Reading: 1 Corinthians 1: 18-25
I still remember the first day, not knowing anyone and my older sister checking up on me to make sure I was OK. It didn’t take long for any nervousness to go away, make new friends, laugh, and play and feel completely free in this new environment. As an 8 year old it was merely a week filled with games, crafts, singing and candy. (Lots of it!) I remember enjoying Vespers in the woods sitting on flat stones but the “Church” experience was not as paramount to an 8 year old brain as the games and goofing off. In retrospect, what the early years created were strong friendships, trust, love and acceptance that would grow exponentially each passing year. As a Jr. High and High School camper it was much more than playing 4 square, dodge ball or basketball. (Although it was still fun) It was about reconnecting and building on the friendships and relationships from the previous years and sharing in growth of our faith as a tight knit group. At times that group of 100-120 of us felt as close to a cohesive whole as one could imagine. We came from different backgrounds, economic statuses and family situations but tried our best and succeeded 99% of the time to include and accept EVERYONE. For a lot of us, I certainly included, camp became the one place we could show our true selves, share difficult thoughts, feelings or escape our lives and know that we would still be loved. ..no matter what. In fact, the openness and sharing brought us closer together. It was a place of happiness, tranquility, love, and spiritual growth during a time in your life when self doubt, peer pressure and shaky self esteem were the norm. What we were experiencing and expressing as individuals and as a group was God’s love if we knew it or not. It just developed much more naturally at camp.
We used to play a game called finding “It”. The game was designed so everyone would eventually get to know and interact with each other in their quest to find who “It” was but became the perfect conduit to teach what “It” symbolized. God’s Love in each of us for all of us. Each day a different person was selected to be “It” and your job was to find out who that person was by hugging them and asking them, “Are you IT?” (And of course not telling anyone else for it was their duty to find “It” on their own. Oh, by the way, hugs were the greeting of choice to any and everyone regardless of the game) Once found you would get a big written “IT” on your hand to let everyone know you had found it. For us “It” was the perfect title because it named or explained the unexplainable. When you don’t know, have or share “It” it becomes difficult to feel or describe “It” the person or “It” God’s love but when you find “It” you can sure feel “It” and share “It” even if you can’t explain “It”. (Make sense?)
In the midst of all of this I experienced an incredible peace, happiness and flow of energy. It was something that had been building for a long time but the light bulb came on one night for me in one of our famous camp talks late at night. The feeling was unlike anything I had ever experienced. It was pure. It was during this time that I moved beyond what I was taught to know into feeling and believing into what I personally knew and experienced of God. For me nothing else could explain or have created the moment or feeling. By the end of camp the tightness of the community would grow and strengthen. Our task and lifelong challenge as campers was not to keep “It” special for this one week of the year and to share only with those friends but to, “take IT off the mountain” and spread it to everyone you know. Easier said than done, especially when the world and all its distractions drag you down, but knowing how good you and others felt and knowing the energy that is generated when “It” was found and shared abundantly is easily enough to make a goal I will continuously pursue. This memory and countless others from my church camp experiences certainly confirmed my belief but also help strengthen me when times become difficult and doubts creep in. I may become confused, cloudy or even reject or lose “It” from time to time but I can always find “It” again to share with others.
The most influential experience that shaped my faith and solidified my belief in God was my experience at Camp Luther growing up. While my family attended church when I was young it was not a moving experience. Not to say that I don’t have pleasant memories of my childhood church but I didn’t grow the special lifelong relationships with people there as I did at Church camp.
I still remember the first day, not knowing anyone and my older sister checking up on me to make sure I was OK. It didn’t take long for any nervousness to go away, make new friends, laugh, and play and feel completely free in this new environment. As an 8 year old it was merely a week filled with games, crafts, singing and candy. (Lots of it!) I remember enjoying Vespers in the woods sitting on flat stones but the “Church” experience was not as paramount to an 8 year old brain as the games and goofing off. In retrospect, what the early years created were strong friendships, trust, love and acceptance that would grow exponentially each passing year. As a Jr. High and High School camper it was much more than playing 4 square, dodge ball or basketball. (Although it was still fun) It was about reconnecting and building on the friendships and relationships from the previous years and sharing in growth of our faith as a tight knit group. At times that group of 100-120 of us felt as close to a cohesive whole as one could imagine. We came from different backgrounds, economic statuses and family situations but tried our best and succeeded 99% of the time to include and accept EVERYONE. For a lot of us, I certainly included, camp became the one place we could show our true selves, share difficult thoughts, feelings or escape our lives and know that we would still be loved. ..no matter what. In fact, the openness and sharing brought us closer together. It was a place of happiness, tranquility, love, and spiritual growth during a time in your life when self doubt, peer pressure and shaky self esteem were the norm. What we were experiencing and expressing as individuals and as a group was God’s love if we knew it or not. It just developed much more naturally at camp.
We used to play a game called finding “It”. The game was designed so everyone would eventually get to know and interact with each other in their quest to find who “It” was but became the perfect conduit to teach what “It” symbolized. God’s Love in each of us for all of us. Each day a different person was selected to be “It” and your job was to find out who that person was by hugging them and asking them, “Are you IT?” (And of course not telling anyone else for it was their duty to find “It” on their own. Oh, by the way, hugs were the greeting of choice to any and everyone regardless of the game) Once found you would get a big written “IT” on your hand to let everyone know you had found it. For us “It” was the perfect title because it named or explained the unexplainable. When you don’t know, have or share “It” it becomes difficult to feel or describe “It” the person or “It” God’s love but when you find “It” you can sure feel “It” and share “It” even if you can’t explain “It”. (Make sense?)
In the midst of all of this I experienced an incredible peace, happiness and flow of energy. It was something that had been building for a long time but the light bulb came on one night for me in one of our famous camp talks late at night. The feeling was unlike anything I had ever experienced. It was pure. It was during this time that I moved beyond what I was taught to know into feeling and believing into what I personally knew and experienced of God. For me nothing else could explain or have created the moment or feeling. By the end of camp the tightness of the community would grow and strengthen. Our task and lifelong challenge as campers was not to keep “It” special for this one week of the year and to share only with those friends but to, “take IT off the mountain” and spread it to everyone you know. Easier said than done, especially when the world and all its distractions drag you down, but knowing how good you and others felt and knowing the energy that is generated when “It” was found and shared abundantly is easily enough to make a goal I will continuously pursue. This memory and countless others from my church camp experiences certainly confirmed my belief but also help strengthen me when times become difficult and doubts creep in. I may become confused, cloudy or even reject or lose “It” from time to time but I can always find “It” again to share with others.
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