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Waterloo chapter held a fall retreat in Five Oaks Camp, Paris, Ontario on Oct 1,2 with a theme of “First”. Andy talked about what should be our top priority in life on Matthew 22:37,38, “Love the Lord with you God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.” We shared our response to the message in small groups. In the evening, Clara Yoon talked about  the things that hold us back from loving God, based on the story of Jesus healing the invalid man, including her personal testimony.  That night, God opened many peoples’ hearts.  We praised the Lord and enjoyed friendship, sitting around the camp fire until midnight. The next day, after hiking along with the Grand River, Matthew Northey encouraged us to seek God and his kingdom first based on Matthew 6:33 and Mark 13:10, testifying how God blessed his university days when he sought God first in the midst of his busy engineering studies.

After the message, we split into two groups by gender.  Many shared their stories in honesty with open hearts. At each meeting, Kris and David led creative icebreaker activities and the worship team served worship, which helped to open people’s hearts widely to hear the messages. This retreat was organized by student leaders.  Senior leaders supported them by praying and cooking food for them.  We all came back with a new desire to love and seek God first. Praise God for blessing our fall retreat!

Joshua Yoon