One of the many reasons I love my church, Loon Mountain Ministry (LMM), is our partnership with SFC. This past weekend we had the opportunity to put on a skiing and snowboarding camp at our local ski area, Loon Mountain. The camp kicked off Friday night with games, snacks, and the re-watching of last year’s SFC camp edit. In addition, one of our interns, Emmett, shared his testimony with the kids.
On Saturday, we spent the day riding from 9am to 4pm. We were blessed to have ample coaches to break up into groups depending on skill level and preferred trail terrain. At noon, we met up for lunch and then returned back to the slopes. During the afternoon shred session, each group stopped at different parts of the mountain and the coaches shared an SFC Weekly Winter Word (WWW) with their kids. That evening, we played some games, watched Serious Fun Volume 5, and viewed the rough edit from that day’s riding. We ended the night on a more serious note with worship and a lesson by Nathan focusing on John 5:24 and God’s plan for salvation through Jesus, ending the night in small discussion groups after the lesson. During the small group time, we talked about what can prevent us or discourage us from truly believing in Christ, following Him, and being a light to others.
On Sunday morning, we rode from 9am to 3:30pm. Each of the groups was assigned one to three chairlifts and was in charge of delivering bags of cookies to all the lifties with notes telling them about LMM and that Jesus loves them. We like to call this tradition “Love a lifty”. Each lifty we gave cookies was extremely grateful; some gave our kids hugs, and some even took a selfie with them. It was awesome to witness the joy shared during this exchange. At 11:30, we headed up to the mountain top church service to worship and hear a lesson by Marcus. After service, we had lunch and went back out riding, stopping mid afternoon to share an SFC WWW with the kids as we did on Saturday. The day ended with free swag for all participants, many which were donated by local ski shops, and the viewing of the rough cut edit of Saturday for all the parents to see.
The weekend was a blast. There were a few moments of disorganization, but I was reminded when I took my girls to the bird sanctuary that God had provided all that was needed for the weekend and I needed not to worry about any loose strings. Matthew 6:26-27 says, “Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” God completely provided us with everything for our SFC shred camp, to Him be the glory for it all, and to Him be our gratitude for His control over it.
By Eunice Bartlett
