This morning, our Chapel Leaders opened the elementary worship service with the singing of O Canada and the recitation of The Lord’s Prayer. After listening to the Land Acknowledgement, the audience engaged in singing praise with the anthem, “Awesome God” by Rich Mullins. This was followed by Mrs. V (dressed in Wesley Wildfire Athletic wear)’s energetic and enthusiastic review of our theme verse taken from 1 Timothy 4:12 and the five steps to train like Jesus – Focus, Respect, Humility, Endurance, and Leadership. She explained that this week’s message will focus on “Respect” and introduced today’s Bible Story video about Jesus and the Leper, taken from Mark 1.
After the video, the Chapel Leaders led the response songs – “Who You Say I Am?” and “Good, Good Gather”.
Our speaker today was “Captain” from Willow Springs Camp. He began by giving thanks for the privilege to worship and praise God freely while others in different parts of the world cannot do the same. This led to his opening prayer for the Persecuted Church. Captain then shared a personal story about kindness. As a “Pastor’s Kid”, he recalls how people were often invited to their home. Sometimes, it was an important speaker from another country but other times, there were folks like “Wanda” who were experiencing a difficult time and needed a warm meal at their dinner table or their couch to sleep on. Captain’s dad was following Jesus’s example of showing Kindness – No Matter What. Referring back to the video and reading the passage from Mark 1:40-45, Captain explained that kindness is about showing care. Jesus healed a leper, a man who had a terrible skin disease and was isolated from the community because of it. However, the man did not follow Jesus’s instructions afterwards – to show himself to the priest but be quiet about his healing. As are result of the man’s sharing, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly and had to stay outside in lonely places. In many ways, Jesus swapped places with the man. His kindness came at a cost. However, Jesus did not keep an account of that price; neither should we when we show kindness. Captain’s third point about kindness is that it continues. Jesus has marked us each with His grace and we must continue to share this with others. Before Captain concluded his message, he tied it back to today’s topic – Respect. Jesus modelled respect by showing us how to treat others with kindness. To conclude, Captain closed in prayer. He thanked God for His kindness – not because we earned or deserved it. He also asked God to help each of us be RADICALLY kind, not out of performance or duty but because Jesus marked each of us as belonging to Him.
Our Chapel Leaders ended the service by leading the students to read the benediction together and encouraging them to have a CRISP day as they continue training to be like Jesus!