Triennium Overview - Thoughts and Opinions

After being at Triennium for a whole week, I think I can finally assess it and give my overall thoughts and opinions about the trip!

Going into the trip, I was nervous because I am a regular Montreat-goer and did not want this to compete with Montreat. Once the first day was done, though, I think it's safe to say that this did not compare at all!! The format, style of worship, and even the college campus were HUGE differences that allowed me to separate the conferences in my mind and not compare them against each other.

As far as worships go, I thoroughly enjoyed every part of them! I loved that we did energizers at the beginning each time to really help us get pumped up. The worship band was also a cool, yet unexpected, addition to worship services. As I talked about in my Day 1 review, I am not used to having a full-on band at worship, so that was quite the surprise, but I really enjoyed it because it made singing even more exciting than it would normally be!

After singing, came the sermon which never disappointed! Each and every day the sermon and pastor kept getting better and better and Triennium really went out with a bang with the Saturday morning sermon! The Saturday morning worship was also a highlight of the trip, because with conferences like Montreat, there is typically no last morning worship to really send us off on a good note. I liked that they sent us off with something to remember and to keep fresh in our minds on the way home and weeks after. My favorite sermons of the week were Thursday's sermon by Alicia Ridgill and Saturday morning's by Perryn Rice because of how passionate they were and how much they held my attention.

The format of the days were interesting because everything was back to back. I felt like there wasn't a lot of time to just relax until after dinner, but then there were recreation events that were fun to participate in. A majority of the days would go: breakfast, delegation group, small group, lunch, worship, dinner, with only enough time in between to get to the next destination. I have mixed emotions about this because I felt like sometimes I needed a break in between, but I also liked that we had our nights to ourselves to do whatever we felt like doing. For example, my roommate went to bed at 9:30 one night just because she didn't have to stay up late for anything and took advantage of it!

Purdue's campus was not what I expected at all. It was very flat. Very, extremely, flat without a lot of tree coverage which made it nearly unbearable to walk to our small group locations. The humidity and heat was outrageous and there was only one day where it threatened to rain, but did not. The campus was great, however, for seeing other Triennium people because of how open it was! There were many times I would pass by hundreds of youth trading pins and getting to know each other and it was so cool that we were all able to make such easy friends.

Overall, I am glad I went to Triennium because I felt like my faith and friendships were strengthened during my time there. The discussions and topics we had were extremely relatable and easy to connect to. I made friends from all over the country, as far as California and Idaho, and even in our delegation group! We have already discussed hanging out together as a group and that makes my heart so happy because it proves that church camp friends don't have to stay at church camp! I also plan to take what I learned this week with me everywhere I go and to not let go of the "Jesus high" that comes with a church retreat so that I am always living as God wants me to.

The last thing I would like to say, is if you ever have the chance to go to Triennium, take it!! You will most definitely not be disappointed.

Day 4 - Friday, July 22, 2016

Today's format was quite different than the past couple of days which made for an interesting day!! To start off with, we had the morning off, so we were able to sleep in a little while and didn't have to rush to have breakfast. After breakfast, instead of going straight to delegation groups, a couple of friends and I went to the Purdue bookstore to get some merchandise to prove that we've actually been here for the week, lol! Next, there was an advocacy walk that was going on for the conference so we followed that around campus to see what types of booths they had set up.

Eventually, it got too hot to be walking around, so we headed back to the dorms to cool and dry off before lunch. After lunch, we had to head over to our delegation group location so we could start off the day's topic of doubt. A major question that was asked was, "what role does doubt play in our faith?" and just as Jesus would, we answered the question with a question. "If you don't doubt how can you truly believe?" I found that to be very accurate, because doubt strengthens our faith by keeping that constant communication with God and having to search to find the answers of our questions.

Worship was in a different setting and at a different time tonight than in past nights, since it was the last night. We had our service outside at an amphitheater because there was to be a candlelight service at the end.  The preacher was a white male and he talked a lot about privilege and he preached that he was a person that had the most privileges of everyone and that was not right. A direct quote from the sermon was, “If you haven’t had to think about the color of your skin, that is privilege,” and he basically described how wrong that was. He said that God needs ordinary people to make a difference, not anyone special, just regular people like you and me and if you turn to look, God will call you. The message of the sermon was fantastic, but the best part was after the sermon when we had a glow stick party, titled “Let My People Glow” (the bible verse of the day dealt with Moses, hence the play on words) and we basically listened and sang along with the worship band as they played fun songs and we threw glow sticks and massive white balls with glow sticks in them all around the lawn. It was a phenomenal experience and probably some of the most fun I had on the trip!

