Day 15 - Park View UMC

This morning we returned to Raleigh Court UMC and along with picking up the remaining equipment, we had our morning devotions led by Andy’s family group. Then we had some reflection time in our family groups. We were pleasantly surprised when Sarah and Rachel Hundley rejoined our group toward the end of our family group time. After the time at Raleigh Court, we left on the bus for Lynchburg. On the way, we stopped at Walmart to get some essential items for the remaining week of the trip. Several hours later, we arrived at Park View UMC, and divided our group for lunch at two fast food restaurants.

After returning with full stomachs and smiling faces, we met with the pastor of the church and were told a brief history of the remarkable church. We then had an option of various activities for the rest of the afternoon before convening for the concerts this evening. A few people took time to work on their Harry Potter shirts that they are going to wear for the movie on Friday.


Some people decided to go to the park nearby and play Frisbee or hang out at the pool.

Others stayed at the church and made Harry Potter tee-shirts or worked in the church’s food pantry which receives two tons of food a week, or the massive clothes closet.

At five o’clock, we gave a mini-concert to the homeless who receive a free dinner in Park View’s fellowship hall every Wednesday night.


After we ate a dinner graciously provided by members of the churches in the area, we prepared for our seven o’clock full concert in the sanctuary. We had a wonderful, spiritual, and moving concert to close out a long, fun day.

Unbeknownst to us, we would be spending the night at Camp Beulah in its dorms and in the closed church, which is on the premises. Park View UMC was unable to house all the youth and adults on the trip, so we were housed at the wonderful, lovely, pleasant, warm, friendly, bright, and happy camp.


Keeping you posted,

- Jeremy and Jordan, Voices of Youth Blogmasters

Raleigh Court UMC - Day 14

This morning we reported back to Gogginsville UMC from our host families at around 8:30 a.m. When we arrived, we learned that the only main road to our next destination was closed due to an accident. So being the fun, flexible people that we are, we changed our plans and decided to start our day with devotions and announcements in the church. After the devotions, we found out that the road had been re-opened so we got on the bus and left for Roanoke. The drive was much longer than usual, adding about an hour for the back-up traffic from the accident. Yet, once we saw the accident, we could understand why there had been such a delay in traffic with a 3-4 mile back-up.

When we arrived in Roanoke, we went straight to Raleigh Court UMC to drop off our suitcases and concert supplies.

We went out to eat at Grace's Place, a local pizza restaurant down the street from the church.

Afterward, we went out to work at West End United Methodist Church where we did some landscaping.

A few others continued on to Trinity United Methodist Church and washed a few vans.

Those at West End had a tour of the church which the pastor, David Tanner, informed us that there were parts of the church that had a lot of history. We were able to see the old architecture and the photos of all the previous pastors. After the group returned from Trinity UMC, we went back to Raleigh Court UMC and got ready for the concert.

We had a nice potluck dinner at the church with some of the congregation followed by a short devotion led by Katie's group. We had a successful concert and then we were off to our host families.


-David and Jordan, Voices of Youth Blogmasters

Gogginsville UMC - Day 13

Today we awoke from an interesting evening at the Knights Inn Motel and traveled to a local McDonalds and Sonic for breakfast. After a quick meal, we were on our way back to Virginia! We stopped for lunch along the way and eventually arrived at our first concert destination, Gogginsville UMC.



We had a warm welcome from the new pastor, the Burks family and Sarah H.'s grandparents. We unpacked all of our things and headed into the church.


After rehearsing for a little while and setting up all of the t-shirts, buttons, slide show, etc. we headed off to the building across the street for a potluck dinner with some of the congregation. We sang our blessing while holding hands with all of the people there and some were even brave enough to join us.

Concert time was quickly approaching so after dinner, we all went back to the church to put on our concert attire. We then met for a prayer outside to help us focus before the concert. The view of the mountains was spectacular!


We mingled with the congregation a little while and said hello to the District Superintendent and his wife that had worked with us in Mississippi and then started the concert.




We had some wonderful solos, especially one from Nick W. who was thrilled that we were singing at his home church. There were also two wonderful testimonies given by Jeremy H. and Elizabeth J. talking about the profound impact Voices of Youth can have on your life.



After the concert, everyone was matched up with their host families and headed off on their own separate ways. We were all really excited to meet those willing to house us and share our testimony with them.


I think the first night at host families was a success!


Keeping you posted,

-David and Jordan, Voices of Youth Blogmasters