Tubing redeemed & other stories

Often when I tell the story of how I got connected with IV, I start it this way:

In my first year of university, I went on the worst retreat of my life…

It was a regional retreat at Muskoka Woods that was for college and career groups from across Ontario, and I went with my church’s college and career group. I won’t go into all the gory details, but I can say that after this experience, one thing was clear: I wasn’t giving up on Jesus or Christian community as a whole, but I knew this group was no longer a good fit for me nor was it a place that would equip me for the mission I felt God had called me to (reaching out and being witness to my fellow design students). I was deeply grieved by this realization, this was the first church I had joined that I really felt connected to and the thought of leaving and starting anew was not something I was looking forward to. In the end, I felt called to stay at my church, but to seek out a Christian community on campus that would be present for me when I was on campus and equip me with the skills and training I needed to be missional amongst my classmates, and after a few divine appointments, I found IV. (There’s more to this story, but I’ll save that for another post.)

One of the many painful memories of the above mentioned retreat was that it housed my first tubing experience. I’ve wanted to go snow tubing ever since I knew it was a legitimate activity and I was through the roof with excitement that we could go tubing during this retreat. The lead up to the tubing was long and my patience was tried as I waited for my slow moving retreat roomies to bundle up so we could go. I could have guessed with their lackluster attitudes about being outside that these folks may not be the best company, but I was so excited it didn’t seem to matter. We finally got outside, and I went down the hill which was much smaller than I imagined a total of 2.5 times, and then my bored and cold roomies went inside and I was left to follow them. Had I known it was to go inside and do nothing, I would have stayed out tubing, but I was young and female bonding and FOMO (fear of missing out) were way too important to me.

Since this time, I’ve had those friendships and retreats in general be redeemed, but it wasn’t until Ryerson’s winter retreat this past January, that God was able to redeem tubing for me. I haven’t always had the best experiences with camp in the past, but I was excited by the possibility of having a winter retreat at OPC, especially since I had students who had worked at camp in the summer coming and I also had built new relationships with camp staff at the National Staff Conference. When it came time to select activities, I was thrilled at tubing was an option. And so, ten years after that first retreat (almost to the exact date), tubing was redeemed for me. As I sped down the hill (so many times I lost count), I was struck by how “right” it felt to be there at OPC, with these students and the alumni that joined us, and that God was so good to give me this redeeming experience with them.

Another highlight from this time include an interactive study of the Rich Ruler in Mark (Mark 10:17-31). The text challenged us as we considered that sometimes we can make the blessings that God has given us into idols and how we are called to let them go in order to put God first. We applied this passage by identifying what we root our identities in or what binds our decisions and then depict that thing in a creative way on a piece of paper. Some of the students drew pictures, some wrote poems, one who was an English Masters student wrote a 6 page paper! After we shared our answered with one another, we then put our papers in the fire as a symbolic representation of putting God above those things. It challenged the students as they wrestled with what it would mean for them to actually allow God to come first before those things.