Spring Term Blog

by Zack Shaffer, Upper School Faculty

Day One The Fellowship is Underway!

Our morning opened with nourishment—both spiritual and physical. We prayed for several spring term teams, reflected on Psalm 34:3 (especially the “together” part, since the first film focuses on the Fellowship of the Ring), and then swung by the grocery store to pick up some brain-food snacks for the week.

After watching a portion of the first film and introducing half the team to Mongolian barbecue (thank you, Yummy Yaki!), we spent the afternoon brainstorming and prepping for our ministry partner, Paulding Pregnancy Services. A big part of that time was spent composing over eighty handwritten thank-you notes for their donors. It may not sound flashy, but each card represented someone we prayed over—donors whose work helps save and better lives throughout Paulding County.

Tomorrow, Lord willing, the Fellowship will continue—both on screen and in real life—as we spend time with our prayer partners and assemble gift bags for Paulding Pregnancy Services’ male clients!

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Day Two 

Today’s LOTR ST26 continued its theme of fellowship and service.

After finishing The Fellowship of the Ring, we spent time playing with our lower school prayer partners and gave each of them a small Lord of the Rings trinket.

Following an early lunch, we headed out to shop for supplies and client gifts for Paulding Pregnancy Services. The afternoon was filled with creative gift-bag packing and a meaningful debrief. Several boys made a sharp connection between the Ring and idols in our own lives—things that captivate us and distract us from our responsibilities to pursue joy and love others well.

Many of the film’s heroes become heroes by embracing responsibility: Aragorn stepping into kingship, Sam faithfully caring for Frodo, and Frodo choosing to carry the Ring. These themes gave us a lot to reflect on as we prepare to serve.

We’re looking forward to blessing the Paulding Pregnancy Services team tomorrow!

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Day Three

Today, our “fellowship” sought first to serve and then to celebrate.

A Chick-fil-A breakfast fueled us to deliver our gift bags and other goodies to Paulding Pregnancy Services. We got to deliver the goods and brighten their day; our day was brightened and blessed to see where such important work goes on. The center seeks not just to save babies but to love people. One takeaway was the realization that the support of the father is the most important factor in whether or not a woman keeps her baby—important stuff for a group of young men to learn! One of the big themes in LOTR has been to take on responsibility to help others, so that piece of counsel fit right in with our themes (and with Proverbs 14:4: “Where there is no ox, the manger is clean, but much revenue comes by way of the ox.”). So here’s to dirty mangers and hard, good responsibilities!

Hobbits and elves love to celebrate with food and company, so our afternoon consisted of Big Air Trampoline Park: lots of obstacle courses, dodgeball, trampoline volleyball, pit-jumping, tricks, American Gladiator beam combat, and all kinds of fun. The boys handled themselves both kindly and competitively; it was a terrific time.

As one student summarized it, “We furthered our communion and fellowship in a godly manner, learned what it looks like to give back to the community as a generous and loving Christian, and tried our best to connect what we did and saw to the Lord. We also prayed over the pregnancy center ourselves and other spring terms.”

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Day Four

The ST26 LOTR group concluded much of its service yesterday, so today we largely watched and debriefed The Two Towers (with a few games of hacky sack here and there).

The day started with a debrief of our trip to Paulding Pregnancy Services (including unpacking the goodie bag they made us) and praying for ourselves and other spring term teams (we’ve been praying for a set of four every day so we pray for each one over the course of the week).

As we discussed the film and applied the reflections of Jesus’ majesty we see in it, one focus was on how evil is often sweet in the short run and painful in the long run, while good is often painful in the short run and sweet in the long run. An enjoyable, leisurely lunch feast gave us ample opportunity to reflect and debrief (and develop our skills as critical viewers, unpackers, and appliers of media).