By Danny Qian

When I first heard that there would be a church “campout” in the summer at our church, I was optimistically cautious.

I was optimistic because I thought that our older girls would love the fellowship with their friends and staying up late with them.  

I was cautious because I never had to be there with them, sleeping in tents (not my preferred sleeping situation) since in previous years they would just campout with the church staff.  

However, knowing that my younger two girls and my wife could also participate, we would definitely have a great time fellowshipping with church families and friends and they could simply go home to sleep and come back to church to participate in more activities the next morning (since we wanted the younger kids to get a good night’s sleep).

The campout turned out to exceed my expectations and the sleeping situation wasn’t too bad either (as I brought air mattresses).

The fellowship was amazing, especially since we really haven’t been able to catch up with many people due to COVID-19. The worship was also awesome and well planned. I was pleasantly surprised that the staff put together a really great outdoor worship program in the grass area, right in front of all the tents.

What I really appreciated beyond the nice worship, good fellowship, all the games and breakfast the following day, was how everything felt simple but to the main point of our faith. The campout simply felt like something that would please the Lord: good fellowship among brothers and sisters in Christ, where Christ was being worshipped in the center of it all.

by Pastor Victor Chen

In an old television commercial, a bear climbs a yellow trailer, rips off the roof to peek inside and exclaims, “Hey, where’s the cream filling?”

The bear thought the yellow trailer was a Twinkie. 

You too may be looking at our website, Plugin or app and be asking, “Hey, where’s the summer program?”

Good question. 

Why isn’t there a weeklong summer program?

Though things are reopening after over a year of the “stay at home” order, much of our church, especially families, are still home. As we explored having a weeklong program, it became difficult to anticipate how many families would feel comfortable sending their children to a weeklong program and how many volunteers would feel comfortable serving throughout the week. In short, there were a lot of unknowns that made it difficult to plan.

Why isn’t there an online weeklong summer program?

Producing weekly videos for families to join Church School online is already a lot of work. Producing an entire weeklong program would require even more time and additional resources. For now, the livestream service and Church School videos are the priorities online. 

Furthermore, we are still providing in-person worship services in the sanctuary and in-person Church School in the MPR with breakout sessions in the MPR and various classrooms. It would be one thing to only produce online content, but to do both online and in person requires more attention, time and resources.

Finally, as a pastor (and parent), I am concerned about the screen time consumption our children have had with a year (or more) of distance learning. This summer, I would recommend our children rest their eyes, go outside, be active and play!

Our family is comfortable returning, what is available this summer for us?

I’m glad you asked! Because we want families to return to service and Church School in person when they are comfortable, we will have opportunities for families to come out on campus outdoors as a step towards returning. 

On June 27, we will have our next Summer Worship Night where families can come early to bring dinner and picnic on our lawn from 4:30-6pm. At 6pm, we will begin our program with family-friendly group activities for both children and adults. This is followed by a time of worship with a devotion as we learn and sing songs that span the generations represented in our church.

Note that this is not just for families, but for the entire church family. At our last Summer Worship Night on May 30, we were blessed to have a great mix of generations join and participate. College students and young adults led the group activity and hand motions for kids worship. It was neat to see the entire group worship as one family.

On July 30-31, we will have our last Summer Worship Night on Friday night with an optional Summer Worship Campout afterward! Households can come set up their tent, have a dinner picnic and join with the summer worship time. Afterward, they can sleep in their tent on our campus under the stars. We hope to provide brunch Saturday morning and allow everybody to enjoy hanging out on campus together.

If you are interested in participating in our Summer Worship Campout, please contact me at vchen@evergreensgv.org to sign up!