For the first time this month we held a parish wide adoration event. One youth told his mother that he'd probably only stay for twenty minutes, but ended up staying the whole two hours!We plan to host another on next week.

 The exceptions to our evening events are our Family Fun days. Last week we held one with a trivia game show theme which also included Minute to Win It, and some wreath making for the..uh.. kids.

When we don't have events, usually our nights are spent in host homes, or we do whatever our host families are doing, like participating in the Christmas Parade, for example, singing carols and waving to the crowd (that's right- we were IN the parade!). Look at the wonderful float the church made!

After such busy days, there's only one thing let to do; get a good night's rest!

God Bless

Stephanie & iNFUSE 3