"You have multiplied, O Lord my God, Your wondrous deeds and Your thoughts toward us; none can compare with You! I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told."
This verse definitely sums up my experience at Camp Highland this summer. After nine weeks in Ellijay—two weeks of training and seven weeks with campers—I can't help but praise God for everything He has done in me, through me, and for me at camp. He has taught me and grown me so much over the last two months that I can't imagine what I would be like now if He hadn't called me to work at camp. I just want to share some of what the Lord has done for me this summer.
To start, my whole experience with Camp Highland began when my friend Lauren applied and was hired as a counselor there. When she was hired, she was told that they still needed five more male counselors, so she told me and got me to apply for the job. Now, I had originally planned on going to Montenegro on a mission trip with the UGA Wesley Foundation, but when the money didn't come through (because all of it went toward my trip to Jamaica through Freshley), it appeared that God did not have Montenegro planned as my direct mission field this year. He did have a reason for making me sign up for the trip in the first place though: so that I could pray for the team specifically while they were there. So even though I wasn't directly influencing the Montenegrins, I was able to support my team and influence the nation through prayer. Anyway, God had a different mission field in mind for me: the youth of the Atlanta area gathered in Ellijay, Georgia. So when I heard about the camp, I immediately applied without much thought. Something inside of me told me that that was what the Lord had planned for me this summer. And since I was hired and I got back a week ago from spending my entire summer there and I saw several lives changed (including my own), I think it's safe to assume that that voice (the Holy Spirit) was right. (Interestingly, the Montenegro trip happened to be during staff training for camp, so having to back out of the trip opened up my schedule to allow me to work at camp.)
When I got to camp back in May (I can't believe that was over two months ago!), I spent the first two weeks there getting to know the rest of the staff and learning how to run all of the activities I would be facilitating this summer, including the Mammoth rock wall, the Drop Zone swing, and the High Ropes course. We also did a few team building activities, or initiatives, some in the Low Ropes courses and some in the gym and on the field. Those first two weeks were incredible, mainly because we had a really relaxed schedule that set aside the whole morning for a brief session that set us up for the day's Bible study, TAG time (Time Alone with God), and a debrief session so that we could share what we learned during our TAG time. That meant that we spent nearly three hours every morning just meeting with God. It was great for each one of us individually because it gave us time to study sections of Scripture we might not have put much thought into before, and it was also really cool to hear what everyone else was learning because all of it was helpful for more than just one person. It was great getting to hear the wisdom the Lord was sharing with all of us, and it showed the unity of the body of Christ in that the Word speaks to all of us in different ways but for a common purpose: to draw us closer to God and to each other, and to help us become more like Him. Just thinking about it right now, all of the staff seemed to be marked by a few specific gifts and characteristics of God: freedom, passion, wisdom, and love. As the summer went on, I got to see how these traits played out in each person uniquely, and it was cool to see how God worked through all of us differently with similar results.
Anyway, week two of staff training came along, and we were given a chance to practice what we had learned by facilitating initiatives for Calibrate, the leadership team from Stone Mountain Park's SkyHike and Wild Adventure. (Throughout the summer we had various outside groups come to camp for their own purposes (Stone Mountain staff training, Journey and Invest training before heading off to Kenya, and Florida College's Georgia Camp during Camp Highland's week off).) Now, before I applied to work at Camp Highland, I never could have seen myself being a camp counselor. I'm just not that energetic, outgoing kind of person that most camp counselors are. Plus, even though God gives me wisdom to share through my blog, I'm usually not much of a talker, so I didn't know how I was going to know how to lead kids, let alone a group of college age leaders for the Stone Mountain staff. Wisdom that comes in big waves and can be recorded in blog posts is one thing, but moment-by-moment wisdom to know how to answer spur-of-the-moment questions is another thing entirely. So when we had the opportunity to lead initiatives for Calibrate, and even when we practiced within the staff bubble, I didn't really know what to expect. But I found the Lord giving me grace to know what to say when I needed to speak, and that became a major area of dependence for me the entire summer. And God pulled through all summer long.
