Kaléo Program

Sunday, November 30, 2014

Adventures in the Caves - A Quick Out-Trip Amidst Studies


The last week was one packed full of exam studying, exam taking, and paper writing. At the end of the week we took a hard earned break and went to visit some of the best caves on the island. This weeks post will be a quick share of some of the photos form our adventure, enjoy!




















Thanks for checking in, 

Levi

Thursday, November 20, 2014

Week of Prayer - And Life at Camp Qwanoes



Fall has definitely come here at Camp Qwanoes and a big identifier of that, is our annual week of prayer with the Kaléo Program.  Every year we take a week to dedicate towards prayer.
We want to be people of prayer in everyday of our lives, but it is always special to set aside some intentional time out of the busyness of our day-to-day, and spend time alone with God.


During the week we set up a special room and had someone praying in it for most of the hours of the day. From sunrise, to sunset, and right through the night. We had a schedule that students would sign up for 1 hour slots throughout the week.



It was definitely a busy week with all the academics the students were working on. Yet despite how counter intuitive it sometimes felt to take an hour and just spend it with God, everyone expressed so much gratitude for their time set specifically aside. It was really cool to watch the room slowly get covered in prayer requests and people sharing their praise and thankfulness. It was a really powerful week that I don't think many will forget anytime soon. 



Community Fireside

Once a month all the students and staff at camp take an evening to get together in small groups at different staff houses. This is one of the way we try to be intentional with community here at camp, and making sure the staff and students are getting opportunities to get to know each other. It is a great way to get to know the families of camp staff as well. 


Firesides are always heaps of fun and this month our fireside was a big gathering with pizza and games where everyone was able to hangout together. 









Our Wild Play Adventure

Last week we also took a break from studies and went on an adventure together.


We visited the island famous Wild Play high ropes course near Nanaimo.







 It was so great to get out into the forest and just have tons of fun together as a group. Everyone was super encouraging to each other, and it was great seeing people face their fears with courage.




 Fall Retreat Season Coming to a Close


A staff meeting at camp before our Sr. High Retreat. 
This past weekend was also one of our last retreats of the fall. It has been so great to watch the students jump in with servants hearts and help put on these amazing weekends for youth all over the island and lower mainland. 




A Costume Party!


This last thing I want to share about is a costume party we had together at the beginning of the month!


We all got together dressed up, made caramel apples, and had a blast with a karaoke contest. It was so much fun allowing a bit of everyones wacky side out, there certainly was no shortage of laughs. Hopefully there isn't any clips of the karaoke that will ever see the light of day. 



Thanks for checkin in with this week's blog post! The students are currently finishing up their class with David Ernst and I look forward to sharing more from that with you next week. 

Until next time,

Levi 

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Fall Qwanoes Retreats - Leading Here at Camp



In the fall here at camp we have retreats.

These weekends are a great time were campers can come and experience Qwanoes in the fall. The students have been helping run the past couple retreats and it has been a great opportunity for them to get involved in the larger ministry of Qwanoes. It gives them a practical way to apply their studies and help put on an amazing weekend for kids.



Our students have opportunities to counsel a cabin, help out with games, or serve in other support roles like maintenance or kitchen.






The students have been doing an amazing job in stepping up and helping make these weekends the best possible for all the campers we have come in. It is so great to see them bring their heart into what they are doing and serve the kids so well. 


Currently we are getting ready for their next course,  I look forward to sharing more!

Until next time, 

Levi  

Saturday, November 8, 2014

Pressing Deep Into Scripture - OT Studies with Don Taylor



The Blessings of Biblical Study

Over the past weeks the students have been hard at work with their 3rd course of the year, Old Testament Literature with Professor Don Taylor. This class is an excellent foundational class for the year as it helps cover an entire view of the Old Testament. In the span of one week Don Taylor was able to walk the class through the themes, imagery, prophecy and literature. This is one of the areas that is very beneficial about studying in a modular format. Covering that amount of material in such an intense time period, really helps for some of those 'big picture' connections to be made. 



A Word From Isaiah Moffatt

Again, who better to share about the experience than someone who took it themselves. This week we have one of our students sharing about his experience.

"O.T. Lit. was an awesome class! There was a ton of information to take in (and I definitely don’t remember everything) but it was great to help me understand the big picture of the Old Testament. Most of the time when reading the OT, I used to get lost on the meaning and confused by all the jumping around in stories. Now I feel like I got a pretty good understanding of the small details and culture of that time. The stories I already knew have begun to take on so much more meaning as I see them in the big picture."




"It was pretty cool to see how God hasn’t changed from the Old Testament, and remains the same loving God even now. In most of the lectures we were going through all the stories in O.T. one by one and getting a better understanding of each. My favourite part was reading all the stories with the class and hearing all the questions we had and hearing how even small details changed the meaning.

A lot of questions seemed to point towards the culture of the time and a lot of understanding the Old Testament was actually reached by figuring out the culture.  Don Taylor was an awesome Professor and if I go to Briercrest next year,  I will definitely take one of his classes!"

Huge thanks to Isaiah for sharing his thoughts on the course. We are big on being able to practice what we are learning, but we are also big on making sure we are doing everything we can to learn and study with excellence. It has been so great to watch the students this year rise to the academic challenge and commit themselves to learning all they can.


The program certainly requires students to develop and continue to grow in their skills of personal energy and time management. There is a lot packed into their life and finding the space to do everything to the best of their abilities takes hard work. They just took their exam for this course a couple days ago, and are now focusing on wrapping up their research papers on the course. It has honestly been so cool to see all the students hard at work studying their books. 




Above is a video showing one of the days were the students had an opportunity to go learn in the forest. Not every day of class is like this, but it certainly is a benefit to doing school on the west coast. 









 Excellent Leadership on Display

An awesome project the students worked on for this course was the yearly Old Testament video. Every year for this class the students get together and put their best acting skills to use for doing a dramatic re-telling of the OT events. I personally love seeing this project come together in it's various forms. Each year the students bring their own flair and it's so exciting seeing what they come up with.  


There were three student directors in charge and they had just over a week to start and complete the project. The directors did an amazing job of leading their peers and spreading out the tasks. I have now seen 3 of these videos come together and I can say with confidence this was definitely one of the best team efforts I have seen put into the project. All the editors, script writers, actors, directors, and everyone else was putting in so much work to help pull this thing off. 



We invited the entire Camp Qwanoes staff team to watch the film for the first time on their last day of class. It was definitely very exciting.




Thanks so much for checking in!

I look forward to sharing more with you soon,

Levi Allen,