Groundbreakers! Holiday Club

Colin Shipway gives a personal view of some of the activities that took place at Groundbreakers!

Holiday Club this year was different to recent years in that it didn't take place at QBC, but at St. Bart's Church. Following the successful joint holiday club last year held at QBC it was decided to work together again but swap venues. I must admit that initially I was a little hesitant about this - isn't this always the case when we are thinking about doing something different.

Anyway we seemed to have quite a good team of helpers and the Church Rooms floor was finished early in the summer so we also had quite a good venue. The theme of the holiday club was 'breaking new ground for God' and we covered Jonah, Elijah, Nehemiah, Hezekiah and Jesus. We had a good number of children coming along and most of them came throughout the week, even though the last two days were part of the Bank Holiday weekend! As usual, on the first day the children were relatively subdued, but by the Sunday their excitement had grown. However, when the children went out to their group activities I am assured that they were mostly very well behaved and listened well.

On the Saturday evening we had our barbecue on Stafford Orchard. Again we had some good weather - no rain even though it seemed to be threatening. The games organised at the same time meant that most people seemed to have something to do - either play games or just sit around and chat.

The Sunday morning was the real highlight for me. St. Bart's seemed to be full of people, not just Holiday Club children and parents but regular church members, and everyone seemed to enjoy it. We had great fun organising the games, especially the wet ones, and also in doing the drama. But we pray that through all this, and all the other times during the week that we had the chance to talk about God's love, that children and adults will grow closer to God and that this will be part of some people coming to know Jesus as their Saviour.

We did notice that being closer to the centre of the village than usual, many more people did pass by and ask about what was going on. Pray also that these people may be challenged about their response to God after having seen the enthusiasm of those involved with Groundbreakers!

One thing that I did forget to do on the Sunday was to thank all those who had helped, so I hope that you will take this as my thanks. Special thanks must go to Howard and Gillian who did so much of the organisation for the Holiday Club and the barbecue, and also to Simon Bursell who didn't need too much arm-twisting to come out and help with the Holiday Club again.

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