So after all our training on the equipment and our practice with briefing and debriefing, and after two whole weeks of soaking up all that God wanted to pour into us before starting camp, the campers finally arrived on Monday of Week One. What an adventure. Throughout the summer I found the Lord using me in ways I never could have imagined being used. To begin with, as introverted as I am, God had called me to spend my entire summer getting kids pumped up about knowing Jesus and living for Him. And not just any kids, but I spent the entire summer with kids between the ages of 9 and 14—fourth through eighth graders. Somehow God gave me the energy, patience, wisdom, and love to be able to lead the 62 kids who passed through my cabin this summer, along with the handful of other campers outside of my cabin that I got to talk to. Some weeks tested me more than others, and some were more rewarding than others, but each week had its breakthroughs and lessons from God.
Week One. I didn't know what to expect. I was encouraged at the end of the week by how much God worked through me and how little I had to worry about because of the confidence He gave me as I relied of Him. That week was just the start of something I came to realize throughout the summer: when I worry about not knowing what to say, I won't know what to say; but if I just open my mouth and let the words come out, without doubting whether or not the words mean anything, God speaks through me clearly without any hindrance from my self-consciousness. I had one camper that week who was a big thinker on spiritual matters. This particular fourth grader asked a lot of tough questions that I would expect to hear from high schoolers and even some of my friends at UGA. The one question that sticks out the most in my mind is "How do you hear God, and how do you know if you're hearing Him?" I don't really remember how Greg, my co-counselor, and I answered him, but I know that the Lord spoke through us to him, and I hope and pray that the answer will help him as he continues to walk with God.
The Lord also taught me a lot about loving those who are difficult to love that week, and He continued to teach me that all summer. Before the summer started I had written my prayer for the summer in my journal, so toward the end of the summer I went back to that page to see what I had written. I was amazed to see that I had written that I wanted to have "a heart for the least likely." In other words, I wanted to be able to show God's love to the kids who make things difficult. I wanted to see breakthrough in the kids who seemed to not be getting anything out of our discussions. And the funny thing is that, as Greg pointed out, because I prayed for a heart for the least likely, God gave me the least likely. Anyway, that first week I had one camper who made things pretty difficult. He was easily distracted and wasn't the best listener most of the time. But after several one-on-one talks with him, from both me and Greg, his behavior seemed to improve. I actually came to like hanging out with him as the week went on. I began to see that he was just looking for attention and for a role model, because his behavior was a result of a less than ideal home life; so when he started receiving positive attention, his output starting reflecting the input he was getting.
And what's awesome about that camper is that he came back the next week. This time he wasn't in my cabin, but that made things more interesting for me because I got to hear all the positives that he was getting that week instead of seeing everything, good and bad, play out personally. My favorite comment from him was toward the end of the week when he asked me for a dollar to get something out of the vending machine. First, a little background: he had spent the whole first week trying to borrow money from me and from other campers because he didn't have any of his own. But week two, his grandparents had given him $20 to spend, and on Thursday evening he still had $11 left because "my grandparents gave it to me and I don't want to spend all of it because I want to have something left to give back to them." And even more encouraging was when his counselors that week told me that he was pretty much leading their debrief discussions rather than being a distraction.
