REFLECTIONS BACKPACKERS 21
or 40 something or......?
This year sees the 21st season of ‘Backpackers’. This
came about when the ‘Local Ecumenical Project’ (an
association of Anglican, Methodist, United Reform and Trinity Baptist
Churches) formed a committee to explore the possibility of holding
a Holiday Bible Club in Chesham Park. All the churches in the
town were invited to send representatives and as a result of their
recommendations a joint churches Backpackers Committee was formed
which resulted in Backpackers 1991 held on Chesham football ground.
To discover the true origins
we have to go back much further, a cutting from the Bucks Examiner
dated August 20th 1971 tells of a ‘Holiday Club’ run
jointly by the Anglican and Broadway Baptist churches. Over
150 children attended; morning sessions included a serial film and
the modelling of scenes from the story of Noah. After a lunch
break the children played rounders, cricket and other games in the
park. The organisers
and leaders of this Holiday Bible Club were David and Margaret Goodgame
from Emmanuel Church.
However even earlier than,
this some 43 years ago (1968) ‘Parish Life’ the
magazine of the Anglican church reported:-
The call for child evangelism is clear enough in the NT and
here in Chesham it has meant, the sound of singing to a guitar,
team games, film shows, paper, paint and glue! for this was the
week of the Holiday Bible Club.
The aim of Stephen English,
a C.S.S.M staff worker, his team of young people and local church
members was to give the children a happy time and, above all, to
teach them in simple terms about the Lord Jesus Christ and what
he did for them on the Cross.
Each morning there were choruses sung to
modern tunes, a serial story of Pilgrim’s Progress accompanied
by a film strip after which the children worked in small groups
to produce a tabletop model of Pilgrim’s journey. Games occupied
most of the afternoon. Then, after a drink and several choruses,
there was a period of bible study. The older children returned
in the evening for bible quizzes, competitions and a talk presenting
the gospel in a way the children could apply to their lives.
On the Saturday afternoon the church hall
was packed with children and their parents for the final celebration.
Sounds just like Backpackers to me!!
Thanks to David Haddock
for supplying this news article and to Pam Leach for supplying
the Bucks Examiner cutting and to David and Margaret Goodgame for
alerting David to the fact that 2008 was the 40th anniversary of
the first Holiday Bible club, or was it? If you were
involved in an even earlier HBC do let us know.
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