At Illinois Youth Convention
The theme of the 2009 Illinois District Youth Convention was "Launch."
Easter week is always crazy for my family; that’s when the Illinois District hosts their annual Youth Convention. This past Wednesday, young people from all over the state gathered in Springfield for three days of music, worship and preaching. Lives were changed and young people went home fired up to do the work of God.
On Thursday evening alone, 18 young people received the Holy Ghost, including a young man from our home church in Quincy.
This year’s guest evangelist for the three evening services was Greg Glover, a United Pentecostal Church pastor from Spokane, Wash. On Thursday night, he stopped the post-preaching prayer service, asked anyone who didn’t have the Holy Ghost to raise their hand, and then instructed other young people to focus on them. Glover then prayed over the congregation, and within minutes young people were being filled with the Holy Spirit.
The music and worship at Youth Convention are always top notch. Kris and Sarah Bledsoe were responsible for coordinating the music this year, and they did a fabulous job.
Kudos to Nathaniel Dugal of Quincy and Lauren Paris of Litchfield; both of these talented Section Six young people won last year’s singing competition at Relay and were invited to sing in a special concert prior to the Thursday evening service. Both did an outstanding job. I introduced Nathaniel, and I believe I was more nervous than he was.
The Illinois District has found the perfect location for this event – the Prairie Capital Convention Center in downtown Springfield, just a few blocks from the state capital building and around the corner from the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. Attendees can stay across the street at the Hilton or the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Hotel and never have to leave the downtown area.
From left: Danny Arruda, Chris Jones and Jonathan Mohr try to unload the last few remaining "Launch" t-shirts at the close of the Friday evening service.
This year was a little more stressful than most because Tollie and I were at Youth Convention to work. That’s the reward for being elected to serve as Sectional Youth Director. We collected registration fees, checked in attendees at the door, sold t-shirts, counted money, and anything else we could do to help make the convention a success.
But I’m not complaining. The district takes care of the youth committee, making sure you don’t want for anything.
The most enjoyable part, though, is hanging out with fellow members of the youth board. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: we’ve got a great committee in Illinois. Everyone appears to have a good time working together, and egos don’t get in the way of getting the job done.
I’ve attached a few photos from the event, and you can see more by visiting the photos page on this site.
The crowd responds with prayer and worship at the close of the Friday evening sermon. Calvary Tabernacle members can be seen praying in the foreground.