The Lord's Army in China
China Youth Camp – August 2006
What a privilege and delight to be enabled by the Lord to sow, even in
a small way, into the next generation of Christian leaders in
China. These young people were extraordinary. Their commitment to
the Lord and to reaching the lost is amazing. Even the smallest child
was able to pray confidently and fervently.
Preparation for this camp began months ahead and at every stage we felt
God’s hand as the Holy Spirit guided us and gave us inspiration and
creativity. The theme of the four and a half day camp was “The
Full Armour of God” from Ephesians 6:10-20. This gave us a good
umbrella for some sound biblical teaching and opportunities to have fun
with the young people. Our slot was part of a much longer residential
camp run by a house church for young Christians from a wide area. Our
theme song ‘The Lord’s Army’ was a fun action song. It was a big
challenge for me to learn how to sing this in Mandarin. A greater
challenge was to cope with the age range of the young people, (from age
8-17) which meant we had to think in terms of some different activities
for the younger children and for the teenagers. While it would
have been easier to have only children or only youth, we were blessed
to see them interacting e.g. watching a small boy praying with power
and authority for the tallest 17 year old youth.
The teaching covered each part of the armour and also some basic
teaching on spiritual warfare such as using the name of Jesus and
emphasizing that God’s power is the greatest and that the devil has
already been defeated by Jesus on the cross, so that we can walk in
victory. In addition to the ‘Sword of the Spirit’, they also
learnt about prayer and worship as spiritual weapons. We were
again blessed by having Sister M as our interpreter.
God gave us some
interesting sound effects. During the teaching, when we wanted a
scripture verse to be read we would say, “Draw your Swords” and the
youngsters would lift their Bibles { Sword of the Spirit} high in the
air and wait to hear which verse they needed to find. One of the youth
added a “schiing” sound effect every time the swords were drawn.
During the teaching on “Shield of Faith,” having explained that the
Roman shield was made of leather so it could be soaked in water to
extinguish flaming arrows, a derogatory “pisssst” was added to
emphasize how effective the shield of faith is in fighting Satan’s
fiery darts (flaming arrows) of doubts, fears, temptation and
accusation.
One team competition was to dress the smallest team member in a
newspaper ‘Armour of God’ and another was to make a very large ‘Shield
of faith’ along with ‘fiery arrows’. The younger children made
puppets dressed in the full armour from cardboard tubes from paper
towel rolls. They also had the special treat of Aunty Cecilia
making the armour for them from balloons which of course they loved.
Everyone had fun making a ‘Helmet of Salvation’ craft. As part of
the teaching on ‘Feet fitted with the readiness of the Gospel of
Peace,’ they were given a large sheet of paper, with a map of the
world, on which they were to draw an outline of their feet and then
they were given time to ask God where He wanted their feet to go. They
then used a star to mark the country or countries where they felt God
wanted them to go.
The youth had one afternoon session of discussion and counseling.
The boys had no problems that they were admitting to but the girls’
session went on for a couple of hours.
Cecilia introduced a Bible E motion activity based on Ezekiel’s ‘dry
bones’ to show how we become alive when we are born again.
A delicious and very large “Born Again Birthday Cake” was enjoyed by
all toward the end of the camp and we all sang “Happy Birthday.”
This camp we used more English. We taught them the action song “This
Little Light Of Mine” in English. Pat was able to fit in a
couple of sessions teaching English.
Each group prepared a skit for the final morning showing how the gospel
could be shared in different situations. We were very impressed
by the talented presentations. One I can remember very well
because it was very visual. Skit A - In this Skit, three of the older
youth acted as gangsters complete with scars and tattoos drawn with
marker pens and fake cigarettes made from rolled paper. They first
“robbed” three of the smaller boys and then two of the older
girls. The girls protested “take whatever you want but you cannot
have what is in my bag”. Of course the robbers persisted and
found that inside the bag was a bible. They asked the girls why the
book was so important when it didn’t even have any pictures. They
took the bible away and started gambling. Meanwhile the girls were
praying for them. They soon became bored with the gambling and
started to look at the bible and then went back to the girls to ask
questions. The girls shared the gospel with them and they then
accepted Christ and threw away their cigarettes and cards. Praise the
Lord!
After the skits we
gave everyone a soft toy and presented them with a CD of the camp songs
with a plain CD sticker to decorate as a reminder of what God had
taught them in the camp. After thanksgivings we sang the song
“Shalom my Friend” as a very fitting and moving finale.
When we left the camp our host drove four of us plus luggage into GZ
while Aunty Pat and Sister M went via motor bike and bus.
In GZ we enjoyed visiting the European Quarter and also going on a
night cruise on the river. Unfortunately Brother Larry lost his
cell phone on the cruise. The next day when we went to enquire about it
I saw a young mum and her little boy and she had a tee-shirt which said
“As for me and my family, we will serve the Lord” around a large cross.
I tried sign language thinking she must be a Christian and then Sister
M asked her if she knew Jesus. She listened very patiently and
thoughtfully while sister M shared with her. She did not accept
Jesus but we were happy to have been able to sow the seed
I was very humbled and touched when one of the full time workers shared
that she had prayed for the Youth Camp 2005 team every day since our
visit last year. The faith of the workers is China is very strong and
their witness and testimonies are both encouraging and challenging.
Persecution in China is a fact of life but it keeps the Church strong.
Thank you, all of you who helped the team in so many ways and
especially for your prayers all of which God so graciously answered.
What a wonderful God we
serve.
By
Norah Hession, Shepherd of Shalom 4 SG Norah and Mike have recently moved to
Langkawi
God gave us some
interesting sound effects. During the teaching, when we wanted a
scripture verse to be read we would say, “Draw your Swords” and the
youngsters would lift their Bibles { Sword of the Spirit} high in the
air and wait to hear which verse they needed to find. One of the youth
added a “schiing” sound effect every time the swords were drawn.
During the teaching on “Shield of Faith,” having explained that the
Roman shield was made of leather so it could be soaked in water to
extinguish flaming arrows, a derogatory “pisssst” was added to
emphasize how effective the shield of faith is in fighting Satan’s
fiery darts (flaming arrows) of doubts, fears, temptation and
accusation. 
After the skits we
gave everyone a soft toy and presented them with a CD of the camp songs
with a plain CD sticker to decorate as a reminder of what God had
taught them in the camp. After thanksgivings we sang the song
“Shalom my Friend” as a very fitting and moving finale.