We are cleaning up from a rental group last week and preparing to receive another one at the beginning of this week. Then the summer will be officially over. It has been a long and lovely chain of camps. From staff training in June, to these last few rental groups in the final days of August.

Camas Meadows is a simple place. A few log cabins on an alpine meadow, wrapped in quiet forest. Small and insignificant. But so much has happened this summer. God makes beautiful things out of dust, as the song goes.

The speaker at Jr. A Camp said something about mankind. How we were the ragged beggar who was rescued and made a prince. Enemies of God, we now stand before Him as heirs to His throne. Isn’t this the story we love to hear most of all. Luke Skywalker, whiney farm hand, saves the galaxy from the Emperor. Harry Potter, orphaned boy living beneath the stairs, sacrifices himself to defeat Voldemort. Aragon, unknown ranger, is the king in hiding who will wed the Elvin princess and inspire mankind into the next age.

One of my oldest son’s favorite Hank the Cowdog books is Hank and the Case of the Hooking Bull. I think I know why. Normally, Hank rescues the ranch from marauding dinosaur birds (pelicans) or a robot alien in the garden (an armadillo) or saves Sally Mae from poisoned food (by eating all the steaks). Most of the time, Hank is just a dog, doing doggy things and imagining that we could never live without him. But in The Case of the Hooking Bull Hank is more. When a dangerous bull threatens Little Alfred, Hank risks his life to save his boy. He is injured in the line of duty. And even Sally Mae, his archenemy, acknowledges his heroism and condescends to pay good money to get the stinky old dog patched up. Hank is a hero.

That is our story.

What we were before, is not who we are in Christ. God made us to be more. He made us to be princes, but we have chosen to live as paupers, away from Him. But He ransomed us and enabled us to be more. More than everyone thought we were. Heroes.

God makes beauty out of ashes. Beautiful things from dust. This summer was all about that. We are small and we are simple.

God is big.

2 Corinthians 4:7–“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.”

Boo Boo

It is the last day of camp. Saturday morning. I am sitting on the back porch at the lodge. The worn wood of the deck is smooth under my bare feet and the sunlight slants down through the trees with that bright airiness that seems particular to mornings. My three boys and one of the cook’s grandsons are digging in the volleyball court. They have a running hose and a labyrinth of rivers and lakes crisscrossing across the sand. The campers are singing. I’ll Fly Away and Lean on Me and Blessed Be Your Name. The gentle tones of an acoustic guitar and children’s voices touch the forest this morning. I find myself weeping as I type and listen. For no reason at all.

I didn’t know what to Blog about this morning. I am weary with a terrible cold and void of writerly brilliance. But here I am, somehow finding a corner of camp to share with you.

This is the last Camas-run camp of the summer. We have rental groups through the rest of August. It has been amazing. This week, at least three children re-dedicated their lives to Christ, and one little girl decided to follow Him for the first time. But even more than this has occurred. Camp is like the wardrobe in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia. It takes you away. It is a place that is different then the every day. The forest is bright and clean around you. Wild life thrive nearby. Camp can be incredibly noisy (Have you ever heard 60 kids singing “Pharoah Pharoah” or “Jesus Got Heaps of Lambs”), it is rowdier than the classroom or lunchroom at school. But it also holds a deep kind of quiet that speaks to the soul. At night, when the power is turned off and the dark and the stars surround you, black and bright in the heavens, the woods feel solemn and huge. Quiet, in ways we have forgotten. And the staff, they are here just for you. To love you and teach you and help you grow just a little bit more like Jesus. They are here to chase you in the water fight, urge you to snag the glowstick in capture the flag, and to slurp up gummy worms out of a tub of gravy when no one else from your cabin volunteered.

Things are coming to a close for the summer, but Camas Camps will be back. Much has occurred, kids have been loved, God has been glimpsed. I wish I had words to explain. But sometimes just a peek is enough. And that I can share with you.

Boo Boo

This week was a rental group instead of a Camas run camp. Actually two rental groups. For the first camp, the staff came on Sunday and then on Monday the campers arrived. This camp left at 12:30 on Friday and the next camp arrived at 1:30 that same Friday. This makes for a tight turnover, trying to get the camp ready for the next group. Nonetheless, after a month of Camas run camps it felt like a little break. Instead of being in charge of every little thing from stocking TP to shopping for lettuce to camper discipline, Scruffy gets to cater to the needs of these rental groups, helping them do the ministry they have come up into the mountains to accomplish. This second rental group finishes up on Sunday, Scruffy will do cabin assignments and other last minute details for Jr. High 2 on Sunday night, and then the staff and campers arrive on Monday for Jr. High 2 our last Camas run summer camp of the season.

