End of week one

Hello!

Well, I survived my first week as a counselor! And discovered that next week, I will once again be a counselor. This time, though, I will be working with high school guys - one or two of them, I'm not sure yet - at least, that's the plan. This past week was definitely a learning experience for me.

Wednesday nights are our camp-out nights, and this past Wednesday turned out to be absolutely beautiful - we did see some lightning, but nowhere near us - it didn't get real cold, and it was cloudless. High Adventure, Bike, and Music paths camped out at the cliffs, the same place that the staff went to during staff training, and it was great. I spent several hours just helping people get there harnesses and helmets on right and stuff like that, but got to talk to them while I was doing that, so really enjoyed that time. We then cooked burgers over the fire, Abby did a devotional, and we talked and hung out and went star tipping. Everyone actually decided to go to bed at like 11:45, so it was great - I actually got to bed earlier on the camp out than in the cabin. Everyone stayed safe, and everybody at the cliffs (other groups went to two other places) really enjoyed the camp out. We got up in the morning and cooked bacon and eggs over the fire, then cooked up supreme eggs for the staff. Anna and Aaron did most of the work on that - potatoes, tomatoes, onions, cheese, peppers, bacon, and a hamburger were all mixed into the eggs. I think everything (including the hamburger) got deep fried in bacon grease before we mixed it in with the eggs (which were then cooked in bacon grease). That was one GOOD breakfast. Aaron and I also discovered that if you take toast and deep fry it in bacon grease, it tastes like a bacon sandwich - but it's only the bread.

Anna and I drove the supply vehicles back early from the camp out and started unloading and cleaning up, then after the others came back and we finished, everybody got to clean up and eat lunch. High Adventure then went to Medicine Rocks and did some free (no ropes) climbing on the rocks out there - it was a lot of fun. Friday was the last full day of Week 1, so we played a bunch of whole-camp games down in the gym and then had our awards ceremony, where it was announced that I had the cleanest guys' cabin all week and Becky had the cleanest girls' cabin all week, so we and our cabins got to go have free root beer floats. I then let my cabin go participate in a pillow fight, then did our last nightly devos and then everybody got ready and went to bed. We got up Saturday morning, cleaned up the cabin, watched a video from the week, Jim shared the message in our meeting, then the kids left. Staff had a meeting, finished up paperwork, and then got the rest of the day off. Becky and I drove around for a bit, found out that there really is nothing to do in Baker, MT or the small town we went to in North Dakota, then stopped at Medicine Rocks on the way back.

Now I need to cut this off, because a staff group is going to Sarah's (one of the full-time staff members here) house to watch a movie tonight.

Tuesday, Week 1

Hello!

This will probably be a quick update, as it is almost time for lunch, but I wanted to give a bit of an update.

First off, I'm still alive so far! And I haven't killed any campers, either!

Okay, so actually, my campers aren't that bad. I ended up with 7 boys, 6th and 7th graders. Two of them like to make things a challenge for me, but that's okay. Most of them are really good, one of them is in my path, and two are on my Team Competition team.

Path is kind of like their major for the week - what they're studying. I am the guy helping out with high adventure - rappelling, rock climbing, ropes courses, and the like. Abby, and Nikki are the leaders of high adventure, and I am helping them. We have two boys and seven girl campers in our path, including a 50 pound fifth grader. The whole group is pretty small, but that works, because it makes doing their safety stuff pretty easy - except for trying to find harnesses that fit. It's been good, and I am really enjoying working with them.

Anna and I were the two counselors assigned to lead one of the Team Competition teams - after trying and trying and not being able to come up with a name for the team, we finally decided on "Danannas" - kind of like bananas in how it's said. That's a good group of 12 kids that we get to work with, though, and I expect it will continue to be good.

Last night the campers played a game called "Mission Impossible" in which they try to sneak from one "fire" to another across camp without getting caught - if they get caught, we take away their white tickets, give them red ones, and they have to go trade them in and start again. I ended up with 27 white tickets that i had taken from campers by the time the evening was over - but it was a lot of fun for the campers, too - not just the staff that was looking for them.

Well, I need to go, but wanted to post a quick update. As usual, I'd love to hear from you, and I'll get back to you when I can if you do write to me. I don't expect to have cell phone service until I leave here, except for maybe one Saturday afternoon, but I don't even know which week yet.

Take care, and may God bless you this week.

End of staff training

Except for finishing up a little more catch-up work from being nearly a week late, staff training is done. Sunday our first set of campers arrive! And, I found out this morning, at least the first week, I will be a counselor.

I want to tell you about Solo time yesterday – and no, no worries, I was not singing in front of people – that would be cruel and unusual punishment. Solo is a time that we were all required to take Friday, and will probably have another time in a few weeks, to just go and spend some time alone with God. Our allotted time was six hours, so I got to spend almost six hours without seeing another person. Don’t get me wrong, the people here are great – but getting that one-on-one time with God was absolutely amazing.

I drove towards the cliffs where we did our campout and rappelling on Wednesday night, but didn’t go as far as we went on Wednesday before getting sidetracked exploring and finding a great place to spend my solo time. I parked my car, grabbed my chair, sandwich, Bible, staff manual, and notebook paper, and climbed to where I was sitting on the top of the nearest hill right there, looking out about 250-300 feet and down about 50 feet to my car. I was able to see over a lot of the nearby trees, and could just really enjoy the beauty of God’s creation.

