Four Arkadelphia churches came together last weekend to host One Weekend, a community wide Disciple Now program. One Weekend involved about 200 students from sixth to 12th grades coming together to engage in worship, activities, games and ministry service projects. First, Second, Park Hill and Third Street Baptist churches participated.
“We’ve been working together for quite a few years now, and it’s one of those [events] where we can pull our resources and collectively do more as a team than we could as individuals,” said Jason Bean, the youth minister at Park Hill Baptist Church. “We have a group of youth ministers in town that collaborate together for a few things we do throughout the year, and One Weekend is the biggest thing we do for that. We started planning in the fall and met regularly to find speakers and bands and plan the activities.”
Bean’s involvement this year included writing the curriculum for one of the breakout sessions that the students participated in. He also acted as the group’s treasurer.
“I wrote the checks and planned the meals,” he said. “I’d order the pizzas and get the plates and things like that. Then other guys would take care of hosting speakers and bands.”
The students met in the Tiger Den last Friday evening for dinner and a large worship session. On Saturday morning, the students met for a small worship session, were given sack lunches and then went out into the town to do service projects.
“Our group visited a nursing home in town — Court Yard Gardens,” said Jim Darby, the associate pastor for youth and family at First Baptist Church. “We had some of the high school students go and visit residents there, and it was a good chance for them to have contact with people that they normally wouldn’t and hopefully make there day a little bit better.”
Ouachita provided the use of its facilities for the students.
“It has definitely been a huge asset to have Ouachita provide their facilities to us at no cost,” Bean said. “Because of the large number of kids we’re bringing together, individual churches cannot host it, and it’s also a nice neutral site that we can work with.”
In the past, there were usually more than just churches involved with One Weekend.
“Traditionally, we try to include all the churches in town, and we’d normally have a lot of other denominations involved,” Bean said. “But this year, the ones that are normally active are unable to participate because of scheduling issues.”
According to Bean, First United Methodist Church has always played a big part in making One Weekend happen, as has Trinity Assembly of God and Fellowship Church.
Zach Waggoner, a freshman Biblical studies major, is an intern at Park Hill Baptist and led a group of young students.
“I had five middle school boys,” he said. “I led a devotional time each morning and night, except Sunday. [I] was basically responsible for watching after these kids. At the beginning of the weekend it was really difficult to get everyone to be still and listen to what I was saying and they were hard to manage, but they all behaved better as the weekend progressed.”
Waggoner, a native of Arkadelphia, spoke of his experiences with One Weekend when he was younger.
“I had gone to One Weekend as a student probably three times before and had a blast at each one of them,” he said. “It was so awesome to be able to do that. I can remember my college intern and how he led and how through God he impacted my life. I will always be thankful for him and my youth pastors.”
The purpose of One Weekend is to bring together students, regardless of church home or denomination, and to worship God and serve as Christ did.
“I feel like on the big picture, we’re showing our students that collectively we’re greater than we are individually,” Bean said. “And by letting them come together with multiple churches, they realize that they’re part of a bigger church body.”
The churches working together served to bring a fruitful experience to those involved.
“The spirit of community between the churches in Arkadelphia is really good in my experience,” Darby said. “Especially with the youth programs, the other youth ministers do a great job, and we don’t really view each other as competition so much as partners in ministry. It has been a wonderful experience for me getting to work with them and to try and reach students in Arkadelphia with the Gospel.”
Picture by Heather Francis.
