The British Union Conference (BUC) Youth Day of Fellowship took place this year on Sabbath 26 January 2019 at the Dominion Centre in Wood Green, London. It was a day in which more than 2,200 youth travelled from all over the British Union ‒ Ireland, Scotland and Wales, North and South England.
This very simple, but powerful, idea of bringing the family together came about last year during a committee meeting; after spending some time in prayer, someone suggested that we try and bring the youth from the Union together. For those who do not know, the British Union is a territory that is quite large and includes the United Kingdom and Ireland, so it was never going to be easy to try to bring everybody together for the one day. For those of us sitting on that committee, which included the directors and sponsors from all the entities, the dream did come true and I am so thankful to God that we were able to find and work towards that one date.
For me, as the Youth Ministries director for the Union, it was important not to add another day to plan for the very busy Mission and Conference fields, (and also important that we would not take the young people away from any of the local events already planned in the various regions), so when the call was made for someone to open one of their existing planned dates to the whole Union, Pastor Anthony Fuller (South England Conference Youth Ministries director) said that he was the one who was willing to host the British Union Youth Day of Fellowship. So that is what happened – the SEC planned the day with Pastor Anthony, his coordinator Milimo Ninvalle and regional representatives working very hard to produce the programme and bring together the volunteers needed to run the event.
My contribution was to provide the food for over 2000 people and I called on the services of none other than the BUC Treasurer, Earl Ramharacksingh, who I have worked with so often in the past at events like these. I received many comments after the event to say how well-fed and watered people had been, not just from the food that Earl and his team were able to provide, but also the spiritual food from Pastor Anthony's sermon which truly inspired us.
At the end of his sermon, Pastor Anthony gave out a challenge and asked those in the room who were willing to rise to this challenge to come around the beautifully-decorated table on the stage – representing our closeness with Jesus but also representing the unity in our Union. He reminded us that it doesn't matter what region we come from, what culture or ethnicity we originate from, we are all the same in God's eyes. Many people answered the call that day.
Between feeding the multitudes and a shorter afternoon programme, the youth were able to use the precious moments afterwards to make new friends and reacquaint themselves with old friends. It was so beautiful to see the hugs, hear the laughter and to watch so many people with smiles on their faces as they talked with one another.
Now as this event passes into a sweet memory, I would like to say thank God for giving us this wonderful opportunity to come together in peace and worship His name. I would also like to thank every single regional Youth Ministries director and sponsor: Pastors Anthony Fuller, Adam Ramdin, David Rancić, Claudiu Popescu and the Irish Mission team, and their committee representatives who promoted and took part in this day – without their love and willingness to cooperate with the British Union, days like these would not take place.
It showed a small glimpse of what we can look forward to one day soon when Jesus comes again for a second time. Our Trans-European Division Youth Ministries director, Zlatko Musija was present at the event and prayed for God's blessing over everyone represented from the British Union.
We would ask that you also join us in praying for our youth so that not one young person within the British Union will be missed out when that great day comes.