All you wanted to know but afraid to ask

Hi all,

Have you ever wondered what your parents did or talk about when they attend the CANOPY meetings (or was it called the NOSEY meetings). Let me share some light on what we (yes, we, I am involved too!) discussed and talked about.

By the way, CANOPY is an acroymn for Communing And Neighbouring Of Parents with Youths. It is more that we as parents are often not very good at being one. We need some practical help or tips or encouragement to enable us to relate ourselves and befriend you better in a parent-teenager relationship. These CANOPY meetings are for us to talk about our failures as parents, our shortcomings, our desires to be better parents, our yearnings to mentor you in the ways of the Lord, and seeking wisdom from others in the community who may have journeyed that path of our shortcomings before. We shall primarily be talking about ourselves, our relationship with the Lord, our relationship that ought to be with our spouses, our parenting skills (or the lack of it), and our praying together as a community of God's people.

We give you the assurance that YOU will not feature as a subject of our discussions. In rare occasions that we do, rest assure that we will definitely obtain your permission first. Failing to obtain your permission, we have no right to discuss you. We will not embarrass you nor will we disclose anything personal about you. We will also not be nosey!

We are meeting as a group because of the desire for us to form a community with like mindedness people. We hope to neigbour with one another as God desires us to be in a community. Some communities in Africa, requires that an entire community be entrusted to help raise up children, children not only from one's own family but children from others' families.

At the end of the day, YOU are precious to us and hence we shall demonstrate a decorum of taking your interests in our hearts. We want to do all we can with the Lord's help , to encourage that both our (you and I) characters may be characters that is a testament to being like Christ in all that we do.your lives. Not just now, but the rest of our lives.

Thank you.

Love,
U Gan (on behalf of all CANOPYers)

p/s I would certainly like to hear from you on what do you think you would like us to discuss in our CANOPY meetings? Specific topics are welcome too!

YA for next Saturday

Well if you know, next week, we are supposed to have participated the LRT Amazing Race. Since, none of our YA-ers are attending, (high entry fees being one of the reasons), there is a open slot for YA next week.

This is what I have been thinking:-

We shall have a Quiz of sorts.

GENERAL INFO:-
We shall divide ourselves into 3 groups. Each participant gets to choose a question from a category of their choice to answer. If gets to answer it first, failing which his/her group gets to anwer. Again, failing which, it is then opened to the other groups.

CATEGORIES OF QUIZ
Tentatively, we shall select from the below categories:-
a. Capitals of nations
b. Parables of Jesus
c. Lyrics of hymnals
d. Famous Quotations
e. Names of Bible Characters
f. Meaning of idioms/Expressions
g. Pictures of places/buildings
h. History
i. Random Trivial
j. Bible Knowledge
k. Sports

HOW THE QUIZ WORKS
Each category will have 5-6 questions. Each question in each category gets harder in sequence. First question of that category which is supposedly easier will be tagged with 5 points, and maybe the second question is worth 8 points which is harder than the first, and so on. You cannot jump to answer the 4th question if the 2nd question of that category has not been answered. Easy?

ADDITIONAL FUN RULES
1) Prior to the start of the quiz, each team is allowed to "bid" and "sell" for any players to be included in their team. Bidding and selling is done and payment is via points transfered. For example, if Team A & Team B both bid for player X from Team C, and if Team A wins Team B in bidding for the player in a tender process (because Team A pledge higher points to be paid to Team C), then Team A is liable to pay Team C the designated amount of points. Hence, points will be deducted from Team A and paid to Team C. Team C does not have the option not to sell the player. The only way that Team C can retain that player is to bid for their own player to be retained in the team by placing a value (in terms of points) secretly via a ballot. If the point placed by Team C is higher than any of the bidders, then player X is retained. However, Team C, is liable to lose the difference in points from the value of the highest other bidders. For example, if Team A & B bid secretly for a player at 15 and 12 points respectively, while Team C bids for own player at 18 points, then Team C will lose 3 points from total score. THERE CAN ONLY BE ONLY ONE BIDDING FOR PLAYERS FROM EACH TEAM.

2) If a team member cannot answer a question, the team or the individual can decide to buy a hint from the Master of Ceremony. However, the hint is only made know to the team and not the other teams. If the question has been opened to the other teams, any other team can also buy a hint.

3) Each team has a MULTIPLIER WILDCARD to play. Meaning, if answering a 10 point question, if the team is confident in answering the question favorably, the team can decide to play the WILDCARD prior to the reading of the question. If the team manages to answer that question favourably, then the team will stand to win 20 points instead due to the multiplication factor. Only one MULTIPLIER WILDCARD is allowed per team.

4) If you have any dispute to any proceedings of the quiz, you may raise your concerns and petitions to the MASTER REFEREE. Bringing your petitions to the MASTER REFEREE is not free and it will cost you some administrative points. However, if the MR judges in your favour, then the points will be returned to you. If unfavourably, the points will be forfeited.


So interesting enough??

Share your thoughts with me. Thanks. Bye got to get ready to fetch Amos for the YA Committee Meeting.

Appreciation notes

Thank you all for your kind and appreciate notes during the Bro & Sis Appreciation Nite. I am appreciative of what you have written and encouraged me. I truly hope and pray that we can be friends with you and vice versa. I promise to accept you for who you are and not who everybody thought you ought to be. I will remember not to judge you for only God judges us. While I want you all to grow spiritually, I want to help you see the benefits of a life that is lived for the Lord and an obedient life. The choice is all ours to make. I will want to listen to you first before I desire to speak, seeking to understand you first before being understood. I shall try my best to demonstrate to you I can be like one of you i.e. speaking your lingo, partake the things you liked to do, and filter your actions and things that you hold dear to, first seeing you through the eyes of a teenager and affectionating you regardless. I shall try my best to be authentic with you, living out what I profess. On occasions that I faltered, I seek yours and God's forgiveness. I shall have your best interests at heart and support you in your heart's best interests.

I echo Paul's prayer for the Phillippians, "that my prayer for you is that your love will abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and be pure and blameless until the day of Christ...."

Amen!