On Thursday, 9/16, all our high school students and teachers went on our Annual High School Retreat, which was once again held at Camp CONNRI in Ashford. For the students, the day began at 9:15 AM as they were dropped off under threatening clouds and an outlook of rain. The forecast didn’t dampen spirits, though, as students focused on our Great Provider of strength and encouragement as an impactful time of worship and bonding commenced.
Students and staff were blessed this year to have Captain Bryan Bywater, Ministry Director of Church Army USA in Hartford, as our keynote speaker. His messages centered on the need to remember how firmly our roots must always be planted in God’s Word, and the importance of being and inviting others to become disciples of Jesus. Aaron Roszczewski, Oliver Toal and Danielle Toal did a great job leading us in our worship times together, too.
Much to our delight, as the Son took over our hearts, the sun quickly took over the sky, leading to a picture-perfect day! In addition to spending some time with our Lord in prayer and thought and some free time with one another, Mr. Press led us in some fun team activities. He and Mr. Clark also prepared and led our 11th Annual Best of CCS class competitions, where each grade competed against the others to see who could eat a pie plate of whipped cream the fastest (with Ms. Butler trying to make a hard press for first place), who could read a
baby board book most dramatically, who had the best overall talent, and more! Our seniors and freshmen tied for first place (which is a first for any freshmen class!), but the tie was broken by the seniors in a last game of Rock, Scissors, Paper with the seniors taking the final win. (You may have noticed they had a spirit day the following day as the winners!)
In addition to pizza for lunch and a turkey dinner for supper, we were able to finish the day with an evening time of sharing around the campfire while roasting marshmallows for s’mores. Our sweet day of retreat ended with 8:00 PM pick-ups by parents; it was such a special time that we are hoping to do something like it again in the spring!