The Mission’s Valentine Event

Since 2005, each February, save one, has brought The Mission’s Valentines Event. What began as a small musical/dance production by ten or so students that drew around fifty in attendance grew into a musical-movie-drama requiring forty or so workers, and drawing nearly 400 in attendance. This year’s Valentines event added a new element: food. The Mission hosted its first Valentines Dinner Theater on Saturday, February 6th at Olivet Baptist Church.

The drama, “Love Please, Nothing Else,” told the story of Sara, a girl whose rosy outlook on the world grew dark as she faced rejection and betrayal at school. In the end she realizes that even though the world isn’t as great as she hoped, she doesn’t have to give in to its ways, and instead decides to believe in love and hope.

After the drama, I shared about how the world isn’t the world we all want, but God has promised to someday give us that world. I told about how Jesus gave us a glimpse of that world by bringing joy where there was sadness, life where there was death and health where there had been sickness. I challenged the audience to consider Jesus’ claim to be the one through which God would bring the world we all want, and to give him a fair look by reading about him in the Bible. Some students took home a New Testament.

The following day, at our regular Sunday service, I challenged our students to engage their friends in conversations about the event. I reminded them that this would be one of the easiest, and most natural times to ask them questions about what they think about Jesus, and then share what they themselves believe. We continue to pray for the harvest that will come.

If you would like to see pictures and video from the event, you can see them at www.themission.cc.

I would like to give a special thanks to Olivet Baptist Church, for the use of their building and Pastor Ron Pracht, for the time he helped us while we were using their building, I’d also like to thank Sharon Baptist Church, and Midway Baptist Church for allowing us to use their vans to transport students from Wichita State to Olivet Baptist Church. I would also like to credit the evangelistic Bible study book “The World We All Want” by Tim Chester & Steve Timmis, for the inspiration for the message.