I have a minute....

Ok, So I have a minute, and I wanted to type about my most current events. Anyone heard of AWANA Youth Ministries? *CRICKETS* Check them out, definitely. So I have been involved off and on with AWANA since I was in 3rd Grade. I say off and on because I did my 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade years, but skipped 6th grade because I went to a private school and thought I would be too busy. I now wish I had found and attended the church I am about to graduate from that year, but I didn't until 7th grade. I think it would have been an encouragement to me, because 6th grade was tough. Trust me, even private schools have bad peer pressure, and I am thankful my parents pulled me out when they did, even though at the time I was rebellious and wanted to stay in. I have never been in such an atmosphere of good peer pressure as at this church program. We all are Christians, but we have different convictions in our families. Despite this we don't pressure each other to not keep our convictions. In fact, we encourage each other to keep our convictions even if they aren't our own....Ok, that wasn't the reason I wanted to blog....So as I was saying, I am involved in a wonderful church for this program, now in my last year of 24/7 Journey, the High School program. I knew almost nothing about this church when I started attending, and wasn't aware that they were very competitive in the yearly Quiz and Games. Needless to say, I don't remember anything about 7th grade, except that the games team I was on won 3rd, while our other games team won 1st. This church has a long history of excellence in Q&G. I am proud that I have been able to help keep that record of excellence. Along with my team of course! I could never do it without them. Since I joined the High School program, we have won 2nd in games every year we have been able to attend (which was only 3, instead of 4, but you have to have a minimum of 5 girls and boys, and we didn't enough girls last year. Actually we didn't have enough girls this year, but we were able to find another church to pair up with for State, and we did very well for not having practiced together but one event on the day of the games.) and I have been on a 2nd place quiz team (with 3 others), a 1st place quiz team (with the same team as the year before, minus the senior that graduated) and just this past State wide event, yet another 1st place quiz team (this time me the senior, with 2 younger, who happened to be siblings.) I would have to say this program has been the highlight of my high school career. I strongly encourage any high school (and Jr. High, not to mention younger, for they start in at age 3, I believe, at some churches, though many only offer the K-12 program) to look into and find a church in your area who does AWANA. You have fun, you learn scripture, you make friends, you study God's Word, and you are able to compete in an uplifting environment, even going up to Nationals if your church has enough interest and funds. I have never had the privilege to go to Nationals (known as SUMMIT) but I know people who have, and they say it was lots of fun, and competitive at the same time. The Quiz is grueling mentally, you are stretched to your limit, but the rush of answering the questions, working with your teammates, encouraging when they get a question wrong, them encouraging you in a similar situation. The pats on the back and hugs from your coaches, other teammates, parents, and even strangers from other churches, no matter what place you get. It is all worth it. All the studying, the pressure, even the caffeine withdrawal (which I: 1) shouldn't have to deal with at my age, don't get addicted to caffeine. 2)Which I AMAZINGLY didn't have, even though I didn't have ANY until 5-6 PM, at our celebration dinner, and I had woken up at 5:30. All I can figure is adrenaline rush...ALL DAY. Miracle I tell you.)  Then there is games. I am not athletic. Anyone could look at me and tell you that. I have just now started to seriously do some physical training, like running and such. In games, you run in circles, you throw stuff at each other, you pull each other around with ropes, you grab stuff (ok, I am making this sound kinda rough, it's a little more organized then what it sounds like.) You do run in a circle, up to 8 times in a single race (that's the most, and you only have to do it once (THANK GOD) It's called the Marathon, and I've done it once. I almost died. As it was I felt sick for the rest of the afternoon. My coach kept asking me if I was going to throw up yet.....fortunately I never did..) My personal favorite is the Basketball Relay, which means you have one person in the middle of the circle, with 4 other people on the outside of the circle (which is about 10-15 feet across) and you have to do chest and then bounce passes to each person, before running 'in' to hit the center pin (which are bowling pins basically, each color coated 1 of 4 different colors: Red, Blue, Green or Yellow. In High School, they only do 3 teams per circle though) You do a girl round, a guy round, and then a team round, which has a guy in the center, with girl, guy, girl, guy, girl, guy, girl, guy, girl, on the outside of the circle. That's my favorite part, because we do the SCOOCH, which means after we do our chest pass, we all turn sideways and scoot as close to each other as possible, and then on the way back, we 'unfold' as it is called, and do our bounce pass. Unfortunately, they don't allow the scooch anymore, and when we did it on our first team (and we did it SOOOO beautifully) they disqualified us from that game. :'( Well I won't go into every even on this post, cuz I have to go do other stuff now, but I think I will do more explanations later. I just want to close out with the Citation Achievement. This is based on the handbooks you do every year from 3rd-12th grade. If you complete the 10 books for those years, you are a Citation Achiever. Something they do at the State Wide, and at SUMMIT, is have a Citation Achievers Award Ceremony, which means the Seniors who have finished, or are about to finish that year, 10 AWANA books, are going to receive their Citation Award that year. So the Missionaries in charge of AWANA Youth Ministries (LET"S HAVE SOME APPLAUSE PEOPLE, they are a dedicated group of people, who love the kids, the program, and Christ with all their hearts, and I found out why churches have to register the kids, so the missionaries can personally pray for you throughout your AWANA years.) decided they wanted to show everyone at the events what these talented young men and woman have done. For that reason, they have the Citation Achievers Award Ceremony. You get to go up on stage, have pictures (which you sent in) put up on a screen, shake the hands of all the Missionaries, have your picture taken holding a Citation Award with the Head Missionary (I THINK), and then walk off the stage to go back to your seat. I must say, because I missed my 6th grade year, and some other complications, I thought I would never achieve the Citation Award. But through God's grace, and the encouragement of my leaders and fellow students I am going to make it. (Told you it was good peer pressure, by encouragement, I mean they are telling me that I can memorize those last 50 verses. That they know I can do it. They have seen me do similar things for quiz. And they are doing the same thing with me. I think almost every single senior in my church is doing catch up work, and we are all rooting for each other. We walked up on stage and told everybody we were going to do it, so we ARE going to do it, and we will go up on stage together at the end of the year and be able to say "WE DID IT TOGETHER!!". I don't want to go up on stage by myself for that award. I want the rest of my year up there with me. They are my friends whom I have come to know, and, as a sister in Christ, love. We are the family of our 24/7 group, and if one of us doesn't accomplish his task, the others of us mourn it with him.)

