National Young Adults Retreat, June 2006

By Charlotte Thorpe, Dallas, TX

There’s going to be rappelling? I’ll be there! This was my first thought as I became the first registrant for the National Young Adults Retreat in Cheyenne, WY, held the first weekend in June. I had something to look forward to for months. The retreat would turn out to be so much more, as it consisted of praise and worship, workshops and fun activities.

I attended the retreat with about 25 other young adults (ages 19-35), some local to the area and a few from as far away as New Hampshire and (originally) Togo, Africa. Our base was the historic Plains Hotel in downtown Cheyenne. The retreat, well organized by Denise Fertig and Katrina Weber, of the Cheyenne congregation, started Thursday night with a cookout at the Fertigs’ home, where Shannon Fertig, bivocational pastor, and Jeb Egbert, our guest speaker, focused us on Christ, through "popcorn prayer" (short sentences) around a roaring campfire.

Friday morning, after praise and worship with Katrina Weber, Jeb Egbert led our first workshop, encouraging us to brainstorm ideas and solutions as to why the people of our age group are leaving the Church (Body of Christ). Some of the top reasons were perceived hypocrisy in the church, lack of empowerment or knowing where they fit, and apathy and distractions. This led us into a discussion of one of the solutions: mentoring. Jeb spoke about the life-on-life approach of Jesus, and how important it is to spend time with and share our lives with people we can positively influence and encourage.

After our lively discussion and some lunch, we headed for a bison ranch to enjoy an interesting tour and talk while riding a slow open-air train. We joked that we could have walked faster than this train, but it gave us the chance to view camels, llamas, ostriches, bison and longhorn cattle up close in safety. After the ride, many of us took a horseback trail ride before enjoying a wonderful chuckwagon dinner prepared by the Cheyenne congregation.

Saturday morning, we enjoyed praise and worship and then a lively workshop regarding relationship styles based on the book The Platinum Rule. After taking a short assessment, we learned whether we were a Thinker, Relater, Director, or Socializer, what that meant, and what verbal cues to look for so that we could relate to each other more effectively. This was an eye-opening experience. I am a thinker, but just keep in mind that a relater wants people to get along and for no one to be left behind.

Finally, it was time to go rappelling. Since I told everyone that I wanted to do this since I was 12, I could not chicken out. Thankfully, Joe Weber, our instructor, with many years of rock climbing and rappelling experience, made us feel very safe. As I stepped backward over the edge of the cliff, I looked down and realized it was not too far. We all made it down safely and most, with smiles, by the time we set our feet on the horizontal surface again. That worked up an appetite, and members of the Cheyenne congregation were waiting for us with snacks and water. After dinner, we played mini-golf and some of us tried out our secondary relationship styles, just for fun.

Sunday, the Cheyenne congregation joined us at the hotel for church. After lunch, we ran around downtown Cheyenne for a clever scavenger hunt with puzzling clues. Our teams were divided so that each type of relationship style was represented. My teammates took off running, but since I was not feeling my best that day and the altitude affected my running speed, I was jogging and walking. I knew my relater teammate would notice me back there, and she did, almost on cue, stopping to wait for me. Well, we didn’t win the race to return first, but I still chuckle at the memory of all of us counting through the alphabet on our fingers to find numbers for letters, and the look of shame when we discovered that we mistook the total number of books in the New Testament for the number in the whole Bible. This caused us to run ten extra blocks, I think. (I was even carrying a Bible in my pocket!)

Thankfully, we had time to rest a bit before attending a dinner-dance hosted by the Cheyenne congregation. The teens of the church served us at our tables and then we enjoyed a wonderful evening of dancing, the best way to end any weekend, in my opinion. I appreciate all the efforts of the Cheyenne church family, who made our stay comfortable and memorable. If they do this again, we hope that even more will join us!

Copyright 2006 Worldwide Church of God