Aurea

"Value." Matt started and I sighed, sinking back into my seat. When speeches started with a single word, you knew it was going to be a long, boring spiel that would leave you refreshed when you woke up from a nice, long nap at the end. Getting comfortable, I opened up my ears to listen to Matt's talk as white noise to help me fall asleep.

"Does it ever really diminish? Is it something that material things from the world can take away? Or can we balance it out, like a scale?" Matt nodded to Elise, who carried over a table with a scale on the top that had jelly beans, an even amount, on either side. Another scale was under the one on top, resting on a small shelf in the legs of the table.

Matt ate one of the beans as a joke, and the room hummed with the buzz of laughter. He winked and pulled another bean out of his pocket, setting it on the scale so everything was even again. "Let's give this a little test, shall we?" Matt said. "This scale is you when you're born. No faults, but you haven't done anything too spectacular either. Your good deeds balance out the bad, as there is none other either.

"Now, let's say you turn about two. You're just learning how to walk, and accidentally knock over mom's brand new vase." He eyed one of the kids in the crowd who was most likely his son, judging how he was sinking into his chair shamefully. A few of his buddies rapped him on the back and he laughed along with him, knowing it was so long ago.

Matt rolled his eyes playfully at his son and continued. "Now, you're bad deeds," Matt brought out a small sign labeled 'bad' from behind the scale and placed it in front of one of the sides of the scale. "Outweighs the good that you've done, which isn't much, because you're only two, what have you done that's so fantastic? So, now the world views you as less valued because you've done a bad thing. So," Matt said, and moved about ten jelly beans from the other side of the scale to the 'bad' side.

With that, Matt pulled out another paper labeled 'good' and put it in front of the side of the scale with less jelly beans, which was now hoisted slightly up in the air. "Now, let's say you're five years old. You just made dad breakfast in bed for fathers day, with the help of mom of course. That gets you a lot of brownie points in most father's books, especially mine, so you've done so much good, you're now seen as very valued in my world." Picking up a handful of about twenty jelly beans, Matt moved them to the other side of the scale. "Now, as seen from a worldly view, you're valued!"

Matt dusted the sugary coating of the jelly beans off on his pants and continued. "Now, you're ten, and have just crashed your bike that your uncle just bought for you." Matt looked over to a man that looked sort of similar to him that was standing off to the side. He chucked a little bit and looked over to Matt's son who shrugged in a 'whoops' kind of fashion. "Your whole family is mad at you, and your best friend who's turn it almost was on the new toy. So, you're pretty much feeling hated by the world at this point." On that note, Matt picked up almost all the jelly beans on the 'good' side and moved them to the 'bad' side, and the bad side weighed heavily to the ground, the clear winner of the weight-in-jelly-beans contest.

"Now," Matt said, pulling out the scale from underneath the table and putting it out front, and laying the other scale with all the jelly beans on the floor. "This is God's scale of your value, and also that of this Church community." Matt reached behind him and pulled off of the podium a bag of golden chocolate coins. "We're just using these because someone," He glared at Sari, who blushed. "Ate the rest of the jelly beans, and God is golden, so he gets the gold."

I rolled my eyes. It was going to take a million years for Matt to count out all the coins and make sure they were even on both sides. Before he started anything, though, he labeled one side 'sins' and the other side 'holy'. Matt opened the bag of chocolate coins, and before I could even sigh, he poured all the coins onto the 'sins' side of the scale. I sat up, slightly intrigued at this.

"Can anyone tell me why all the coins are on the sins side of the table?" Matt asked, scanning the crowd. He pointed to a girl with a short ponytail and bright blue glasses. "Martha?"

Martha smiled, pleased that she was picked out of the twenty or so more-than-willing volunteers. "Because of Original Sin?" She said. Matt nodded and she crossed her arms, satisfied that she had had the correct answer.

