The prayer station evening had many artistic ways for students to connect with the theme of "Identity" for the weekend. My favorite station was of masks that people wear- a mask that makes you feel comfortable, but isn't who you really are. Below, Lindsey adds a mask to the wall. One mask says, "I'm fine. I don't mind. It's okay," of a student trying to cover up his real feelings and hurts. We invited students to be real with God, and open to being who He wants us to be.
Two stations below share expressions of God's vision for who you are, and burning in a fire old lies about yourself.
Early morning sessions had students met for prayer, and to pray for each other personally. Our praise band led songs about understanding identity in Christ. The RI guys staff also performed silly musical skits to understand identity.
My group had ten RIC students, who all enjoyed being silly, playing in the snow, and also each heard powerful and personal messages from God through the weekend.
Jill became a Christian on their spring break trip to New Orleans last year. But she felt like she'd wandered some, and needed this retreat to re-focus on God. The topic of the retreat was "Identity." During one evening with prayer stations, she was doing an artistic sculpting prayer station. There was a pile of little stones and one fell on the floor. She turned it over, and "Jillian" was written on it.
Jill turned to her best friend, Michelle, and said, "Did you write my name on this stone?" Michelle said no. Jill dug through the other stones- they were all blank. She asked the staff, but no one knew how her name got on a stone. She finally said, "God's calling me by name!"
Michelle became a Christian at the same time as Jill, and although she has continued attending church-related things since then, she had a good revelation over the weekend also- "Before I was a Christian, I spent my time trying to get people to accept me through drinking and partying. After I became a Christian, I kept trying to get acceptance- this time through doing good Christian things. But this weekend, God told me I'm supposed to pursue Him, not pursue the acceptance of Christians."
