God seen to move among teens at retreats

By Rachel L. Toalson
Staff Writer
Something happens at Midwinter retreats each year.
Somewhere between the worship team, the group leaders and the quiet, God moves.
“The young people who leave on this retreat are not the same young people who return to their families, to their school lives, to the life they once knew,” said Christ Bistline, dean of the second 2008 Midwinter session Feb. 1-3 at Mount Wesley Conference Center, Kerrville.
“Something happens at our Midwinter retreats that affirm God is at work in a mighty and powerful way transforming hearts and lives into becoming disciples of Jesus Christ.”
The Council on Youth Ministries sponsors six Midwinter retreats each year—three for senior high school students, three for junior high school students.
The Feb. 1-3 Midwinter for senior high students had a “great response,” said the Rev. Rusty Freeman, youth ministries director. More than 200 high school students attended.
Bistline said very few attendees were first-timers. Most had been coming for many, many years.
Kelsye Mire, a director at the Feb. 1-3 session, said the Big Card response was overwhelming. Leaders pass out the cards at the end of each retreat to evaluate where youths are in their spiritual journey and to let students say how they felt God moving during the weekend.
The Saturday night worship “really shows what God is doing through the weekend,” Mire said.
Midwinters give students an “outlet to escape the confines of their high school stereotypes” and offer participants a chance to have fellowship with other students with like minds, she said.
“It’s a place to meet with Christ in a real way, right where you are in life, and just be open to what he has to say,” Mire said. “The facilitators of the camp pour themselves into making the camp theological and seeking God’s truth and heart in the way they present Christianity.
“I have seen kids changed from the inside, and the way it shines through their actions is a beautiful truth of the power of our God.”
Amy Howell, another director at the Feb. 1-3 session, said participants, both youths and adults, experienced God in a “whole new way.”
This year’s Midwinter theme was “It’s All Good.” The words related to God’s love and grace being available to everyone through the sacrifice, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Amy Maletta, a high school sophomore who plans to apply to be a servant leader for conference youth camps when she is old enough, said Midwinters started her on a “spiritual journey with God” in sixth grade and have offered ways to “reconnect with God” every year she’s gone.
“It is very powerful, and God truly works wonders in the young people who go,” Maletta said. “The experience is absolutely amazing, and it is even more amazing sharing it with people who are there for the same reason—to grow in our relationship with God.”
All Midwinter retreats are about “stirring up a next generation with a fire for knowing and exploring the truth, for experiencing God and for engaging their communities with service and love,” Freeman said.
Howell said, “Midwinter is such a unique and amazing opportunity for us to grow closer in, or begin, our walk with God. There is something so powerful about 48 hours to focus on God, without all the usual distractions. You walk away from Midwinter with a better understanding, not only of who God is, but also who he is calling us to be.”
“There is nothing like being in worship with students deep in worship, surrounded by friends and the presence of the Lord…where people are set free from sin and empowered to return to their churches not only changed but sparked with a renewed sense of purpose and mission.”