Over the last weekend, “Love Wirral” took place. Weeks and weeks of preparations finally got to an end and it was so worth it. Everyone agreed: This was an amazing and incredible weekend!
Love Wirral is where a group of young people from the church in Heswall come and share God’s love with the people of Wallasey. This first Love Wirral took place in 2014 and is now an annual event. The goal of Love Wirral is to do something good. Whether it is to help people having a good weekend or bring them closer to Jesus, we believe that we can make a difference. It is also a great opportunity for the young people of Heswall Parish to get to know each other better, to work in a team and to grow as a group. It really gets them out of their comfort zones to share their faith with others. Meanwhile, they are growing in faith as well, even it’s just three days. It’s such a great time to see God in action!
This year’s topic was joy because we felt like it was important, especially after all this time of lockdown, to bring joy to the people we meet. There were three teams, all serving in different areas. I was the leader of Team 2 and we ran our events in a big park in Wallasey. It was a huge responsibility looking after a team of 18 people and organising an event this big. Each day, we had between 150-300 people in the park! Whilst preparing I learned a lot about organisation, responsibilities and delegation. Luckily, I had such an amazing team: everyone was ready to get involved, prepare and help wherever necessary. This made everything easier and we also had a lot of fun. Here’s our programme:
On our first day we offered different sport activities such as badminton, volleyball, rounder’s, stilt-race, parachute-games and many more. In the craft-area, the kids could draw on pebble stones or get a tattoo or painting on their arms. We ended our first day with a family-quiz and a BBQ.
On the Sunday, we led a family-service for around 30 adults and 10 children in one of the churches we partnered with. We talked about the parable of the lost sheep, did craft activities and prayer stations. It was a really relaxed service for people of all ages. Every young person in my team was in some way involved (e.g. in the worship-band, leading the service, re-telling the Bible passage or giving the talk). A lot of them stepped out of their own comfort zone so I was really proud of my team!
After the service, we went straight back to the park where we ran our second day of activities. This time we set up a fairground, including games like Hook-a-Duck or Tin Can Alley. We also gave out pre-packed lunches so families could have a little picnic together. Meanwhile, Steve the Juggler, who did his programme in each of the three teams, joined us. He calls himself a “gospel-juggler” and managed to engage the children with both: circus skills and the good news of Jesus.
Our last day looked kind of similar to the first one. We offered craft and sport activities and had an inflatable football pitch as our highlight. People from the church in Heswall had made a lot of cake for us to share and the people were again really grateful for that.
If you want to see what all the others team did, have allok at our instagram page: @lovewirral21 (https://www.instagram.com/lovewirral21/)
The whole team was residential at a church in Wallasey where we slept on the floor, had our meals, played games and most importantly spent time worshipping and listening to talks. Each of the three talks was amazing and I want to share with you a little bit about their messages:
1. We have to rely on God’s power and not ours. That is true for running an event like Love Wirral but it is also true for our day to day life. And: Doing God’s work is important. The first talk challenged us to think about the things God is calling us to do and to overcome our fears by trusting God and using every opportunity.
2. You cannot give the full gospel story in one minute, but you can share something life changing. Jesus loves you unconditionally. You make mistakes but Jesus died for you. You are forgiven. That’s my summary of the Gospel in three sentence. We also thought about questions like: Why are you a Christian? What would you miss if you weren’t? What do we tell our friends about God and the things He does in our lives?
3. The God of everywhere always wants to be somewhere. He has made His home in us. Based on the story of Moses, we asked ourselves the question: What is in your hand? Which things are you good at? And it was made clear: You cannot hide from God. God sees all of you. God wants all of you. God loves all of you. So comparison is the enemy’s way of telling you God cheated you.
I am so thankful for this experience of Love Wirral! It was such a great opportunity to step out of my comfort zone, to gain confidence in leading and to grow in my faith once again. It was also a good time to say goodbye properly to most of the young people. The last days of my time in the UK will now be filled with other goodbyes and I am grateful to have the chance to take my time for that and to be able to end on a high note!