Actually, there is a story about that second rental group, the Egyptian Orthodox Church. They have been coming up for several years now and we just love them. They even invited the boys and I to come and do crafts with them one year, so cool. But this year their leader called, they didn’t have enough campers to meet the 40 person minimum. Scruff thought about it and told them that he would facilitate their ministry this year anyway, even without the minimum number of campers. He just felt it was what God wanted him to do. So the leaders prayed about it and struggled, should they go through the expense themselves with such a small number of kids? Finally they called back, they felt that God wanted them to come as well. And you know what? Last week Scruff got a call from their leader. So many last minute campers had come out of the woodwork that not only did they meet the minimum, but she was forced to go and buy new craft supplies four different times!

One of those beautiful, quiet, miracles that God is such an expert at accomplishing. He is good when the campers are few. He is good when the campers are abundant. God is good to His word, accomplishing great things among everyday people.

Boo Boo

My oldest son is an incredibly active and inventive boy, but he is also quite straight-laced. When he was little he would plug his ears during singing time at church, because the music was “too wild”. If he is playing an imaginary game with his brothers and everyone is a tiger except one of them who wants to be a cheetah with a prehensile tail, he informs them that only new world monkeys have prehensile tails and that brother better pick a more realistic animal for the game. I love these things about him, but I also love to watch those moments when he lets go and runs rampant with joy.

Camp is one of those times. This week my boy was in the Sasquatch cabin with a bunch of his buddies and a little guy from Korea who spoke about 10 words of English. His counselor got an English to Korean translator on his phone and the camp speaker “just happened” to have a Korean Bible laying around at his house and off they went on a week of adventure. After the very first night game, three of them came to the nurse with bloody knees. They had all run down the same trail together, fallen, and limped to the nurse to show off their war wounds and get patched up. From the sidelines, I watched my little guy laughing and running with his friends. Not brushing his hair until it stuck straight up, doing crazy skits, and wonder of wonders, doing all the motions to “Pharaoh Pharaoh” during singing time. This boy won’t even look up from his book to glance at the overhead during church, but at camp he is a rowdy and confident participant in all things crazy. He even shared at the campfire. My guy, who gritted his teeth and endured standing up to get his reading award at school this year. He chose, on his own, on purpose, to stand up and say something in front of the camp.

I love to see him as a camper.

Camp is a special place. You are safe to learn, to love, to grow, to be goofy, and to TP the other cabins just as long as you never ever use duct tape. I love watching kids blossom at camp, especially my own.

Thank you Maximus, Pippin, and Spitfire for giving my guy a wonderful week. A week where he was away from my hovering, he was a Sasquatch, and he was free to be goofier then he ever had been before. Thank you for showing him that other people besides his parents believe in God too and for walking with him on this journey of growing up.

Boo Boo

We just wrapped up Junior A camp yesterday. For the week of Staff Training Scruffy, Choco, and Sparks worked to prepare this year’s counselors and support staff for a summer of service. Last week all that head-knowledge was put to the test. A starlight hike to Inspiration Point, horseback rides down the dusty summer road, splashing in the sun at Lake Chelan, and dashing through the meadow with a milk jug full of water during the big water fight. There is a lot of fun to be had at camp. But all of this requires a good deal of energy, patience, and self-sacrifice. It means making sure the kids have sunscreen on lake day, close toed shoes on horse day, and a buddy close by during night games so they don’t get freaked out by the darkening woods. It means getting down in the sand to make a sculpture of a giant frog during the sand castle competition when you were up late the night before mopping the kitchen. It means sneaking a camper’s sleeping bag to the laundry room so no one knows he had an accident. It means sharing your candy to bribe the cabin inspector and standing by a child’s bunk holding her hand until she falls asleep. It means reading stories at bedtime instead of collapsing into your bunk and running for the puke bucket when your camper gets a surprise case of the flu. A difficult and beautiful task, but the week went well. Two little boys chose to become followers of Christ, a counselor and one camper asked to be baptized in the horse trough down in the meadow, and a passel of kids were shown a week of love in Jesus name. As the mom of a ten-year-old camper this week, I want to thank the counselors. I saw you welcome my boy and the children around him into your hearts. I saw you love and give and laugh and cry. I am thankful for you and I am proud of you. My little guy came home exhausted but exultant. He had a wonderful week, and I was shocked and amazed to discover that he actually remembered the main point of the chapel sessions as well. Our worth is not dependent upon our actions. God loves us and wants us as His own…just because.