"That's right." Matt said. "Now, I'm going to fast forward to your baptism." He pushed all the coins over to the 'holy' side. I furrowed my brow, realizing something about the scale. It never tipped either way, no matter where Matt was putting the coins.

"And now, when you crashed the bike." Matt pushed ten coins over to the 'sin' side. "And then when you lied to the teacher in school." He put fifteen more on the 'sins' end. "Finally, when you break mom's new lamp, you've had enough of feeling bad." Matt finished as he moved the last batch of coins over to the 'sins' side. "So, you head on down to Reconciliation." Carefully, he moved all the coins back to the 'holy' side. "So, can anyone tell me something they observed about this scale?"

Mary Rose raised her hand from the front of the room, waving it around rapidly like a palm tree in the wind. "Yes, Mary Rose?" Matt asked, turning his attention to her, along with the rest of the room. I even found myself tuning in to listen to her response.

"The scale never tipped!" She exclaimed.

"And do you know why?" Matt asked.

"Because," Mary Rose said. "In God's eyes, no one's value is lessened by the pain of sin or increased by our good deeds or connection to him. We all start out the same, and we all finish the same, because we're all his, so we're all worth it." A small round of applause followed Mary Rose's response and she blushed, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Very well done!" Matt nodded in approval. "So, to wrap up my talk, although Mary Rose pretty much did that for me," He laughed, and Mary Rose giggled. "We all are of value, and of the same value to God and what should be to each other, from life until death. Nothing can take away our importance from this world, and we will have all of it and more in the next. Thank you all." Matt nodded and walked off to the side, giving his microphone to Sari, and everyone erupted into applause.

Once everything had died down a bit, Sari tapped the microphone and began speaking. "Another round of applause for Matt?" She said, and the crowd started up again, dying down faster this time. Surprisingly, I found my hands subconsciously clapping together as well. "That was fantastic," Sari gushed and took a second to pull herself together before continuing. These people sure got into this stuff. "Alright, next we just have a little free time for you all to talk among yourselves, followed by a game at three, and then some time to prepare before Adoration before dinner. Sound good?" She asked, to a reply of cheers. "Okay, break!"

Before I could even gather my bearings, everyone and everything was in motion. The boys were already wrestling around, and two boys and one girl were dragging out some octagon that everyone had been obsessing over earlier. Nearly everyone's attention shifted over to that activity, and people started taking off their shoes eagerly, although some were already permanently barefoot, as it seemed.

I stood on the outside away from the crowd that was now squeezing into the octagon. A girl who wore jail breads and a red shirt that said 'GOT JESUS?' on it walked up to me. She didn't seem to be too interested in the game either, but at least knew what was going on. "Hi, I'm Emma, who are you?" She asked.

"Aurea," I replied, shaking her hand, which was surprisingly callused, despite her seemingly sweet-good-girl-who-doesn't-ever-lift-a-finger personality. "So, what's going on here?" I pointed to the octagon, where everyone was now jumping around like crazy.

"You mean gaga?" Emma looked at me like I'd grown a second head, not believing like I didn't know what that madness was.

I gave her an equally confused look. What kind of name was gaga? "Come again?"

"Gaga ball? Like where you have as many people as you can fit in an octagon and you hit a little bouncy ball around and it can't touch below your knees?" Emma explained slowly. I nodded my head slightly in understanding, but I still thought it was useless. "I'm not really a fan of the game." She said, as if reading my thoughts.

"It looks kind of... Dangerous." I said.

"Yeah," Emma laughed. "That's a bit of an understatement." We were silent for a few moments just watching the game, which was thinning out very quickly, and was now down to ten people. "So, are you new here?" She asked, my ever-dreaded question at this retreat.

"I'm just here with Mary Rose. Kind of against my will." I sighed and leaned back, hoping Emma wasn't best friends with Mary Rose.

"Ah, I hear that." Emma said, which surprised me. "I was you about three years ago, but now I love it here."

"Really?"

