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!
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