Mime4Jesus - AIM Branson: News and Nolds

Do not let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set the example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity. I Timothy 4:12

May. 12, 2009

AIM Branson: News and Nolds

New: Bible studies in which everyone talks, everyone does their homework, and everyone finds something to apply to her life.

Nold (a combination of new and old: i.e. it’s happened before in Branson but not for a long time): Seventeen presenting members – girls outnumbered the guys, 10-7

New: Established structure that is very specific about which jobs belong to whom. This was extremely useful in many ways. We always knew who to go to when, say, someone needed a mime shirt or the props weren’t in place. Everyone also had an understudy so that each job was not only being performed, but taught to a younger (SALTnT or non-SALT) team member so that the job could be continued even if the SALT or leader left.

Nold: EIGHT SALTeam members! We had Ryan, Courtney, Melissa and I as SALT and Jo, Jarek, Madison and Josh as SALTnT – SALT in Training. It was really, really nice to have so many people – we can call on them in Bible study, expect more from them, have them teach songs, critique songs – you name it. It was great.

Nold: A teenage director. Not sure how old Andrew was when he was directing and I’m almost positive that Jared was a teen. Having Ryan direct this session was certainly a learning experience, especially for those of us who’ve been used to Tess directing for the past year and a half. Not bad at all… just different. He was directing as a part of his internship and he did a great job.

New: Practice schedules! Well, maybe it happened before at session training camps, but this session we’ve been having them EVERY week, which is really, really good. It’s helped us stay on track, know who’s teaching what, and when we’re behind schedule (never used to have a schedule).

Nold: Cleanup schedule. We’ve had them before, but usually the person to whom they were assigned would forget to write the cleaning schedule up until right before the end of practice *coughmecough* so it was always different, random, and uncoordinated. Courtney was in charge of cleaning and she set it up so everyone had the same assignment every week. Certainly makes things less complicated, and we have been doing a lot more cleaning for the church so it was really nice to have things planned out.

New: the table at the back of the room. It is now an official AIM Branson rule that everybody’s stuff has to be confined to that table (instead of being thrown all over the room). This has a) significantly decreased the amount of lost articles, thus making Kristi happy, b) greatly decreased general clutter, making the place look tidier, and c) made it much easier to clean up. Don’t know whose idea it was but it’s worked quite well.

New: SCHEDULED SALTeam mentorship. Those of us who were on the team two sessions ago would recall SALTeam mentorship as something that happened maybe twice a month and then for maybe seven minutes. The issue was that it was scheduled at the END of our SALTeam meeting, and of course, here at AIM Branson, we can stretch a meeting to fill the time allotted, so since we had no pressing deadline we’d just keep discussing till the team got there and we had no more time. This session things have been a bit different. The SALTeam mentorship has been scheduled every other week, before the SALTeam meeting, at 11:30. This gives us (ideally) thirty minutes to talk with our mentors, which is certainly much better than what we had previously.

All right, catching up: PAST PRESENTATIONS

Last last Thursday, 4/30, we had a presentation at College of the Ozarks’ Keeter Center – a very luxurious, top-of-the-line conference center. We presented in the Silver Dollar City Parlor (which you can see at this link: http://www.keetercenter.edu/meetings.asp?page=3), and though you might not be able to tell from the picture, the room was very long and skinny. The tables were situated to cover about 5/6 of the floor space (not covered by the armchairs by the fireplaces on each side of the room), and we presented in the long, thin strip of remaining stage room.

Of course, we knew none of this when we arrived thirty minutes early and set up to practice in the parking lot. We set up in a parking space right up against the curb and backed by a HUGE RC. Jorge pulled into the space to sort of close it off so it was a nice long skinny stage, which is what we needed to practice for. We ran Faithful twice and America Again at least once on the asphalt with the scent of cattle wafting in from the hills (yeah, it was pretty pungent). With much whispering (shhhh!!) and some complaints of holey holey holey gloves, we got through the two songs with decent practice – Faithful for that evening and America Again for the Final Presentation the next week.

We went inside, stood there for about two minutes, and went right onstage. Those moments were slightly frenzied. Apparently during those two minutes Tess told us to present to the RIGHT of the large table situated neatly in center stage, but (also apparently) most of us didn’t hear her, because when we went onstage maybe two people set up to the right of the table and the rest of us – myself included – trooped over to stage left and set up for Faithful.

Well, after violent protest by some team members we all grouped on stage left and presented the song. The stage was lengthy but not very deep, and never in my life have I presented to such a long audience. We had to stand facing the wall in order to be open enough for everyone to see what was going on, and even then we were so far away from the people on the fringes that I’m not sure if they could see. The song itself went pretty well even though some of us martyrs almost threw our “blood” into people’s dinner – we were so close to them.

We trooped offstage and ensued mad whispering with periodic rapid glances to the front to make sure the speaker wasn’t watching us. We should have been to the left of the table. Why weren’t we? Is the table going to be moved for Go? What about the Go banner? Does anybody know what’s going on? Can we communicate to the team that we have to be more open to the audience? Can we step out into the hallway? (Tess) Jessica, when you do the ending part in Go, you can’t go onto your knees; you have to die from a standing position. OK, now I REALLY need to step out into the hallway! Etc., etc. We all tried to sit their quietly and after about twenty minutes, with no fanfare (read: no warning), the guy said, “And now would you join me in welcoming back ACTION Impact Missions!”

Uh. Yeah. With great surprise we all jumped up, tucked our arms properly, and hurried onstage. Egroj and Ryan moved the table offstage and I, seeing no strong guys readily available, I grasped the podium to move it out of the way. The solid oak podium. The solid oak podium that weighed a ton. Trying to look professional and moving that podium at the same time was virtually impossible, and I scraped it across the floor as I moved it. “Be careful!” Jorge whispered as he walked past on his way offstage. Thanks, Jorge. You’re so helpful.

As for the song, very few things went wrong. Madison and I had a rapid conversation in the back which consisted of her asking, “I don’t have an angel cape, right?” and my slow realization turning into a cheerful, “Nope!” Other than that and a very few technical errors, the song went off flawlessly. Before I’d gone onstage I had been completely exhausted and to do the main part in that song requires SO much emotion. I told God that He was going to have to give me the strength and passion to do the part right ‘cause I was beat. And He did. It was amazing. Rarely have I ever experienced anything like that.

I died and the man in charge took the Bible from my hand and we all walked offstage, exhausted but glowing. We prayed – well, Egroj prayed – in the lobby to give it back to God and then we all split up, but it was amazing. It was great… it was a God thing.

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