Lastly, we toned things down a little bit and got our candles, lit them, and sang songs and did a simple dance with them. Seeing over 6,000 candles lit up was such a cool experience and one that won’t soon be forgotten, and although last night’s sermon was not my favorite out of all the sermons we’d heard, worship itself was one of the best!

I’m so sad tonight is the last night, but I can’t wait for worship tomorrow to really wrap everything up!!

Day 3 - Thursday July 21, 2016

Today's theme was "Teach Me the Way I Should Go" and we had some great discussions about it. 

The format of the day was the exact same as yesterday, where we went to Delegation Groups after breakfast to open up discussion of the topic and then small group from there. The scripture passage of the day was Psalm 23.

In delegation group, we were led by one of the adults in the group, Daewon, who asked us a series of questions regarding to Psalm 23. A couple of them were "what kinds of things keep us from going in the way God leads us to go?" and "what are ways we can serve others back home?" with some wonderful answers from the youth in the group. These questions were very relatable because we all have issues in our lives that make us stray from the path God has chosen for us and there are many options for us to lead the life God wants us to live by serving others in ways like taking chances and setting examples. 

 Small groups was extremely fun because we started off by sharing Insanely Dumb Moments (IDM) with a smaller group within our small group. This lightened the mood and got us prepped for the topic of the day which we examined through stations. On one station, we wrote "Teach Me the Way I Should Go" and doodled the word "pray" around it and at another we wrote some of our sins down on a black strip of construction paper, wadded it up and threw it in the trash to symbolize how none of our sins are too great to be forgiven by God. 

After small group we made our way back to the dining hall where we had a yummy lunch and then we were ready to go to worship! Today's worship service was my favorite of the week for many reasons. For one, the songs playing before worship started were really fun to dance to and a bunch of us stood up and danced along. Second, the energizers we did, Waving Flag, On Top of the World, and Numa Numa, are some of my favorites. Third, the band played some of my absolute favorite songs which are Beautiful Things by Gungor and Your Love Never Fails by Newsboys. Lastly, the sermon by Alicia Ridgill was phenomenal and had such a powerful message I was nearly brought to tears. She told us that God will never change his mind about us even if we happen to make a mistake because he is less concerned about how we fall down as he wants to see how it is that we stand back up. God, she told us, is a FUN God. Forgiving, Understanding, and Never-too-busy. When we feel like we stand alone in the world, we are not because God always understands us since he is the one who created us. Not only was the message incredible, she also had such a passion behind her words that I and the other youth felt extremely moved and looking back, I definitely felt God's presence in that music hall. 

After worship and dinner, I went to recreation which was a massive scavenger hunt all around Purdue University's campus and I must say, it was probably the most fun I've had in awhile! We went from playing leap frog, to finding Cardboard Jesus, to making a rocket out of recycled materials and along the way we made many new friends which was extremely special to me. 

So far, I have been extremely grateful for this experience and I cannot wait to see what tomorrow has in store for us!!

Day 2 - Wednesday, July 20, 2016

Today was an exciting new day bringing fresh opportunities to find God in the world around us!

We started out with breakfast at the Earhart Dining Hall where we were able to continue bonding with the people in our group. After breakfast, we headed to our delegation group location where we would jump start the conversation of the day (delegation group is the group we came with aka the churches of New Hope Presbytery).  We read Luke 10:25-37, the story of the Good Samaritan and discussed the meaning of Jesus's words. Discussion was led through examples of times we have seen the parable of the Good Samaritan in real life as well as what we can do to be neighbors to those in need.

Right after delegation group, we all split up and headed to our separate small groups where we were able to make friends from all over the country (I met people from New York, Tennessee, and California!!) and dive into the Lord's words further. The topic for this discussion was "Stereotypes" and how they affect people. This tied into the parable of the Good Samaritan, as the priest and Levite that passed by the man who was robbed, ignored him, but the Samaritan (the lowest of the low back then) put time and effort and money into this man that he barely knew. The stereotype that a priest and Levite should be extremely Godly and help all those in need was broken since they did not help their neighbor in need. A big point my small group made is that God does not stereotype as he does not have to. We are all created by a God who loves us and there is no need for Him to classify us in groups as humans tend to do. We are all different in our own ways and that separates us from the stereotypes that try to define us.

