Proclaim Community Day

I know we're starting to sound like a broken record but today has just been incredible! Even though we're still not getting as much sleep as we'd like, we are having so much fun together!

Today started with another early rise. I'm so proud of the group for having such a good attitude about being on the bus by 7:15am each day. One of the perks of being up so early: we were front row for worship with Presiding Bishop Eaton and even got a picture with her! We had a great time singing along with Rachel Kurtz too.

After worship, we headed straight over to the interaction center. Yesterday there were long lines for the Walk for Water activity that helps simulate what it would be like to have to cart your water 3.7 miles each trip. Today we jumped in a walked right away. We didn't do the full 3.7 but one lap around was enough for most of us! Along the way we read stories of people who live with this struggle to walk for water and even had a few pit stop challenges such as a heat wave, bumpy bridge, malaria, diarrhea and worms. We were all thankful to give $300 more to the initiative today. We got a certificate to take home to Zion to help us celebrate!

After spending a little more time exploring the many stations available to us, we set out for a lunch break on our way to Ford Field. Turns out the place we wanted to eat at was a little busy but thanks be to God we found another with just enough time before we had to get to practice for our Mass Cast appearance tonight. 

The rest of the afternoon was spent going up and down, up and down, up and down the stairs to practice our entrance for the finale song. There are a few hundred helping make it possible! It's amazing to watch it all come together from behind the scenes. But boy are we going to have some sore legs tomorrow! The ending song was "Love Can Build A Bridge" sung by Rachel Kurtz and a young boy named Rudy. The rendition is enough to get you choked up and inspired to walk hand in hand with our neighbors to make this world better. May we leave inspired By God's love to build bridges back home.

We hope you had a chance to tune in to the livestream to watch! Hopefully, a link to the live video will be posted soon to share with you.

We had been expecting to have floor seats since we were a part of the ass cast. Instead, we sat at the top to make our entrance even more incredible for all those in the dome. The Gathering people were generous enough to make sure we got floor seats for tomorrow though!

Tomorrow during the day we head out for our Proclaim Justice day. We will be serving someway somehow but we won't find out the details until we get on the bus. May our contribution tomorrow be meaningful not just for us but for those we meet too!

Peace,

Anna Wencl

Jenny on stage during worship!

We learned a lot of sad facts about the struggle for water in many parts of the world (hence the glum faces!)

We are strong enough to carry all that water ... so we thought!

Dan and Madisen making the long walk to the finish

We were proud to give $300 to the WfW cause

Meeting Palestinian and an Israeli Lutherans! We had a great time talking with them about their friendship, frustrations with how their perceived in the media and what they hope for.

We love art!

We're all getting used to all the bag checks we need to go through to get into Ford Field. The girls are not getting silly as they vary their bags on their front!

Dan and Brady LOVE our obsession with duck lips. We finally got Dan to do it today. Still working on Brady!

Group photo!

The wristbands just keep on coming

Practicing to be a part of the mass cast!

So exciting!

We helped form 3 crosses on the floor of Ford Field

Great time on the floor without orbs

Proclaim Story Day

Our morning began with a sack breakfast on the bus and worship with Agape and Rachel Kurtz at the Cobo Center. Nothing gets you going quite like a hip hop worship service! It felt like a morning workout as we worshipped our amazing God.

After worship, we ventured over to the Interaction Center to experience a bunch of different activities both fun and thoughtful. We challenged our kids. We gave each of them $5 that they could spend on anything or anyone other than someone from our group. The purpose was to pay it forward. They made us proud by giving all the money to ELCA's Work for Water campaign that's building wells in Africa. Zion parents, thanks for lending us such amazing kids this week!

After lunch, we gathered with the Southeastern MN synod for our Proclaim Story Day. We learned that we all have a story and our story is God's story. We all have struggles but God is with us in them all. We are on a lifelong journey with Jesus. The afternoon closed with a worship service.

We've had some short nights so we promptly headed to the Atwater Lounge for some nap time before heading over to Ford Field at dinner. We made reservations for sit down meal of chicken fajitas with all the trimmings.

