In the Jungles of Nashville

We found our way to lush jungle foliage and tropical waterfalls. In Nashville, Tennessee, of all places.

We spent the Easter Weekend in Nashville at the Gaylord Opryland Resort for the annual Lads to Leaders convention with several people from our church and around 10,000 other people. It was a great time, even if it did make us tired. We had been several times before when Jaylin was a participant, but we stopped when a certain pandemic came around and then Jaylin graduated from high school. So this was our first time to go to the convention in five years.

It was a wonderful time, but more about that in just a minute. After it was over, and before we left for home, we restarted our tradition of wandering through the hotel taking family photos, even though this time we were only a family of two. We used several different locations as backdrops, but this waterfall in the Delta Island section of the hotel turned out to be my favorite.

One of the nice things about the time after the worship service on Sunday morning is that most people are trying to pack up their cars and leave, so there are not as many of us in the hotel. I probably should not have said that, because now everyone will want to do it. But for us, for now, it is a nice way to wind up the weekend. By the way, here are some past Lads to Leaders photos from the old days.

Don’t be surprised if I share more photos from our photo trek later on, too.

Young People

As I mentioned above, we had participated in Lads to Leaders for 11 years straight before stopping due to the pandemic and then Jaylin being in college. But then last year, we were home for Easter Sunday, which was a little strange, since several from our congregation were at Lads to Leaders.

And then later on last year for our church’s book club, Laura and I read “3 Big Questions That Change Every Teenager: Making the Most of Your Conversations and Connections”, published by the Fuller Youth Institute. The first part of the book emphasizes the necessity of having young people connected with older people in the church to serve as mentors, role models, resources, and encouragers for the younger generation. Largely because of that, I volunteered to help out with our teen class on Wednesday nights, and we decided to get involved with Lads to Leaders again. It was important for our child when he was growing up, and he learned a lot from the adults that were there, so maybe we can help to pass that long to the next generation.

And besides, the Lads to Leaders weekend is just fun. It is great to be able to spend time with people from our church outside of a worship service setting, which is something that we all need to do more of anyway. We all laugh a lot, cheer for the winners, encourage everyone to keep on trying, and just get to hang out with everyone, especially the younger generations, making those connections that are as good for us older folks as they are for the younger ones. Because we can learn from them just like they can learn from us.

Young people are a blessing. Without them, a church will eventually die out. And if our going to song leading practices every other week and then spending Easter weekend in Nashville will help the younger ones feel engaged and a part of our church family, then it is definitely worth it. Even if it takes us a day or two to catch up on sleep afterward.

People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the little children come to me. Don’t stop them, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” - Mark 10:13-15 CSV

About the Photos

I had taken my tripod with me in case I needed to use it to take our traditional group photo. I decided to take it along with me when we did our photo walk after the Sunday worship service, and I was glad I did. It came in handy for that first photo.

The Gaylord Opryland Resort (which I am old enough to remember as just the Opryland Hotel) has lots of great photo areas with lots of natural light, so it is always fun to take advantage of those when we can.

Photo: Each photo is a single Raw exposure, processed in Darktable and GIMP.
Camera: Sony Alpha A7 II
Lens: Rokinon 35mm f/1.8
Date: April 20, 2025
Location: Nashville, Tennessee
Refer to the photo captions for specific settings for each photo