We had to do several things for staff training assignments. This past Monday I had to turn in a list that had something I could use for doing devotions each night if I were to end up being a counselor, Thursday morning at the campout I had to give my testimony, Thursday night I had to do a quick personal interview with Jim, the director here, and Friday I had to turn in a list of 42 teachable moments. The teachable moments was by far the one that had me the most worried, as I had to come up with 42 situations that could be used to demonstrate a different Biblical principal. Going into my solo, I had written down the astonishing total of: 1 (Pat, Jim, Sarah, or anybody else on staff if you’re reading this, please feel free to pretend you didn’t read that part). I was able to think back through a lot of the different activities here that the kids will do, as well as just some other things that God brought to mind while looking out over His astonishing creation, and I was able to come up with the other 41 that I needed. We also were supposed to have entirely read the staff manual (something like 193 pages) as well as Pat’s book, Tears in the Bug Juice. I borrowed Becky’s copy of Pat’s book on Friday night after I got in last week, and finished reading it on Sunday, then started in on the staff manual. I also finished reading the staff manual during my solo time.

After finishing those things, I filled out another paper with responses to some of the questions that kids might ask, and spent some time reading my Bible and praying. Each of us on staff has a bookmark with a list of the names of everybody on staff, and I prayed through that list, praying for each person individually as camp is getting ready to start. I also prayed about some other things going on in life right now, and ultimately ended up thinking “man, this is a stupid thing for me to do, but here goes” and I prayed for God to teach me patience and to deal well with adversity. A few minutes later I walked down to my car to put my stuff in the car and go for a walk, and as I walked up to the car, I noticed that one of my tires looked low, so I checked it: 20 psi, instead of the desired 32 psi. I figured “while I’m checking I might as well check all the others, too” and I found one of them to be good, and the other two at about 25 psi. It was drivable, but definitely not good. I thought “wow, God – you didn’t waste any time on that one, did you” and then remembered that 6 weeks ago, one of my LeTourneau friends gave me one of the two little air compressors that he had for keeping in a car, and mine was in my trunk. So I was able to get all of the tires back up to where they needed to be, although the compressor is slow. I know I still have a lot to learn, but God definitely decided to give me a good start in improving my patience and helping me deal well with adversity. He also used that situation to remind me that, no matter what I need (not necessarily want, but truly need) He will provide.

Overall, the solo time was absolutely amazing, and I highly recommend doing something similar. I know, 6 hours seems like a huge part out of your day – but I think most of us, if we really wanted to, could make it work on a weekend or something. If throughout the week, or at least on the weekend, we were to maybe give up some TV time or reading time, most of us could make it work. If not 6 hours, then I recommend doing at least 3 or 4 hours. Just go out, alone, and spend some time with God. If possible, I recommend going somewhere where you can be alone the whole time, without being likely to come across anybody else. The focused time with God is absolutely amazing. Just spend some time in His Word and talking with Him, and maybe most importantly, listening to Him. I know that I plan on making sure that solos similar to today are able to take place for me on a somewhat regular basis.

Oh – and for those that care, during my drive up here last week I saw 26 antelope, and during solo today I saw 1 coyote and 2 members of the deer family (I couldn’t see them well or long enough to be exactly sure what they were – I don’t think they were whitetail, though).

After solo we came back to an amazing dinner, after which I had dishes duty, then we spent some time with the group of us sharing what God has been doing in our lives during staff training, and during our solos today, singing, and finally, sharing in communion. Although I wasn’t initially looking forward to it all that much, Friday turned out to be an absolutely amazing day. God is truly amazing.

Staff training is almost over

Once again, I am very overdue on updating my blog, and I apologize. It has been a very busy past few weeks.

Since last updating, I completed summer school. For the last week and a half, I took 15 minute lunch breaks and no mid-morning breaks, so I was able to leave school one day early, so I left on Thursday at 3:30 PM, after 8 hours of lab. I drove to Wichita, Kansas, arriving at 11:30 PM, where I stayed with my uncle and cousins - my aunt was in the hospital at the time. I got up at 6:00 the next morning and was on the road by 6:35, driving the rest of the way to Trail's End Ranch - it was an almost 14.5 hour drive. I made it here safely, although very tired, and was in time for the last part of the evening meeting. Saturday was a workday here, so I spent a lot of time mowing, then hung out with my fellow staff members here at TER.

Sunday morning I attended Ekalaka Bible Church, along with a bunch of other staff members. The service was good, and I then spent the afternoon catching up on some require dreading and hanging out with people here. Sunday night training resumed, and I have been keeping busy with meetings and training on different events (BMX biking, low ropes course, paint ball course, high ropes course, etc.) ever since. Wednesday night was spent on a camp-out, which also involved getting to rappel down a 65 foot cliff, which was good - I had not been rappelling in over a year and a half, so it was fun to get to go again.

Thursday we came back from the camp-out, ate lunch, and got back to work, until meetings resumed, then supper, group game, and more meetings.

Please be praying for myself and the rest of the staff as we are already tired, and the campers have not gotten here yet. Be praying for the campers, as our first set will be arriving Sunday. Be praying that we be prepared to work with them and teach them, and that God work through us in their lives.

I would love to hear from you, so please, feel free to email me.

Take care, and God Bless.