Koinonia Christian Campus Fellowship – UC Berkeley Club

This past weekend, the upperclassmen from A2F, Kairos, and Koinonia had a combined discipleship retreat with Pastor Ed and Kelly at Sierra Lodge where we had a time of fellowship, studying God’s Word, and casting visions together.

Those of us who were able to get a day off of work, don’t have class on Fridays, or just wanted to chill, headed up to Sierra Lodge early and spent the day at Lake Tahoe. We had an awesome time swimming and kayaking in the lake, trying to catch little fish with our bare hands (which proved to be impossible), and getting our friends as wet as possible without capsizing our own kayaks. I’m sure we all returned to Sierra Lodge several shades darker than we were when we first left it.

When the rest of the upperclassmen arrived Friday night (for a total of 120 students/staff!), we got started right away as Pastor Ed and Kelly started off the retreat with our first session—a review of the gospel through Genesis, and the theme of entrustment as shown in 2 Timothy. We were all reminded of the life changing treasure that each of us has been entrusted with, how we have received the gospel message through reliable men, and how we are also called to become those reliable men who preserve and guard this treasure.

Other sessions throughout the weekend included reflecting on the picture of wisdom illustrated in the book of Proverbs, looking at Apostle Paul’s relationships and reevaluating our own criteria for feeling close to people, and listening to an inspiring message, “the local church is the hope of the world,” by Bill Hybels.

Hearty meals (bomb pulled-pork-sandwiches), fun at the lake, singing hymns around the campfire, late-night basketball fellowship, and simply spending the weekend with all of our peers really put the icing on the cake.

We ended our time at the retreat with a time of casting visions of where our church will be in 10 years. Expansion of our Interhigh ministry, homegrown leaders in our sister church in Taiwan, church plants at every UC—let’s remain faithful in sharing the gospel and maturing spiritually so that these visions may become a reality!