As for my own experience with Week Two—or, as we call it, Week 1.2—I had a great time! That week most of my cabin was either all in for Jesus or at least interested. There were two specific kids who I could tell got a lot from that week. One of the kids had so much wisdom, and he was very inquisitive. He would ask question after question, diving deep into the meaning of Scripture, looking for life lessons and interpretations of whatever he read. One night we, the three counselors, washed our campers' feet at the end of the day as a display of humility and leadership by service. After we were done, a couple of the kids, including the inquisitive one, said that they wanted to wash our feet, so they did. Afterward, while the rest of the cabin was getting in bed, another camper pulled me outside to talk for a little bit. Throughout the week this kid was probably the most enthusiastic kid in everything we did, whether it was doing the Drop Zone, debriefing Nitro Crossing, packing up to camp out under the rock wall, or just sitting having TAG time in the morning and cabin time at night. He said that a lot of times when he prays he feels like he doesn't really connect with God. Again, another comment I would expect to hear from someone my age, this time coming from a rising sixth grader. Conveniently, God had been teaching me a lot about prayer throughout the school year, so He allowed me to use what He had taught me to encourage my camper. The words He gave me were along the lines of "Jesus prayed the Lord's prayer as a model for our own prayers, so praying with the Lord's prayer as a guide is one way to ensure that we're praying with the right intentions. Pray that God would be glorified before asking for anything, then pray that His will would be done before your own; then ask for what you need. And keep no sins hidden from God (Jesus didn't need forgiveness of sins, but He included this in His prayer because He was demonstrating how we should pray), and ask for protection against the devil's schemes. The best way to learn to connect with God through is to pray. A lot. When we pray often, prayer becomes easier. It becomes a natural response in any situation because we see results, and we know that we will see more results if we continue to pray, so we pray even more." Then on the last day of the week, when we were going around the cabin talking about our takeaways from the week, this camper said that that week had changed his perspective on reading the Bible, and he was a lot more interested and excited to not only read the Bible regularly, but also to study it in depth.
The next couple of weeks were really hard for me, and I get the feeling that I learned more from those two weeks than most of my campers did. I learned a lot about patience and the hope that does not disappoint (Romans 5:5). One cool thing from Week 1.3 was that I had the nine-year-old son of the founder of Camp Highland, and since his parents own the camp, he's been around for a few summers. I had him in my cabin the first week too, and there was a noticeable change in him the third week. The first week and the beginning of the third week, it was a little bit of a challenge to keep him interested in our discussions. He just wanted to get to the next activity. But toward the end of Week 1.3, he started really getting into our debriefs and TAG times and cabin time discussions. It was encouraging to hear from his mom that he took note of my knowledge of Scripture, and apparently it's hard to impress him. So it was cool seeing how God used my extreme thirst for the Word when I first started really following Him to build up a store of Scripture that I could draw from at any time (Psalm 119:11), so that one kid would notice and want to have that same desire for the Word.
One thing from Week 1.4 struck me hard: halfway through the week the campers started identifying me as kind of a disciplinarian (in eighth grade terms). I wasn't used to that, and that made me realize that I had to work on my patience with the kids so that I could direct them on the right path in love instead of strictly forbidding the wrong path.
The following week was a week off for most of the summer staff. Some people stayed behind to help with a camp Florida College was running on Camp Highland's property, but most of us went home for a week of much needed rest. That week taught me a little bit about hunger and thirst for God. Sometimes when I'm not physically hungry, if I eat a little bit, I find that I actually had more of an appetite than I realized. And it's the same way spiritually: if I know that I should pray and read the Bible but I don't feel like it, if I do it anyway it might make me realize that I really do want to spend more time with God in that moment.
Then Week 1.6 came around. That week God showed me a lot about authentic passion for His glory. I'm pretty sure He showed that to a lot of people that week. During Week 1.4, the Chapman family, the family that owns and runs the camp, left to go to Alaska. They spent that entire week, as well as the week off and the first half of Week 1.6, away from camp. But they were not any farther away from God than we were while they were gone. In fact, when Mr. Bill came up to speak the first day he was back, it was obvious that he had spent some, as he likes to say, rich time with Jesus, getting to see just how awesome and how worthy of all glory He is. Interestingly, the night before, my cabin had been talking about the same thing. Two of my campers had been asking a lot of really good questions that had both me and my co-counselor searching deep in our knowledge of Scripture to be able to provide answers for them. But the one question that stood out to me was, "What does God look like?" I tried to find Exodus 33:18-23 and 34:5-8 to use as an answer, but I wasn't sure of the Scripture reference, so I couldn't find it. God had a different passage in mind that night. We went to Isaiah 6 and saw how the glory of the Lord completely filled the temple, and how the sound of His praises were so powerful that the entire temple shook. We saw Isaiah's reaction to seeing the Lord face-to-face, with such all-consuming conviction and repentance and awe at God's power that when He asked who would go to the nations as a messenger of the word He wanted to proclaim, Isaiah eagerly jumped at the opportunity to play a part in giving God just a piece of the glory He deserves. One kid in particular was amazed when he heard just how awesome God is. The Spirit very much filled us all that week.
