The students and some of their parents gathered at 5:00 p.m. for orientation. Half of the students this year are from outside Arkansas: Illinois, Iowa, Texas, Florida, Arizona, California, Tennessee, Ohio and Virginia. |
Probe's president Dr. Ray Bohlin welcomed everyone, introduced the other Probe staff, and gave an overview of what we will be covering this week. (For a look at the schedule, click here.) |
First thing on the agenda was a wonderful fajita dinner. Chef Ted used to be the head banquet chef for Tavern on the Green in New York City, and is an incredible chef. This is highly unusual, EXCELLENT "camp food"!! |
Dinner was the first opportunity for the students to start to get to know each other and the Probe staff. |
There is no "staff table" at the Ozark Mind Games conference. We eat all our meals with the students, getting into all kinds of atypical conversations. Here, Greg Grooms engages some of the guys. Greg is director of the Probe Center at the University of Texas in Austin. Having spent 16 years at Swiss L'Abri with Dr. Francis Schaeffer, Greg is a great gift from the Lord to Probe and to everyone he ministers to. |
We took pictures of all the students with their nametags so the Probe folks could get to know who's who through our own in-house PowerPoint. Here are Karla Evans, KC Vetter and Stuart Torrance, who gets the prize for coming the longest distance and being the oldest student. Stuart came from Australia to experience Mind Games for himself, hoping to be able to launch a worldview education in that country. He asked at dinner how we pronounce the name of the conference center, and was told "OH-zark." He remarked that he'd been telling everyone he was coming to "Aah-zark" because where he's from, OZ means "Aussie" and is pronounced like Dorothy's country! |
At the conclusion of dinner, we were treated to a "gun show" by Scotty Wayne Wayne, the "root'nest, toot'nest, sharp-shoot'nest cowboy of all time." Scotty continues to make visits to us at various meals. |
Everyone showed their appreciation for Scotty's amazing marksmanship abilities with his plastic shoot-em-up pistols. |
The Ozark staff had prepared their version of a bucking bronco to ride: a decorated 55-gallon drum tied to trees with bungee ropes. The goal was to stay upright for eight seconds before being thrown off onto mats. Nobody quite made it, but Grant Nabholz did his best to show the rest of us how it's done. |
Michelle Sweeney held on longer than anybody else and made quite an impression. |
In the first session of the conference, Ray role-played an atheistic professor from the University of Texas at Dallas doing research on the religious beliefs of young people. He challenged several students to explain why they were Christians. . . and it was an effective way to show why everyone needed to be there, since most people had a hard time coming up with answers that satisfied him. Here, Tyler Bennett animatedly engages with "Professor Schwartz." |
Erin Singleton does her best to respond to the professor "in her face." Ray also had all of the students introduce themselves and tell why they were there. He invited honesty, acknowledging that saying "I'm here because my parents made me come" was perfectly acceptable. . . and, as always, there were a number of those. We're okay with that because by Wednesday, they're usually glad they're with us. Some of them even come back another year! Most of the students have come looking for help in defending their faith and in seach for better grounding in their understanding of a Christian worldview. |
The Ozark staff provided a memorable "Scream Swing in the Dark" after we finished the Sunday night session. Here, Emily Wood gets her harness checked. |
John Burris swinging, but not screaming. (The flash from the camera provided the only light. The swing happens in total pitch darkness!) |