A Youth Year-End Party: Happy Birthday Everyone!!!

Hm… how to explain the youth wrap-up party. Things become things through lots of laughter while hanging out with friends! A thing thats become a thing is, most every youth night now, everyone gets wished “happy birthday!” Occasionally this turns into being sung “Happy Birthday!” Again, it is never actually anyone’s birthday when this happens. This was the theme for our final night, a massive birthday party to everyone!!! Decorations were everywhere, cake was thrown off the portable roof, squawkers were blown, cupcakes were eaten, games were played, including pin the braid on Kyle… with his actual cut-off hair! At the end we had a meaningful time celebrating and prayer for the graduating students as well as praying for Cole and Mary who are moving to Laos and who have faithfully served at youth for many years! Want to join the madness as a youth leader in the Fall? Reach out to kyle@sunridge.org to apply!

April and May are the Marriage Course Season. We are looking forward to Sesson #3 (this Friday). God has been moving in the sessions so far as He loves strong marriages! We believe that strong marriages contribute to a strong church family from young to old. If you would like to get involved with this important ministry, contact Jon Ransom the next Sunday you're at church.

RIDGE Youth had such a joyful time kicking off youth again after Spring Break in the new fire pit space! Complete with hot chocolate and some classic campfire songs ("Trading My Sorrows” anyone?!?) it all set a great stage for Cole to share a devo about the peace that God offers us.

Parent Lifeboat Last Weekend!
Potter's House was host to "1000 Little Conversations" on Saturday. Darlene Unrau's approach to teaching our kids about sexuality was well received and created some lively table talk at the break-out sessions. We are so thankful for Darlene's academic knowledge on love and relationships, but it is her biblical foundation on the subject that really deepens this topic and adds powerful grounding in a world that is so confused. Thank you Darlene, Potter's House and everyone who attended!

RIDGE Youth had an awesome time at the RIDGE Retreat this past weekend!! Students met and stayed at the church for a couple days, made meals together and had meals made for them by some amazing SunRidgers, went to see the film “Jesus Revolution”, had devotions around campfires, embarked on a cotton-candy tasting (spicy dill pickle!?), drew self portraits with pudding, celebrated eeeeevery moment with kazoos, and spent most of Saturday building a new campfire space next to the basketball court! There was a lot of laughter and a lot of meaningful times together and... a lot of great sleeps through the night (ha not). HUGE thank you SunRidge for supporting the youth group through this event! Be sure to check out the new campfire space, jump on the swing, and high-five a student for doing such a great job building it! We pray this space will facilitate many meaningful and encouraging times ahead :)

Basketball with a soccer ball addition, campfires, hot chocolate, gummies in the hot chocolate, s'mores, camp worship songs, the lighthouse song obvs, caring questions, church community, passionate debate about dragons, everyone gets sung happy birthday as they leave. Good times at RIDGE Youth. :)

One of our small groups recently had the opportunity to help out recently with the FACT Program through the Boys & Girls Club, serving a meal to families in our community - many hands make light work! Thank You Lord for the chance to be a blessing and to be blessed at the same time.

The Money Matters course kicked off this past Wed night. Over the next number of weeks, Magnus will be leading this group through this course as they discuss handling money, conquering debt and saving for the future. Such timely teaching - Thank you Magnus and Thank You Lord for providing such an amazing equipper!

Family "Soup" Sunday! This past Sunday we were blessed as a congregation by our Chinese small group as they prepared a Chinese New Year feast for us instead of our regular soup lunch on Family Sunday. It was awesome - pretty sure there were no leftovers! Thank You Lord for the blessing of this amazing food and those who prepared it!

We had another great evening this past Wednesday enjoying a fantastic dinner together before learning and practicing prayer! Huge thanks to the many volunteers who make these beautiful evenings happen! It is such a win when God's people come together and pray and we always have something great to learn about how can further prayer in our life.

This week we were reminded that prayer is work. And the work of prayer begins by REMEMBERING the call to pray. That very first reaction to…everything! Then to work at WATCHING for Jesus with our eyes and ears. What is His Spirit saying as we pray, what is His Word telling us. See how He is moving or how He wants you to move. And then the work of TRUSTING — be in that place where you acknowledge He is able. It is all Him. We are only tagging along with God, waiting on Him, and responding obediently when He asks us to “do” something.

Thanks to everyone who served and joined in on Christmas Eve! We had such a good evening celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ! After songs and speaking we finished the evening by all lighting candles as a symbol of Jesus being the light of the world. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I love being a “Ridge Roadie” - a practical, behind-the-scenes support for our Ridge Student Ministries Leaders. This past week I had the fun assignment of picking out a ton of candy for their upcoming Christmas party challenge! I can hardly wait to hear how it goes!

At 54 I’m not the one to be on deck for youth nights, but I get so much joy prepping for evenings and then hearing about what’s going on week to week: the crazy activities make me laugh , the hilarious moments (more laughing), the meaningful connections encourage me, the places of need make me pray.

If you have some time to run around, gather stuff, make some calls, do some photocopying - any of these behind the scenes practical things - you too could be a part of the youth team as a Ridge Roadie (and don’t forget the Ridge swag!) If your heart beats to invest in the next generation and you aren’t serving elsewhere - this may be a fit! Email me at teresa@sunridge.org for the details.

On December 2, the Ladies Friday Morning Devotions Group had breakfast together at the church and took the time to “send" one of our beloved sisters on to a new assignment. Lisa has been a devoted part of this group for many years and her presence, personal words, and prayers will be so missed! The ladies brought verses and words of encouragement and affirmation, and we prayed over her! We also put together a gift “bin” so that Lisa has a gift to open every day from December 5 all the way to December 31 — to remind her of all of us at SunRidge who love her and are praying for her as she moves into a new season!!

The Call & The Send
Last Sunday was Shawn & Lisa Klassen's last Sunday with SunRidge before they go on to be a part of Kelowna Gospel Fellowship. Shawn has accepted as position as their lead pastor and will start there in the New Year! It was so good to hear from both Shawn and Lisa, about their time with the SunRidge church family for the past 8 years, and their calling to walk with another church family. We had a time of prayer for them, for KGF, and for SunRidge. While it is always sad to say "goodbye" it is so joyful to look back at our good memories together and to join in the joy of, as a church family, sending people to go and do the Lord's work! May God so bless Shawn, Lisa, and Mackenzie as they now go to serve our brothers and sisters at KGF!

Last Saturday, Emmanuel Church hosted Parenting in a Digital World. It was a collaboration between Westside Churches and their respective Family Ministry Pastors and was 5 months in the making. Cole Hubscher was the keynote speaker. Though attendance was less than anticipated, the response was enormous. Many parents came out of the session feeling more aware and equipped to take action at home. Thank you Cole, and all the local experts who contributed their knowledge and wisdom to this event! We are already looking forward to the next Parenting Lifeboat Session: Healthy Relationships, with Darlene Unrau.

A few weeks ago we finished BLESS. What a great series that was for adults and kids alike. Looking back, there were some cool lessons from Sunland that we enjoyed learning about. Here, the kids are learning what it was to Serve others the way Jesus did it: washing feet. Mind you, our feet aren't as dirty as people's feet used to be, so we had to make them dirty first :)