That Thursday night, Chad, one of the full-time staff, came to me to say that the person who normally speaks before Friday morning TAG time wasn't there, so he asked me to lead it instead. I'm not much of a public speaker. I write a lot, but talking isn't my strong point, especially in front of large groups. But the Holy Spirit gave me peace and kept me from getting nervous. Now, that week was the first—and only—week that I had campers who actually
wanted to go off and read on their own during TAG time. It was
refreshing to not have to say, "Open your devotional and read today's
section, then open your Bible and read the related passage." They just
got their Bibles out and started reading. So I decided I wanted to get some of their input on what they thought I should say the next morning. So we talked about it that night, and I was amazed, and I still am, at the wisdom that came from those twelve- and thirteen-year-olds. The next morning when I went up to deliver the message before TAG and to debrief afterward, I got a little nervous beforehand and my heart rushed a little as soon as I was done, but I felt no anxiety at all while I was speaking. I don't even remember most of what I said, because it wasn't me speaking. As I was trying to plan the night before on what I should say, I had some kind of mind block that prevented me from thinking clearly. When my exhaustion from the day's activities became too much, I decided to just pray and go to bed, leaving it all up to God. And the Lord was faithful to speak powerfully and clearly through me because I wasn't mentally present enough to be a hindrance to His voice. I had some notes and a general idea of what to say, but my plan wasn't so solid that I was determined to say everything I had planned. The Spirit just flowed freely, without hindrance from my plan (or lack thereof). In that moment, the prayer "Empty me of me so I can be filled with You" was answered.
A little background on that week: After getting back from my week off, something inside me made a decision on the day the campers arrived that I didn't want to get to know just the kids in my cabin, but I wanted to hang out with kids from other cabins too throughout the week. So as the campers arrived, I made a real effort to get to know the names of as many kids as I could, and I made sure to acknowledge them and talk to them some throughout the week. Being a typically shy person, I have to say that was a little out of my comfort zone. But it became a huge blessing Friday morning because when the Lord spoke through me, He spoke to everyone, but He especially spoke directly to the people I had gotten to know and who had gotten to know me, which was really cool. The Christ-centered fellowship that whole week was like nothing I had experienced all summer. It was awesome!
Week 1.7 presented me with a little roadblock, but it became a huge surprise and an incredible blessing by the end of the week. I had one camper who required a lot of one-on-one attention, especially at the beginning of the week. His family is moving to Africa to be missionaries, and it wasn't exactly the most exciting thing for him to be leaving his home in just a few short months. It took him a while to become entirely present in the here-and-now, but when he finally got it Thursday evening, he transformed like I've never seen anyone transform before. He went from being reluctant to play Tribal Games (Camp Highland has an outpost in Kwambekenya, Kenya, so the teams we use for our Tribal Games represent the tribes that exist in that area of Kenya), to telling me that he didn't want to wear shoes because he needed to practice for Africa so that he wouldn't make kids sad by wearing shoes when he visits orphanages where the kids don't have shoes. He went from not listening, to seeking approval from the counselors before doing anything. He even asked the worship band to play a specific song for him, and it changed the entire week for everyone there. Friday night the band played Lose My Soul, by TobyMac, mixed with Open Up the Skies, and whereas we were all used to hearing a few feeble voices in the audience singing during worship, the entire camp sang back that night as if making a bold declaration. I think this particular camper finally started to realize why his parents are taking the whole family to Africa, and it started to click with him just how important it is that they go and take the gospel of Jesus Christ with them. I'm thankful that he came to Camp Highland that week, because it wasn't just his life that was changed. I'm still amazed at the change that took place in him, and I'm excited and honored to get the chance to partner with him and his family by supporting them as they move to Africa.
