That's A Wrap

At the conclusion of the Floridays 1990 experience- after the trip, the banquet and all of the work that followed- I took the slide of the group picture I had taken in the Great Hall underneath Cinderella's Castle and had it blown up into an 8x11 picture.  The picture was taken around midnight our last night, and the entire group is in it except for myself and Robin Thomas (he was also taking pictures.).  I had it framed and hung it on my office wall at Springfield.  I also hung it every office I had after that.  It is currently hanging over the bed in our guest room.  I was going to scan it and post it here, but I discovered after almost 20 years it is stuck to the glass of the frame, and to remove it would destroy it.  And I can't do that.  I did, however, take a picture of the picture so I could post it here.  You can't really see much of the group, but the symbolism is important.

Why has this picture always been so significant to me?  After all, this particular Florida trip is only the second best Disney trip I ever led (the 1993 WDW trip is my favorite trip ever!).  Overall, it would rank sixth or seventh on my all-time list of favorite trips.  So why is it a picture from this trip that has always been on display for people to see?  The picture has always reminded me of what can happen when we seek God's will and are faithful to God's vision.  It reminds of how the youth ministry of Springfield Friends Meeting changed in a three year period, going from 5 my first Sunday to 20 on the first Disney trip in 1987 to 60 on this trip.  I look at the picture and see so many lives that were touched by God through our TNT program and wound up in Florida as a result.  We invited Jesus to be a part of our student ministry, and He showed up in a very real way.  The trip also represented a changing of the guard in our ministry.  The youth who had taken us to a new level were aging out, and a whole new batch of incredible young people were assuming leadership .  The next four years would be amazing.  I cannot overstate the significance of this trip as a wrap-up to the  first four years and the beginning of whole new world. 

Tomorrow I am going to rant a little bit about why so much of USAmerica sees Christians not as Christ-followers, but as "Jerks for Jesus."  I hope you'll be here.

Because of Jesus,