F.R.O.G. - Youth Retreat 2006

Fully Rely On God was this years theme for Youth Retreat 2006. Everyone had fun, fun, fun learning how they can fully rely on God in everything they do. God gave us a beautiful day which started off with Worship in both English and Spanish. Our speaker Rev. Claudio Leal did not disappoint us. He used fitting examples of leaders who relied on God’s guidance and leadership to illustrate to our youths how great things can be achieved with God if we follow His direction and allow Him to use us.

To ensure that everyone fully understood the message Celina translated it into Spanish as it was shared. Many thanks to Celina for volunteering her assistance. Rev. Leal continued by encouraging us to pattern our lives after these persons and to stand out from the crowd by standing up for what is right in God’s sight. As a little entertainment he even hopped up on one of the table like a frog to demonstrate his frog-hopping abilities. We now have our very own Frogman here in Belize. This day was also a very special day for us because it was Rev. Claudio's birthday. He would like his age to remain unknown but we found out he is now 36. Don't worry Pastor, it's not your age that matters its how you feel!!!

A Scavenger Hunt was next on the agenda. We divided everyone into four teams and we began the scavenger hunt where they had to find a list of items which included a live frog, a live tadpole and a live cricket. Only one team managed to find a live frog!

This was followed by an obstacle course where different members of the teams had to fill a water bottle with water using a small scoop, string a needle through a thread, walk with a lime in a spoon that was in their mouth,

juggle some balls while walking, run through some cones to pick up tennis balls and finally eat some flies (not really) and hop like a frog to the finish line.

This was really a lot of fun and the team that finished with the best time was declared the winner.

We followed this up with a sack race for the boys, then the girls, and finally the older men.


Emmanuel, Jazell and Claudio won for their respective categories.

A piñata was next in line for the outdoor activities. They were given a piece of string to hold and on the count of three they pulled the strings and the bottom of the frog piñata fell out showering them with candy.


Finally the day came to an end with a contest where each team was given supplies and thirty minutes to dress one of their team members like a frog. Then the frogs were asked come to the front fully dressed and to croak like real frogs. We had two male frogs and two female frogs. They all did so well that the judges had trouble deciding who the winner was so they ended up giving each of them a prize.


Most of the churches in the Methodist Protestant Conference were well represented at this Youth Retreat and the youths had a chance to intermingle with the youths from the other churches they had not seen since July. It was truly an enjoyable event and we were glad to see so many youths come out to have fun while learning about God. Before the youths left for their respective destinations they were all give little frog tokens to take home with them so they could have something to remind them that they are to Fully Rely On God for everything.