Our elementary chapel service took place on Thursday morning this week, as the gym will be occupied on Friday morning by Edge Imaging who will be here for class photos and individual portraits of our JK to Grade 8 students.
A trio of Grade 8 students led the pledges, O Canada, the Lord’s Prayer and the Land Acknowledgement. Mrs. V then opened in prayer, asking God to help us learn what it means to walk with integrity. The first song was “From The Inside Out” by Joel Houston.
Mrs. V then led the students in reading together the chosen Bible verse about integrity from Proverbs 27:19. This was followed by reading two slides about how leaders with integrity behave.
Next, several students in grades 6 and 7 helped the teachers lead the singing of “The Wise Man Built His House Upon the Rock / Don’t Build Your House on the Sandy Land” with lots of actions.
Just like in the previous weeks, the audience watched a video entitled “CRISP Kid Questions – Topic of Integrity”. It featured a variety of Wesley students sharing their thoughts about “What is integrity?” and “Why do CRISP leaders need to show integrity?”
Our guest speaker this week was Jake Wilson (aka “Captain”) from Willow Springs Camp. He introduced himself as a follower of Christ, a dad of 3 children and the oldest of 5 siblings. After telling some stories about his kids and his youngest brother, he decided to explain why leadership is important before he dove into today’s topic about integrity. He shared that leadership is about influence. As Christians, we can use that influence to help others know Jesus. Captain used the example of Paul from the Bible. Paul had accomplished a great deal in the eyes of men (e.g. knowledge, status, titles, etc.) but he considered all of it to be a “loss”. What he had of value was his hope and relationship with Jesus. Next, Captain talked about integrity and the need to have consistency – just like a watermelon that is cut at different points – each section still needs to be a watermelon and not something else. However, to always demonstrate integrity is no easy feat. Then, Captain shared 2 Corinthians 5:17, which talks about being a new creation if we are “in Christ”. If we identify as being in unity with Christ, we will slowly be transformed, and people who are looking for Christ will find us and see Jesus in us. Together, we would grow as a community of faith. To conclude, Captain challenged the audience to pick a Gospel, read about the character of Jesus, and see the integrity in the way that He lived and treated others. Then, he prayed, asking Jesus to help us not to identify with the world but to be radically transformed and be like minded with Christ so we can see God’s glory all around us.
To end the service, Mrs. V led the students in reading an aspirational passage, which is the hope of being a CRISP leader.