"Yeah, you get used to Sari and Elise after a while." She giggled. "A long while. I laughed. Sari and Elise really were a little outgoing, though they both seemed fairly nice. That's really how all of the adults were here.

It looked like the game of gaga was winding down to it's last few players, so Emma and I walked over to see what was going on. There was a boy who was sixteen or seventeen that seemed very into it, and a girl that looked to be about only fourteen going up against him. Everyone was chanting and leaning up against the edge of the octagon, trying to hit the ball towards their least favorite of the match. After about three minutes, the girl hit the boy's ankle and his hands flew up to his head in disappointment and disbelief that he had just lost. The girl squealed and walked around the octagon for high fives.

"So this game has high stakes here?" I asked, turning back to Emma.

She rolled her eyes. "Again, much of an understatement." She smirked and told me that she had to go, wandering off to a group of her friends.

Mary Rose walked up to me, and I sighed, but decided to just let it go and see what she wanted. "Hi," I greeted her, sitting down on one of the chairs on the end of an isle.

"Did you just see that game?!" Mary Rose asked, bubbling over with excitement.

"I did." I said, nodding. "Hey, do you know what's for dinner?" I asked.

Mary Rose pointed a finger to the air and nodded. "Ah, but that's the mystery of the day. Wouldn't want to spoil it."

I furrowed my brow, not sure what she meant, but decided just to let it go. "What else do you all do around here? Besides, like, whatever that is." I pointed to the octagon.

"Exactly this." Mary Rose said, and I cocked my head in confusion. "We stand, often in circles, and just talk." She explained and motioned around the room, where I saw several groups laughing and chatting with each other, some having light, hearty conversations, while others were deep into their discussions.

Suddenly Katie bounded over to us, dragging one of the boys that I saw pray over Matt earlier. "Aurea, you have to meet Aaron!" She said, gleaming with excitement. Aaron gave a shy wave and glared at Katie, who had clearly brought him against his will.

"Uh, hi." Aaron said, and Katie checked him with her shoulder. "Ow! I'm Aaron." He stuck out his hand for me to shake. I did, and they were very cold.

"Aurea." I smiled and looked over to Katie, who was bouncing up and down. Figuring the best path here was just to be straightforward. "Okay, I don't get it. What's the deal here?" I asked Katie.

Katie turned to Aaron, who shrugged like he didn't know what she was talking about, but clearly did. "Aaron, show her the thing." Katie instructed, nudging him.

Aaron sighed and reluctantly, and to my surprise lowered himself into a handstand. Once he was stable he looked around behind him and lifted his head to look in front of him. When he had decided he had enough room to do whatever he was about to do, he bent his elbows to a ninety degree angle and and pushed his legs forward, springing into a flip, not to mention stuck the landing.

Mary Rose and I launched into a slow clap, and Katie joined in. "What was that?" Mary Rose asked, astonished.

"Well, now you know why I brought him over here!" Katie laughed. Aaron rolled his eyes and fixed his shirt and pants, which were all rumpled.

I sat back in my chair and listened to them talk, every once in a while putting my own thoughts into the conversation. It was really weird how I barely knew any of them and I felt like I was their equal, and equally loved by all of them. Like we were of the same value, in all our eyes.

Heyyy! Who liked that chapter? I got a lot of my ideas for this chapter (and a lot of the other ones, if I haven't mentioned already) from my fantastic friends and leaders at my church, SJN. We actually are obsessed with gaga at our church, and I identify very much with Emma, as I don't like it! I'm not a ball sport person, that's why I swim :)

And did anyone like that value talk? I got the base idea for it from high school retreat 2016 at my church, but the whole scale thing was my idea. I have one more 'talk' like that for this book, but I need a whole bunch more ideas because I plan on having several in this book, so if you have an idea for a topic for one or already have one, PM me or comment below!!!

Nowwwwww Soul Study!:

What do you feel your value is in the world? Is it the same as everyone else's, or different? Who's scale do you go by, God's or the world's?

xoxo

~bcruzy_02