Our Mission Explore Weekend in Edinburgh has just finished: it’s been an action packed weekend, full of God moving in and through us all. We spent time in God’s presence, worshipping, praying for each other, washing each other’s feet, listening to God, eating together, doing evangelism, eating together and sleeping on church floors – all in a weekend with a bunch of youth going for it with God!

 

On Saturday afternoon we were out on the streets doing evangelism. We had four different groups: one group was asking people to join our chalk street art project and draw or write down their biggest dream, another group was handing out treats and bible verses, another group was playing the swap game (which is a game where you start out with a pen and go up to somebody to ask them if they want to swap the pen for something of higher value, they might give you a different item, which you then try to swap with somebody else. Once you have something nice you pray about who God wants you to give it to and then you go and find them and bless them). And the last group was giving out Gospel bracelets (a Gospel bracelet is a bracelet with differently coloured beads which represents different parts of the Gospel story).

We have lots of testimonies from the time of evangelism, but here is one: One of the groups that were giving out bracelets got talking to a couple about what their dreams were. To begin with the man said his biggest dream was to be happy, but as they dug a bit deeper, it came out he had problems with anger and that he dreamt of being free. They spent a long time talking to this couple and, using the Gospel bracelet, they got to share the Gospel story and got to pray for both the man and his wife who were very thankful.

On Saturday morning we asked God for an increased passion for Jesus and boldness to take risks with Him.

In the evenings we had time to worship and listen to God together, and to talk some about who God is. Here are some of the things the youth took away:

‘I connected with God when I was drawing. I had lots of pictures in my mind as I was listening to the songs.’

‘God speaks in different ways and I can hear from him’

‘I was given an encouraging prophetic word, about how God sees me’

‘God has a plan for me, even when there seems to be no way; he still has a plan for me’

‘I was inspired by the outreaches and the opportunity to step out of my comfort zone’

‘I made new friends’

‘There was such a sense of family’

After an intense weekend we are all tired but also very thankful for all God did.