Youth PreCon 2007

The largest Youth PreCon in the last 30 years was held at Molalla Retreat in 2003. That year, as the staff was delayed due to train difficulties, 61 well-behaved campers arrived on site and began the process of impressing the camp owners.

Levi Bond, this year's Host Committee chariman, was serving as PreCon Business Manager and had the "opportunity" to function as the PreCon director for a little while. Eventually, the trains restarted, the staff arrived, Levi was able to depart, and Pastor David Thorngate took the reigns.

The size of that PreCon was a shock. We had not had a youth Pre-Con exceed 60 participants since the 1970s. Almost every Youth PreCon on the West Coast had been noticeably smaller than those on the East Coast or Mid-West. We planned for a PreCon of approximately 50 participants and assumed that that number was overly optimistic. And we were wrong.

Instead, there were lots of campers, lots of fun, and a group of youth was able to demonstrate that they knew God's Love and were willing to show it to each other and to the gracious owners of the camp, who expressed their appreciation for the attitudes and behaviors of the campers and invited to come back "if we are ever in the area again."

Well, we are in the area again, and we are going back to Molalla Retreat. Pastor Chris Mattison is gathering an excellent staff and planning a great program. If you are of the right age for PreCon, you'll want to be there. If you know somebody who is the right age for PreCon, encourage them to go. If God has given you the resources and the desire, do what you can to get them to this year's PreCon. Information is available in the May Sabbath Recorder and on the Board of Christian Education website.

(The two pictures in this article were taken at the 2001 PreCons. The top one was taken at Youth PreCon and shows crosses that were used to teach part of the lessons that year. The other was taken at Young Adult PreCon and shows them visiting Coronado Heights, a WPA project that is wonderful to visit. The pictures also appear on the PreCon page of the BCE website; the pictures on that page serve as links to larger versions with more detail.)