That camper, along with one the following week, fell under the category of "the least likely." But the funny thing is that those kids were the ones I connected with the most all summer. When God gave me the least likely, He gave me a desire to see them changed by His love and His devotion to them, so He gave me a determination to reach out specifically to them. Maybe that kept me from connecting with the other campers because I spent so much time pouring into those few, but I believe that the ones I connected with were some of the ones who most desperately needed someone to reach out to them. Now, I'm not proud to say that there were a few times when I almost lost my cool with them, but those moments taught me and prepared me so that I could hold back and rely on God to give me patience the next time a difficult situation came up. And He had grace for me too: the kids barely seemed to notice when I almost lost it, and they even seemed to respond more willingly afterward. Sometimes I had to be blunt with them, but the Spirit gave me the grace to be able to say it in love. And that helped me understand better when He had to be blunt with me and tell me to take a step back and calm down before doing anything else.
So what did I learn this summer? A lot about patience: God put a spotlight on my impatience so that I could see how much I need His patience. As I was praying at the end of the week off before starting Week 1.6, I asked God to not only give me His strength when I find that I'm weak, but to make me weak so that I would have no other option but to rely on His strength. And boy, did He ever answer that one. He also taught me about confidence: instead of thinking about what to say and worrying about whether not it was the right thing to say, I often found myself saying things without really knowing where it was coming from. When I simply opened my mouth and allowed God to speak through me without hesitating to think about what I was saying, I had less fear about what I was saying, and the Lord's Word had much more power than if I had stopped to think about it and formulate my own sentences. Prayer was another big lesson: I neglected prayer a lot this summer, unfortunately; but when I made time to devote myself to prayer (Colossians 4:2), the Lord responded in big ways. The conversation about Isaiah 6 and what God looks like came after I spent my night off in prayer. (Each staff member gets a night off every week, where we get two hours or so to rest and regain our strength and energy to be with the kids for the rest of the week.) I had planned on doing my own Bible study during that time because my morning TAG times were becoming slack because I was so used to always having to keep the kids focused that I couldn't stay focused myself. But instead, the Lord called me to pray. And I saw immediate results when the campers arrived back at the cabin. And finally, I learned about love and humility: sometimes love requires us to allow ourselves to be humiliated or to suffer pain. It takes a Romans 12:10 heart, a heart of servanthood and a desire to almost competitively put oneself below others. When my camper was walking without shoes Week 1.7 in order to honor the kids in the African orphanages, I was so moved that I had to join him and take my own shoes off. It was uncomfortable and sometimes painful, but the heart behind it is what counts, and I have to say that that kid's statement convicted me and really humbled me.
I feel like I pretty much just recounted the highlights of the summer, and I didn't really elaborate on what God taught me, but I still have a lot of processing—a lot of personal debriefing—to do before I fully understand it myself. So if you've stuck with me this far, congratulations on finishing this whole post. And thank you for keeping me and the whole Camp Highland team in your prayers this summer! Please continue to pray for us as we head back to school, and pray for the campers, that their experience at camp would leave a lasting impact on them. Pray that this summer wouldn't be a mountaintop experience that we have to come down from, but that it just be the beginning of an upward journey toward God. And pray that that "upward" journey would actually be a process of lowering ourselves and allowing the Lord to keep His promise in James 4:10.
"How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you." ~ Psalm 139:17-18
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