The house band got us rocking once again and ready for an evening of worship, dancing and fun! Blanca, a musical performer, was absolutely amazing. WOW, can that lady sing!

The speakers once again brought us a great message. Alexia Salvatierra stole the show. She is a leader in areas of poverty and immigration. And she inspired us to walk with our brothers and sister in Christ to create fair and just immigration laws.

After last night's experience with the buses taking a bit to get us back! The gathering got it right tonight. What a huge job it is to move 30,000. We're thankful for all the people who are helping make this all possible!

Be sure watch tomorrow night's livestream. Our group will be helping with part of the stage production!! We don't know what exactly we'll be doing but we'll be wearing khakis and yellow and orange shirts.

Peace,

Ninja Dan

Thank you prayer partners for your notes this week!

Morning worship with Agape!

The group with their $5 to pay forward!

Proclaim Story Day

Interaction Center!

The group decorated their Bibles

Walking to our delicious dinner at Ford Field

Brady and Dan rocking out

Fun times at the Mass Gathering

Trying to escape the mayhem that is 30,000 leaving at one place

What A Day! The Gathering Begins

What a day! Our first day in Detroit proper began by getting picked up by the ever generous Our Savior's Lutheran in Owatonna. Together we ventured to a local church known for its connection to the Underground Railroad. Together we were shuffled in small groups through the church's basement that was set up to simulate the scary, awful truth of the slave trade and a few of the stories of those who made it to freedom after making it to Canada. Many of the group felt amazed and somewhat terrified thinking about what it must have been like to risk so much and find freedom. 

After processing the experience as a group we headed over to a delicious lunch spot -Slow's- for some wonderful barbacue! We had quite a bit of food left over and went around asking people we walking by if they wanted any extras. It was a great chance to share stories with some local Detroiters.

After we parted ways with Our Savior's we headed downtown to the Cobo Center to experience some of the fun stuff they have to offer! Games, activities, worship prayer galore! We look forward to exploring more tomorrow.

The night ended with a bang as the Gathering finally began officially! We worshipped, prayed, sang, laughed, danced and cheered with 30,000 other Lutherans. Many in our group were challenged and inspired by the main speaker's message. He called us to Rise Up and not be silent for the things that matter. Especially those things Jesus would not be silent about.

We'll continue to process what this means for us as we go about our week. Hold is in prayer as we listen and learn from our peers tomorrow!

Here are some photo highlights:

Morning stretches outside the hotel led by Jenny

Outside First Congregational Church before our Underground Railroad simulation

Before our tour

They gave us apples to survive the the journey!

Lunch at Slow's

At Cobo!

Oh Canada

Hart Plaza

Yay!

Wow

Always fun trying to get 30,000 to where they need to be!

Tuesday In Detroit....Zoo, Ford Factory, Lots Of Laughs

Our first full day in Detroit started with a trip to the zoo.  As we were traveling we noticed all the run down neighborhoods, abandoned homes, amazing graffiti, abandoned factories, and some incredible street art. Our bus driver Nevin was a hoot and so much fun watching him navigate through the city of Detroit and his comments were hilarious...and he had the most incredible sneeze. :-)

The zoo was an incredible place to wander through out the day.  The weather was great...rain forecast, but only saw sprinkles.  But we did see lots and lots or animals with some of the favorites being the chimpanzees, giraffes, pair of wolves, and I think the favorite of all was the incredible penguin exhibit.  Our trip there was much too short, but we did take the train twice and it is nothing to write home about.

The Ford Rouge tour was very interesting for sure.  All of the automation on the factory floor was unbelievable.  I think our favorite spot of the whole tour was the windshield and back installation accomplished totally by robots..pretty crazy.  Not much for pictures here though, not allowed, unless we wanted to risk losing our cameras/cellphones and being sent to Ford penitentiary.   The kids did say this was one way they saw God at work here. They were amazed at the "green" factory and all the things being done by Ford for the environment and creating a sustainable business and energy savings.

When asked to describe the trip in one word we heard: laughter, fantastic, entertaining, trying, carefree, amazing, and stupendous.

When asked what else they would like to share they said they enjoyed dancing in the rain, playing catch phrase at the hotel tonight, meeting new friends and those incredible penguins.  Olivia reenacted how they stood waiting for food.

