One of the best week of prayers at CA took place from August 17 to August 21. Orchard Park Church’s senior pastor, Martin Lister, spoke about living in a cross culture and made many points that we all needed to hear. My heart felt renewed and joyful after the week was through.

All week, I felt myself questioning my beliefs. Pastor Lister got up on his podium and shouted the good word in our faces. He held nothing back. For most of us, we needed that to happen. We do not need someone telling us the Word as it is always presented; we need it exclaimed into our minds. If we were not awake before chapel, we surely woke up during it.

Week of prayer, however, was not just laughing at the expense of others who had fallen asleep; it was a whole school growing closer through the message put into a new light. The cross culture idea that we learned about should not only be applied in our churches but also in our school. Collegedale Academy is in need of some major blending—a crossing of the cultures at the foot of the cross.

The last day of Week of Prayer is always the best. All of the week’s topics and ideas just come together. At the very end when Pastor Lister spoke on how cross culture at its core is about the cross—Jesus Christ coming down to die for us, taking the burden off each and every one of our shoulders, carrying those burdens, and receiving scars as proof—I got chills.

It was an honor to have Pastor Lister refresh the idea of Christ saving our lives. We should think 24/7 about how we have a literal savior who cares so much about us and looks out for us daily. He deeply cares specifically for each of us. If that is not something to be excited about, I do not know what is.