Jesus For All Minds Church recently organised a very special outing for its members at Marina Barrage.
Located at the southernmost tip of Singapore’s main island, the Marina Barrage is a great place to play, picnic and fly kites. A day out at the Barrage is a treat for anybody, including the 170 members of City Harvest Church who participated in the outing, Make My Day on Mar 25.
Make My Day was an event that promoted inclusiveness within CHC: it presented an opportunity for CHC members to volunteer and be a blessing to the members of JAMs church. JAMs is CHC’s service for the intellectually-disabled.
The group spent the day enjoying a picnic and some games in the breezy outdoors. A total of 109 volunteers turned up for the event, divided into two groups handling different tasks. The first group helped in the bussing program, bring the JAMs members to Marina Barrage, and later playing games and spending time with their beneficiaries.
The other group of volunteers assumed the role of stationmasters. Dressed in red tops, the volunteers started the day at 9 am with a mass briefing for the volunteers about the games that were to be played. The group was divided into four with different team leaders.
When the JAMs members arrived, the games began. They were spurred on by loud cheering and clapping as they proceeded from station to station.
“Our station required the JAMs members to line up in a row with us to take a wefie,” explained stationmaster Stefanie Pan, 24. “However, the game was not so simple. The players had to line up according to their age, birthdays or the lengths of their index fingers!”
Other games include a modified version of “musical chairs” which replaced chairs with newspapers.
After completing the games, each JAMs member was rewarded a mini “picnic pack” consisting of snacks and a packet of drink. Volunteers mingled with the JAMs members as they enjoyed their picnic packs while waiting for their ride home.
Before the volunteers left, JAMs Church’s pastor Lily Yong gave out a token of appreciation to each volunteer. She also thanked them spending their Saturday morning being a blessing to the JAMs members.
Vivian Teng, 23, a student and a first-time JAMs volunteer said, “I came with a heart that wanted to bless the people. In the end, I was even more blessed. I see child-like faith in these JAMs members; they are so pure and innocent, always humming praise songs, shouting ‘Amen!’, loving Jesus and caring for the ones they love. I would love to go back and volunteer with JAMs again!”
