Run the Race 2016
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” Hebrews 12:1
As you can see from the photos, we had a very energetic, exciting and successful Holiday Bible Club this year. During the third week of August between 65 and 70 children enrolled to join us during Olympic fever for our very own Dervock Olympics.
Every day, our mini bus circled the village and brought eager boys and girls to our church hall, where we had games, crafts, clay modelling, drama, exercises, sports, singing, a DVD on the life of Olympian Eric Liddle, stories on running the Christian race and even a visit from Harry’s Ices, Ballycastle on the Friday afternoon. When we asked many boys and girls what their favourite part of the week was, they replied, “the ice cream.”
Throughout the course of the week, the boys and girls looked at important aspects of running a race. Training, joining a race, starting a race, perseverance and finishing a race, all of these important aspects of running can be applied to our own lives as we looked at characters like Peter, Paul, Stephen and the Lord Jesus.
Our Holiday Bible Club team was made up of over 20 passionate and united volunteers who stayed in the Manse for the week. They came from Saintfield, Ballygowan, Carryduff, Coleraine, Magherafelt, Gulladuff and Dervock. As well as doing the Holiday Bible Club in Dervock, the team also traveled to Bellaghy to do a Holiday Bible Club there. Since the Rev. Jonathan Sloan has left Bellaghy and been called to OC Randalstown, this will be our last year there. The team are very grateful to those who fed them during the week and to those who drove the mini bus. Also, we are grateful to the local ministers who came and led our team devotions every night, Rev. Philip Dunwoody (Dervock RP), Mr. Richard Morrison (Student for the Ministry, Toberdoney), Rev. Gareth McClean (First Ballymoney) and Very Rev. Dr Godfrey Brown (retired), we enjoyed at the end of a busy day being led through God’s Word and having a time of prayer and praise.
The Holiday Bible Club might be over, the hall has returned to its normal state, the Manse is empty of the 20 plus people who stayed in it, but please continue to pray, that our Sunday School would grow through the work of our Holiday Bible Club and that many boys and girls will come to the activities we have on in our church.