Youth Retreat Reflection
As pastor Kyle of Christ Church Toronto said to me, “there’s a reason they call it March break in Canada instead of spring break.” I, along with Amanda Pieterman and 6 youths, left on Sunday in blowing snow. By Monday morning, everything had melted to mud. We woke up on Tuesday to a foot of freshly fallen snow. Whatever was going on with the weather last week, it wasn’t spring.
But it was a weekend of growth and warmth for the 30 or so youth gathered at Millstream Bible Camp for the 2026 PCA Youth Retreat. In just under 48 hours we heard four sermons, one special talk about God’s plan, had five small group discussions, and spent the rest of the time in fellowship and fun. The theme, and the book we were going through, was Jonah - not the first book I was expecting, to be honest. But through the preaching of Kyle Hackmann, Daniel Kim, and our very own Moses Lee we saw the glory of God’s grace and were left with the call to examine our hearts and to spread the news of God’s grace to everyone.
It was a weekend of fellowship too. The singing started almost as soon as we left New City on Sunday, and so did the jokes (no, Mansi, you did not see 9 meese). Youth and leaders from different churches sat together for breakfast, lunch, and dinner - all the food was incredible, by the way. We spent lots of time getting to know our devotional groups and cabins, and through Amanda’s great icebreaker games we had a chance to learn everyone’s names (a good memory would have helped with this one). Since the weather outside wasn’t the best, the gym was always open. I don’t know how many hours were spent playing pickleball, basketball, volleyball, and whatever other games the kids could think of. By Tuesday afternoon, youth from all three churches were saying goodbye to their new friends, signing each other's retreat booklets, and talking about plans for meeting up again. Some couldn’t wait to call their friends till they got home - Emma got a call 45 minutes after we left. It was also a great opportunity for Amanda and me to meet other youth leaders - Daniel, Zak, Emily, Iris, and George. These are all wonderful people to work with and learn from, and I sincerely hope I get the chance to work and worship with them again.
Finally, it was a weekend of fun. For me, the best part was the talent show, and that's not just because I hosted it. As this was our first (hopefully annual) talent show, I knew it had to be something this group would remember. After a scramble on Monday afternoon to find or design a trophy that we could give our winner, we had created the Elroy Cup (named after the kind camp staff who gave us the base for our trophy: a plastic juice bottle). And believe me, it was a fight for the Cup. We saw an incredible amount of talent coming from such a small group of kids - singing, piano, choreography (planned by some of our girls), tossing marshmallows across the room into each others’ mouths, etc. In the end, we awarded the first annual Elroy Cup based on crowd reaction, which wasn’t an easy decision because so many acts had the crowd going wild. I definitely hope to see this event at next year’s retreat.
Overall, I’m incredibly grateful to God that I got to lead our youth group for this event. Whether or not I end up going next year, I highly recommend this retreat to all the youth at New City! It was a great encouragement to see that God is blessing the youth ministries in our presbytery and equipping the youth of our churches with knowledge of His word and with wonderful Christian fellowship. I hope to continue participating in this work and strive to take what I have learned from this retreat and apply it to improving my work as a leader, by God’s grace.