Boo Boo

My husband, Scruffy, was scheduled to speak about camp at a little church on the West side of Washington, but everything went wrong. First, the generator that powers the camp broke down. Second, the backup generator that we rented at the last minute at an increased price broke down. Third, some electrical thing-a-ma-bob on the pump for the well broke down. This left Choco no choice but to drive forty minutes to Wal-Mart for jugs of water so the rental group could cook and flush toilets.

As we bid Choco goodbye and rushed over the mountains, Scruffy and I couldn’t help but think: “What in the world are we doing here?” At church that Sunday the pastor spoke from many passages, including Mark 8:34. Scruff and I had been stewing over the upcoming Staff Training session on The Gospel. One of the most important elements of Staff Training is to teach our summer staff how to share the gospel with children in a simple way that is true to scripture. Scruff and I both started scribbling notes, looked up at each other and mouthed, “Staff Training”, then continued to scribble.

Why were we there at that cute little church eating pastries, drinking coffee, and talking to folks when Choco was wrestling with the generator and the well pump and they really needed us back at camp? Perhaps there are reasons that I will never guess, but here is one of them.

Mark 8:34—“Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

Deny self, take up cross, follow Christ.

It doesn’t get more simple then that folks. And I don’t think you will make things any clearer or more true by adding words. This is the essence of the Christian walk. The Gospel is the good news that Jesus came, He lived, He loved, He died, He rose, He is coming, and He has called us to follow Him. How does one respond to the Gospel and become a follower? Jesus told us Himself.

Deny self, take up cross, follow me.

At that moment Scruff and I knew that we were supposed to be there. God had things to say. We had been stewing and praying and wondering over the Staff Training sessions. But God had answers, at a little church on the Westside, on the weekend that everything broke down.

Last week Scruffy pointed out an interesting article about outdoor play. It is written by secular scientists who are researching the connection between outdoor play, spirituality, and environmental appreciation. Now the Michigan State University Investigators have barely taken a glimpse at this fascinating concept. But I think they have tapped into an age old truth that further research will only confirm.

Romans 1:20–“For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”

It is 7:31am and I am in my favorite puffy chair at the Staff house writing. If I glance out the window up toward the cabins, I see the mottled morning shadows in the undergrowth that creeps across the hillside and shaggy strips of lichen draping the puzzle piece bark of Ponderosa Pines. I hear birdsong from nearby branches and shoo away a squirrel that tries to break into our home through a gap by the air-conditioner. There is something of God in these simple and powerful sights. Something that tugs at the soul.

A lung-full of crisp morning air and the brush of bright leaves across your skin, the crunch of pine needles under your feet as you run and the wind drying the sweat in your hair when you top the ridge after a long hike. The grumbling strength of a bear and the fluid grace of a deer bounding across the meadow. These things speak of God.

A child, hiking and dancing, running and falling and frolicking and imagining. A child out in God’s creation begins to understand all these things. Just as anyone who is near God is amazed and apprehensive, awed and comforted. Nature has that effect upon us, because it is His. Is it any wonder that a child would understand that we must cherish the splendid world that speaks to us of God? That we must not trample upon the works of His hands.

An ancient truth. But no less vital for this generation of children.

So as these secular scientists suggest, we must get out little ones outdoors. Let them feel a caterpillar rolling across their skin. Allow them the warmth of sunlight on their closed eyelids. Walk them past the fierce chittering squirrel and the bounding hare, the massive bull elk blowing frosty clouds of breath on an October morning and the silent cougar that is but a flash before it is gone. These things speak of God and so many people are missing them. 

This is something that a week at summer camp can offer to the children entrusted to us. We sing about God and learn about God from the camp speaker, but sometimes the walk up to the cabin and that fleeting glimpse of a doe and her fawn is even more profound. God is here, in the Glory of His creation and we shall become a sorry people indeed, if we miss Him as He walks among us.

Boo Boo

http://psychcentral.com/news/2014/05/02/outdoor-play-can-enhance-kids-spirituality/69283.html