After small group, I ended up running into a bunch of youth from our group and we walked to lunch together. Keep in mind, Purdue is a massive campus and it is not easy to find our way around, besides the fact it was nearly a twenty minute walk to get back to the dining hall, but we were able to continue our bonding process for sure!

Worship was from 2-4 p.m. today and the theme was "Go! And Do!" Anna Sweet Brockman recognized the importance of stepping back and trying not to identify with the Samaritan, but with the priest and Levite. This parable is as she states, is "a story about the outsiders, about the enemies we falsely believe cannot do the work of God." Towards the end of her sermon, she had a part about typical thoughts of everyday people and what the Gospel says about it. For example, she says, "we have bought the lie that persons that suffer from poverty and homelessness are lazy and shameful, but the Gospel says NO. We have bought the lie that if you are not from here, if you don't look like us, if you don't think like us, if you don't believe like us, then you can't be a good neighbor, but the Gospel says NO." She states that the Youth have to "lead the church in difficult conversations due to our willingness to listen and understand people who are different than us is one of our gifts." The Youth are not the church of the future, we are needed NOW and we must act as good neighbors if we are to accomplish anything.

Day Two is now over and I am so looking forward to see what Day Three is going to bring so stay tuned!!

Day 1 - Monday night/Tuesday July 18-19, 2016

Monday, July 18th all the churches from the Presbytery of New Hope attending the conference gathered at the Kirk of Kildaire at 10:00 p.m. to meet up before the bus arrived. Within the two hour time span of when we arrived and when the bus arrived, we made new friends, played games and mentally prepared ourselves for the supposed eleven hour bus ride.

The bus arrived around midnight, we packed up and departed at exactly 12:30 a.m. and we were on our way!! Although sleeping through the night on the bus proved to be quite challenging, we all made it through the trip without anyone showing too many signs of sleep deprivation!

Around 8:00 a.m. on Tuesday morning, we stopped at a McDonald's to refuel - physically and mentally - for an hour before getting back on the road. For the next almost six hours, we drove straight to Indiana while driving through cities like Cincinnati and Indianapolis.  Around 2:50 p.m. we started seeing signs for Lafayette and Purdue; nearly 14 hours later and we had finally arrived at our destination!!

After a brief orientation highlighting the rules of the conference and dorm rooms, we were ready to get settled in our homes for the next couple of days, the dorms at Shreve Hall. Although they are not rooms at a five star hotel, by any means, they have comfortable beds and plenty of room for our suitcases and a great atmosphere for bonding with the people in our delegation (back home group).

After dinner, we had to head over to worship at the Elliott Hall of Music which is on campus. Walking in brought on an overwhelming amount of emotions from excitement to anxiety to sleepiness. There was awesomely, fun music playing to get us ready for the fun that was to come and over 6,000 other Presbyterian Youth filing and pushing through the doors to make sure they got the best spots possible. The sheer number of people was awesome and crazy at the same time due to the amount of energy in the building, and especially once we started doing our favorite Presbyterian tradition, energizers!! Energizers have to be one of my favorite parts about being Presbyterian and they are such a great way to get ourselves prepared for the excitement of the week. 

After energizers, we did some singing and this proved to be another eye opening experience as it was my first time experiencing a worship band. They had everything a full band would have: a guitarist, bassist, drummer, keyboard, and a ukulele player besides the lead singer. The power the band possessed was a very strange feeling as I have grown up going to a traditional Presbyterian church where no one claps after songs or moves in any way, shape, or form while singing! I enjoyed the change of scenery from our typical Presbyterian ways, and was able to dance and sing while praising the Lord which was an incredible experience.

Next came the sermon by Rodger Nishioka who talked about seeing God in every day circumstances. A couple things that Rodger said in his sermon were really inspiring and something that stood out to me was the fact that everyone attending this conference did not happen here by chance. There was some form of a call that God made to us all leading us to Purdue University in search of him for the coming week. Rodger told us "How dare you say, 'God cannot reveal God's self to me, I'm only a young person... I'm not masculine enough, I'm not feminine enough, I'm not tall enough, I'm not beautiful enough...'" and the list went on. Rodger truly inspired me and the rest of the youth to "Go and See" the Lord this week in amazing ways and in places we never thought could be possible, and therefore set the tone for the upcoming week. 

And this wraps up days 1 and 2 of our Triennium 2016 experience!! Follow along as I give daily updates for the rest of the trip!