It was an incredible day for all of us...what will God have in store for us tomorrow? We will venture out to a local church that was instrumental in providing safe passage at the end of the underground railroad. And then the Gathering officially begins!  Good night from Detroit...be sure to follow us live tomorrow night.

Ninja Dan

 Getting ready for the awesome day ahead!

 Kaylee and Anna are great at reenacting every poster they see

 Olivia was yelling "giddy up, horsey" for a while. We finally had to break it to her that she was riding a tortoise

 The gorilla looked at our group and said "how you doin'?"

What an evenly spaced group getting ready to visit the Ford Rouge Factory

 Dancing in the rain

 Brady's FIRST TIME eating at Taco Bell!!!

 A great night of hilarity playing Catch Phrase as a group

 Did you know Detroit has a small population of surviving dinosaurs. Ninja Dan(alad) protected us from them.

All in all a great day!

Livestream of Mass Gathering Starts Tomorrow!

For all of you wanting to watch each night's Mass Gathering, we have a schedule to help you know when and where to tune in. Just got to www.elca.org/gathering at the times below and a lifestream video should allow you to see what we're doing at Ford Field!

We are a looking forward to our first mass gathering starting tomorrow night with some incredible musicians and speakers, including our Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton! Check here for details on each of the speakers and musicians that will be leading us each night.

We hope you'll join us in the Gathering experience from your home!

Detroit Bound

We're almost there! After being on the road for quite a few hours, we're all happy to report we're just an hour or so away from our hotel.

Today has mostly been spent in our cozy (albeit chilly) bus seats passing the time as the states fly by. The Good Earth Village team has been leading us and the other groups in a few get-to-know you games. The girls have been passing the time napping, making a multitude of bracelets for our group, eating delicious treats and laughing. Check out the pics below for a few highlights from our day!

Getting our first notes from our Zion prayer partners. (Shout out to all those who are lifting us up during our time in Detroit -- we love you!)

One more group pic before we hit the road. A+ for the whole group being on time today!

Our first stretch break in Wisconsin

It took  some duct tape to finally get our TV working. But we wondered: how many church workers does it take...

Maddy and Flat Jesus enjoying a happy meal together  in Paw Paw, MI

Olivia experiencing her first trip to Burger  King! Brady showed her how it's done.

Kaylee and Olivia are entertaining the back of the bus with their rapping skills. 

Flat Jesus is so pumped he's almost made it to The Motor City!

Thanks for all your love and prayers today! We're excited to explore a bit of Detroit tomorrow. Check back for more pics and highlights!

Love,

The Zion Gathering Crew

Here We Go Again!

It's been 3 years since our wonderful, eye-opening and awesome trip to New Orleans for the National Youth Gathering. This summer, we're headed for another faith-forming experience but this time we'll be in Detroit! Won't you join us as we seek to live out the ELCA's motto "God's Work. Our Hands." on our travels.

Want to know more about what we'll be doing in Detroit? Please check out http://www.elca.org/YouthGathering

We won't be posting much until the Gathering gets closer but I hope you'll plan to join us on our adventures and to learn alongside us through this blog. We welcome your prayers both now and during our travels.

Anna Wencl
Zion Youth Director

Lip Dub Video

Scratch the last post! Here is the video from the first night at the Dome. If you drag the time to 1:30:00 on the bottom you will see Nikki and Mack leading the Lip Dub and the rest dancing behind with Vikings uniforms on. Enjoy!

Watch live streaming video from elcayouthgathering at livestream.com

Youtube It!

FYI, There is no video that I can find of our surprise Lip Dub performance on Wednesday night. However, there are lots of videos on Youtube of all of the speakers and different events held through out the week...check them out by going to this link: http://www.youtube.com/elcagathering

Let's Practice...Sharing!

We've been back from New Orleans for little over a week and we're ready to share all about it! Join our group this Sunday at 9am at Zion as we share about what we've learned and experienced about our faith and our God through the Gathering experience.

Youth Gathering participants, please wear your Orange Practice Justice shirts!

See you then!