For the past few days I have been pondering the thought of the world without Jesus, can you imagine it? Well I was thinking, that although life would definitely be different, it’s not that hard to picture. For most of the people in our society and in our everyday lives, their world does not embrace the love of Jesus, the most they know about the creator is that His name is Jesus and possibly that he is the son of God. I only bring this up because it just means that as followers and disciples, knowing and studying the life of God we have to show our brothers and sisters the light and show them the glory. On the 16th to the 19th of August 2007, a group of young and upcoming leaders of Jesus Youth attended a leadership training program in Sydney, NSW. The theme for the program being ‘Only Jesus, Always Jesus and Forever Jesus’ the group of around 50-60 people were inspired and guided towards a JY lifestyle through an intensive and lively program that consisted of a variety of activities, lectures, games and music. The program was mainly based on leaning skills and techniques to spread the word of God to the rest of the world, to discover and develop personal Christian values, and to expand upon our own already existing leadership skills. It was filled with fun, learning and the Holy Spirit. On the first day of the retreat, JY members from Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and New-Zealand all met at 9.00am sharp at Elenora Heights in NSW. After a quick cup of coffee to wake us all up from the very early start, we made ourselves comfortable in our rooms, had some lunch and had our first introduction to our new family for the next 4 days. Following to our meeting and a couple of games we started with our first session with one of the two inspirational and very knowledgeable speakers, Eddie Edezhath. It was first of the many talks that we experienced through the program and honestly was a great start on our ways to developing a more Jesus centered life. The other speaker that was alternating with Eddie was Manoj Sunny, both of the lecturers that we had were both so different in the way that they conducted their hour or so or talking to us, that we were always kept on our toes learning new and interesting ideas that they willingly shared. During the four days, we not only had a taste of learning the bible and an introduction a fuller knowledge of Jesus we had touching masses, beautiful night adoration gatherings and of course amazing praise and worship sessions to keep us always in touch with the message. Throughout the time we were at the training, the Jesus Youth family that we were with were so welcoming and accepting of new members it was truly encouraging yet, at times within the stay its safe to say we all at least once stepped out of our cozy comfort zones with full hearts and minds and took a leap into what can only be described as the wellspring of wisdom to show our true leadership qualities. By the end of our journey its was sad to say the farewells yet we all new it wasn’t the last time we were to meet because we all knew that we had one thing in common- the love of Jesus and it is now our turn to spread His love. ‘And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.’ (Psalms 40:3) |  |