Ok, I really went overboard on that, but I have so much I want to share about AWANA. I love this program, and I would actually love to be involved as a leader. I would love to do it at the church I attended, but because we are moving, and we aren't church members there, I can't. But here's a twist. I am considering going over to Japan one day, because I love the language, and I really want to see the country and the people. Plus I really feel drawn to them after seeing the results of the earthquake last year. There are AWANA programs over in Japan. I would love to go over to Japan, and as my ministry while I am still single I would love to be involved in the program over there. (because when I marry, my ministry will be my husband and children, being hospitable with my home, and creating an uplifting, learning, God-centered environment. I may sound like I have this all figured out, but I don't. Actually I am wrestling with my next step right now. I am confused, and asking God to daily show me his plan for the next year, month, week, day and hour.)

OK, I think I have exhausted you for the time being, so I will just give you some pics of the Basketball Relay, and say Good Night, because I have a busy day tomorrow, and I am sure you do too.

~Woo

(PS: If you know me, and want to know where I go to AWANA, or are interested in going with me this year, please let me know by commenting. Oh, and just a reminder, please, if you want your comment to be published, and you know me, or by chance, you know someone in the pictures, PLEASE DO NOT use real names in the comments. I want to keep my blog anonymous. I do have comment moderation on, so a comment will not be published if I think it may cause a problem. For that reason, if you want to get a hold of me, you can leave me information in the comments, and I will not publish ANY personal info without your express permission. Thank You.

~W)