Youth groups from Northcross Church (Auckland), Orewa Community Church (Auckland), and Te Awamutu Bible Chapel (Waikato) came together for the Tōtara Springs One Way Easter Camp 2026.
Orewa Community Church Youth Pastor Jermaine Martin says it was a great weekend of friendship, fun, and faith:
“First off, God bless everyone who was part of planning this Easter Camp, I'm not an admin guy and I know that was a big job. Tōtara Springs Easter Camp was an amazing, full-on, blessed time with all in attendance.
“We had quite a few from our youth group that didn't have friends upon arrival, as well as this being their first Easter Camp, but they all developed some good friendships after one night of being crammed together.
“We were blessed with good weather, awesome leaders, and everything at camp was really well thought out.
We started the camp off with the crazy games involving sumo suit wresting, building cardboard box towers, and tagging each other with paint followed by a freezing river swim—a great team building afternoon! This also set the tone for the days to come.”
Jermaine says main speaker Jethro Wall opened the Bible and helped the youth to engage, “Jethro used stories and analogies that really got the youth engaged in the teaching and vocal in the small groups.”
David and Liz Otway ran an elective session on sharing your testimony, “After attending the first session with them, I came back for the second, as it was such a blessing to be amongst the youth and encourage them in that realm of understanding their testimony and sharing their faith.”
Jermaine says that a highlight was seeing young people captivated by God’s goodness, “At the last main session it was a blessing for us leaders to see our youth, in particular the majority of our boys, not trying to impress their friends and really worshipping God.”
The coveted Tōtara Springs Belt was won by the Blue Team, and Jermaine says they “will proudly hold onto that until next Easter!”
