This April, our teams in Witham and Whitley share with us about all the work they’ve been doing in the past months.
Enjoy reading 🙂
Witham Update
We’re back to meeting face-to-face in Witham, as much as we can! We are so very thankful to be able to engage personally with our young people and volunteers. The last 14 months have been the most extraordinary for us as it has been for everyone. Our Boys’ Brigade & Girls’ Association Programmes have been running weekly (mostly on Zoom) since last March. Here are a few examples of skills that our Company Boys’ & Girls’ (ages 11-18) have created over the most recent lockdown.
We pack up and deliver all the supplies to our members’ homes and our talented adult volunteers provide their expert guidance each week. And the result is good online fellowship, learning new things and remembering the importance of our programme “4F” values: Fun, Friendship, Faith and Fullness of Life.
We’ve been busy in the last year as well as a community of adult volunteers. We’ve taken the time to do individual and socially distant work projects at our camping & conservation land. All this is in preparation for retuning to outdoor programming as restrictions are relaxed over the next few months!
Summer residentials are an important, and rustic, piece of the programme and we’re so very ready to spend some time camping out, roasting marshmallows to make s’mores! The new toilet block is now functional and fits right into the aesthetic of the land. We’ve gotten solar panels, wind turbine, battery bank and led lights put up to power and light the kitchen. All of this work is geared towards unlocking future residential and adventuring camps for our young people and adult volunteers to experience life together, worship together and empower everyone live out the Four “F”s.
Whitley Update
A little bit about our new intern, Joe Hethrington
“A bit of a music geek, especially when it comes to anything old school so be warned, I will talk for hours about the band ‘Toto’ when given the chance! After graduating from my music course in 2018, I returned to leading worship at my local church and have recently felt a strong calling to worship ministry. As an intern with Shift I really look forward to getting more stuck in with the wider community, as well as continuing my growth in spiritual maturity, and sharing fellowship with new friends made on the way!”
ROC conversation
On April 28th we were a part of the Reading ROC conversation – a conversation with over 200 other people from Reading looking at young people, health and wellbeing, community and isolation. The aim being to talk about what we can do as a community to enable our young people and our community to thrive. Of specific concern was the impact of violent crime on the community. As part of the response a new song, Born to Fly, which was filmed in Reading, was released; you can watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=xXDMUfQm9EU&feature=youtu.be
It was fantastic having a representative from Reading Youth Council there during the evening gathering, and we are excited to see what initiatives come out of these conversations. To see some highlights of the gathering log onto https://www.facebook.com/wearerocuk/videos/461468944938066
Thank you for reading! We hope you are keeping safe and well
Come back next month for another update
Stay safe and God bless 
