AMP @ North Texas District Fine Arts

This past Friday I took a group of 20 students to Waxahachie, Texas, to compete in various Art, Drama, Music, and Communication categories against hundreds of churches across North Texas. These students were able to use their God-given talents and abilities in categories such as Worship Team, Christian Band, Graphic Design, Traditional Photography, Children's Lesson, Human Video, Drama Group, First Person Essay, T-Shirt Design, Instrumental Ensemble, and many others.

We hopped into multiple vans and loaded our clothes and equipment into the trailer and drove 35 miles to our destination.

We showed up at the college, unloaded into our rooms, checked into the festival, and immediately took off to get to our first competition.

The Story Sweepers were our group of girls who presented a Group Children's Lesson. These girls ended up winning the Merit Award for 1st Place in their category and were invited to Nationals in Orlando Florida.
Throughout the day on Friday we rushed from one event to the next with little time in between to rest. Olivia did her Children's Lesson, then the AMP Worship Team presented their two songs. Alanna performed her Children's Lesson and the Puppet Group their presentation. The AMP Players then presented their drama to a room full of hot and sweaty people. The building we were in had just lost air conditioning earlier that day and we were all sweating like pigs.

This is a picture of the hallway before we entered
the room to compete.

Sweaty.

The Human Video, iAMPi, then performed in a large gym in front of over 100 people, and we concluded the night with a stellar performance from Disciple's Hope in the Christian Band category.

Saturday was less stressful than the previous day. We woke up early and went to Alanna's Flute Solo and then straight to Jonathan's Drum Solo. Matt Briggs later performed a piece that he wrote for Keyboard Solo. We concluded the day with an incredible Flute Duet from Reedless.

When we received our scores we went into a secluded area and went nuts. Group after group received a "Superior with Invitation" - the highest award and an invitation to National Fine Arts in Orlando, Florida.

At the Awards Ceremony, we watched with anticipation as categories were called and the TOP 3 from each were announced to a room of over 2,000 people. When all was said and done, Alanna's Children Lesson, The AMP Players, Reedless, Alanna and Olivia's First Person Essays, and The Story Sweepers all made TOP 3 in their individual categories.

And topping off the entire trip, The Story Sweepers won the Merit Award for 1st Place Group Children's Lesson.

We will all be traveling to Nationals in three months. Keep AMP Student Ministries in your thoughts and prayers and we would love to have your support. This is fun and competion, but we want to use these talents and presentations that we have worked so hard on and use them to bring people into the kingdom of God.