Tuesday, July 1, 2014

AWANA Camp

Last week, I had my first real experience of camp.
I have been to camp in the past. But one of my parents would always be there, and it would be more of a leadership conference for just a few nights. AWANA camp was totally different. It was a six night camp with a lot of people. Since the whole camp thing was pretty new to me, I did not know what to think of it for the first few days. At first, honestly, I did not really like it. It was hard for me to fit in since this was my first year and almost everyone else already knew everyone else. (I did have a close friend go with me which was really nice and helped the factor of not really knowing anyone easier to work with.)
The first day, I got there early since I rode up with some of the counselors. I was able to help one of them set up their cabins. The ride up was okay. I got to sit next to a friend. A silly friend who keeps everything pretty fun and interesting.
After setting up, I went up to sign in. There were no signs that gave me any direction. And the lady I talked to thought I was Rebecca W. the junior higher.... I do not even think I look like a junior higher... but okay. After finally figuring all that out, I set up my cabin.
They ran a tight and sort of strict schedule there. You also always had to wear this bead necklace and your name button. I was on the blue team. Out of the four colors- blue, green, yellow, and red- blue would be my favorite color, so, that was kind of cool. We kept in the lead with the points almost all week and only lost to the yellow team by a whole 15 points. I am very competitive, so, it was a real bummer not winning. Haha.
Throughout the week, I got to memorize lots of verses, play lots of game, etc. They also had a lot of freetime. That was kind of nice.

Enough with the details..

This was a Christian camp, and maybe I should share what I learned there.
Let's just say- When I got to camp, my heart was pretty hard. I have been going through some stuff lately that has caused me to ask God "why?!?" a lot. And my heart was hardened toward Him. And I did not want to soften it. But even through my unwillingness, God was able to soften my heart through being daily in the Word, and the daily worship and Bible study.
So, I came away with a softer, more open heart.

Camp was a different kind of experience for me. But after spending a whole week there, I grew to like and enjoy it. I am definetly going to consider going back next year even though I was not so sure if I wanted to go back the first part of the week. The people there are pretty amazing and my friendships with the people I already did know grew quite a bit that week. :-)

Below is a video with pictures from camp:


Click here to view this video

Free books!

The last few months, I have started going out on Saturday mornings whenever I am free. 
There is a man that goes to my church that runs a table full of free Christian literature. He goes almost every Saturday morning and sits out by an old restaurant. This really drew me in. I decided to go one day and liked it enough to go back again and again. Sometimes there are hardly any people that come, but other times, we get lots of people that stop by.
For the most part, the man I go with does most of the talking, but I had a really cool experience a few weeks ago. I do talk to people some, but this time, I was really the only one doing the talking. A young man came up and was sharing some struggles he was having. It meant a lot to me for him to share and let me talk to him. I gave him a few pamphlets and stuffs, and he went on his way. This would have made my whole day, but later, we found the pamphlets in a restroom next door. Even though he left these which seemed really discouraging, I hope that God was able to somehow use me in this man's life as an encouragement.
So there you have it. That is what I do almost every Saturday morning unless I have something else going on. It has been a cool thing to do, and I hope that I will be able to use what I am learning through this opportunity in my life more and more. :-)