OO, OO, ME, ME, ME! I’m Going!

In fact we’re headed here already. We’re at Latham Springs for WildWeek with our students this year. I’m really excited about what I think God can do in the lives of these kids this week. For students around the country, camp has this big potential to be one of two things:

  1. It can be this big emotional high. They are around a bunch of other students going through the same things they are, and God is meeting people in all kinds of ways, and they get caught up in the great speaker and fantastic worship, the strings of their heart are pulled, and they are moved to tears in the experience. Because it’s an emotional response, they are compelled to make these grand promises to God that they will likely not fulfill after a few weeks. This can leave them feeling defeated.
  2. They can encounter God in such a way that he brings real change into their life. Among all of the emotions that are running high, and even in some of those kids, there are real interactions with Jesus and what his good news really means in our lives. Camp can be a catalyst for students to bring about true life change, based on a dependence in Christ. They come away from the experience knowing they are called to something different, and they not only know how they’ll follow through with it, but they actually do follow through; whether that means they met Jesus for the first time, or decided to live the way He’s called them to.

I pray, and ask that you’ll pray with me, that the students we are taking with us have the second experience. It is often easy to forget how much we need Jesus when we have the majority of our needs met. I pray that they will encounter Jesus, and have real life change based on that encounter. I can’t say what that looks like for any of them, but I know He wants to meet with them and I hope their hearts are open to that.

 

Adults sponsors/volunteers going to camp (from any church at any point this summer), do me a favor: PLEASE for the love of God! Do not treat this week like a vacation. I know hat might be tempting. But it’s not a vacation. If you think you might do this? Please stay home. Our students need you to be checked in with them. Will there be a little more down time that your day to day at home? Probably, and that’s ok. But please don’t volunteer to go if that’s the reason you’re going. This week has the power to change the lives of your students, and they need you present to:

  1. Recognize when they’ve encountered the Living God of the universe.
  2. To be available to them when they come to you with something. Anything. You need to be prepared for anything. Mother Theresa said, “Everyone you meet is in pain”, this is true with teens if with no one else. They have a ton of stuff going on, it all crashes down at some point, and you may be the person they come to to help them lift it up.

Be in prayer and ask God to prepare your heart for your week at camp with your students. Ask God to prepare your heart to encounter Him, and to be ready for whatever may come your way. God gets wild in the lives of students when we take them out of your day to day. Get excited.

 

Grace & Peace,

Stippick