Self-Control

Self-control comes next in the less well-known story of King David from 1 Samuel 25: 2-39. David was in the wilderness near the lands of Nabal. Nabal is a rich man whom David had done a favor for in the past--taking care of some of his men and sheep. David has asked that Nabal give his men some food from the feast that he has prepared, but Nabal accuses them of lying and sends them away. When David hears this he calls for his men to prepare to wipe out Nabal. Nabal's beautiful and clever wife, Abigail, hears what Nabal has done and calls for her servants to gather food and gifts and sends them to David. She follows and throws herself at his mercy, asking for him to spare her husband and not have blood upon his hands. David then praises God for sending Abigail and stopping him in the heat of his anger.

We talked of the difficulty of self-control over our feelings and emotions as well as over our actions. That we often need help outside of ourselves to keep our self-control. We need an Abigail to remind us that how we behave and think are up to us and are our responsibility.

When I read this story, I am reminded of Donald Duck cartoons in which he gets very mad. The red rises from his collar to the top of his head with steam pouring out of his ears (?!) until there is an explosion of rage with yelling and kicking and bouncing around. This explosion ultimately leads to an apology for losing control (in the cartoon, in life we often live with guilt for quite awhile before apologizing).

I challenged them to come up with some strategies to keep self-control--counting to 10 (or 4), deep breaths, walking away, talking to someone, prayer, and to use them in the coming days with fellow campers and changing plans...

Acceptance & Kindness

Day 2, we looked at acceptance and kindness through Jesus's story of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). When a lawyer asked how to be assured of a place in heaven, Jesus asks what the law says. "To love God and to love your neighbor." Then the lawyer asks, "Who is my neighbor?" Jesus responds with the story of the man who is robbed and beat up on a roadside, passed by 2 religious people, and helped by a Samaritan. When Jesus then poses the question back to the lawyer, "Who was the neighbor?" The response was the one who helped. "Go and do likewise."

We talked about why the Jewish people who heard the story didn't like it. That the hero of the story is the enemy of the Jews. Jews and Samaritans did not interact, talk or touch. They were the people on the sidelines, the outskirts, the non-entities. In order to love our neighbor, those are the people we are to see as people, to help, to include--those who annoy us, those who are different from us. At camp I talked about acceptance of the people in your cabin who you were spending all week with, acceptance of change and difference. Kindness to those who pester or who we don't like.  We are all children of God and thus all worthy of both acceptance and kindness.

I find this lesson very important today when we have so much fear of "the other," when we don't see or recognize the humanity in so many in our society. Trying to remember that our neighbors, whom we are to love, may live next door, may look different from us, may believe different things, are still God's children. The Law says love your neighbor--Syrian, gay, black, homeless, refugee, transgendered,  poor...  Jesus says, "Go and do likewise."

Courage

Day 1's theme was courage. Queen Esther was my Bible example. (Esther 4-5) Queen Esther's cousin, Mordecai, told her of a law the king signed that would kill all of the Jews on a certain day. He told her that she had to approach the king and save her people. She knew that to approach the king without being summoned meant a death sentence unless the king raised his scepter to hear the supplicant. She had not been summoned to the king in 30 days. She was scared, but Mordecai told her that this could be her purpose for being in the palace. He also told her that God would save the Jews and that she should be on the right side of history...She agreed to approach the king after 3 days of prayers and fasting by all the Jews. Esther then gathered her courage and went before the king (who welcomed her and granted her request for the lives of her people).

We defined courage--doing something that is difficult or dangerous, being brave, standing up for someone, doing something new. We looked at who can help us find our courage--God, Jesus, parents, friends, counselors. We talked about some of the camp activities that we would face during the week that might call for courage--spending the night at camp, being in the woods, rock climbing, canoeing, zipline,  hiking... and we talked about how practice makes it easier. The more often you use your courage, the easier it gets to use your courage again to do what you found difficult or scary before and to try new things.

Summer 2016 Theme

SUPERHEROES

Camp Grier's theme for the summer was Superheroes. The journals we created for the kids to have to help think more about the daily themes looked (somewhat) like a comic book:

Throughout the week we talked about the gifts (aka Superpowers) that God has given to each of us. Superpowers that we are to use to make this world a better place and to make this week (or 2) a great experience. The 5 superpowers we looked at were courage, acceptance, kindness, self-control and perseverance. Powers that all superheroes have and use in all the comics, cartoons and movies that we are so familiar with. We came up with our own superheroes to show our traits, tied in Bible stories and tried to link them to the challenges and fun we have at camp. 

New job!!

So this is a little belated (about 3 months), but I'll write it as it is way past due.

I got a job! I wasn't looking for a job as my part-time work kept me busy and free, but a friend put my name in and it sounded like a job I would enjoy...

I am now working for Camp Grier, a Presbyterian camp located on 500+ acres in Old Fort, NC. I've been hired year round, full time in the summer as the Director of Ministry, and part time the rest of the year as the Global Village Coordinator. I started in May, getting ready for the summer season. Vainglory assured they had the theme picked and journals almost ready...the theme was picked but needed some fine tuning and specifics put in. And suddenly it was summertime!