Kulaqua :: Day 3

It is hard to believe that we are halfway through camp already. The time is really flying by and we are having a great week. Today was a pretty typical day for us, even down to the time the thunderstorms roll in during free time.

I have been really encouraged by this group of students and their interaction with each other this week. We have had a few minor setbacks, but for the most part they seem to be enjoying each other and even reaching out to make new friends.

This afternoon I took 10 of our boys with me on the snorkeling excursion to Ginnie Springs. It is easily 10-15 degrees colder than the spring here at Kulaqua. Needless to say, these guys don't have much insulation so they were freezing. It was a little better when we ventured into the Santa Fe River, but still a cold journey. We had a first this year... in all my years here I've never seen a gator, but that changed today. Luckily we had already gotten out of the water, but we looked across from one of the springs to see a nice 5-footer sunning on a log. We were all pretty glad we didn't see him in the water.

We capped the day off with a powerful time of worship and the Word! Mario did a great job explaining the big picture of the Bible - God's plan and purpose for our lives and the story of the Gospel. Many of our students were challenged and were asking great questions about faith and being assured of their salvation during small group time.

Our late night activity was a church hang nite, so I reserved the gym and let them go wild playing dodgeball. They were excited and are looking forward to the dodgeball tournament tomorrow. We also have our tubing excursion tomorrow down the Itchmetouchme (not quite spelled or pronounced that way) River. It will be a big day and our last full day at camp, so keep praying for our safety and that God continue the work He has started!

Kulaqua :: Day 2

We have made it through our first full day of camp and it has been a long, but great day. We started early as usual and had a jam packed day full of excitement - from dodging thunderstorms, to a late night game of manhunt, and even a surprise birthday celebration!

After our morning chapel we had some time created for the students to get alone with God out on the beautiful Kulaqua campus. We realize that most ms students aren't probably don't have many quiet moments with God on a regular basis, but that is a neat element here at camp that we hope will grow into an important part of their walk with Christ.

After lunch we had free time for all the activities around camp, although the kickball tourney was literally washed out by a big thunderstorm that rolled through. I got to spend a good amount of time down at the blob skyrocketing ms students that are quite a bit lighter than me (that was saying it nicely) into the air.

We had a great night chapel tonight in worship with Wayne and the band and then Mario continued expanding the reality of pain and suffering in the life of a Christian, but with the promise of Romans 8:28 that God is working for the good and conforming us to His image. It gave us alot to talk about in small group time.

We did celebrate Bailey's birthday tonight and finished with a great game of manhunt. Tomorrow we have our snorkeling excursion for those going down to Ginnie Springs. Keep praying for us!

Kulaqua :: Day 1

Well, we had a good bus ride over and stopped in Lake City for lunch. We made it here safely (around 2pm) to Kulaqua and had a great day today. We were fortunate to have good weather during the free time when we got here and the rain held off while we were in chapel tonight.

The students have already explored camp and were all over the place enjoying the waterpark and spring today. I missed out on alot of the fun due to my duties as a Southland director, but I heard all about it.

Tonight we had our first chapel time with Wayne Kerr and the band and Mario our speaker. It was a high energy time of worship and Mario did a good job as he is going to be answering the question of why God allows pain, suffering and bad things to happen.

We had our church huddle time after chapel and our small groups where we were able to go more in depth with the topic tonight and also hear what the students are excited or expecting out of camp this week. After huddles we had our night time party at the River Ranch waterpark where the students could do the lazy river, slide, wavepool and volleyball.

We our packed into the mini-lodges with kids on mattresses and in bunks everywhere, but we did get everyone a place to sleep! We are looking forward to our first full day of camp tomorrow. Be praying for all of our leaders and students - that God would move in a powerful way this week!

Elevate :: Day 6

I am writing this post from home... which is a weird place that I won't see much over the next month! How do I summarize our week at HS Camp? This is going to be difficult!

As most of you know, we had an eventful final day - mainly due to our bus breakdown in Atlanta, but before we even loaded the bus we had our final chapel session on the overlook. It was a beautiful morning with a cool breeze and some morning fog hanging on the mountain. We joined in some acoustic worship with Wayne and then Tim wrapped up the week with a great parallel from Henry VIII to Christ and His Kingdom. He engaged us in a little reenactment that was really moving. It is awesome to think of Christ as our King who desires our allegiance as we see His Kingdom come.

Our delay in Atlanta was really a blessing from God, in that the air pressure leak happened right when we were exiting in Buckhead for lunch. Praise God it wasn't on the side of 75 in downtown!

HS camp was a powerful time in my life and I pray for our students as well. I was able to personally see the evidence of the Spirit calling students, changing students and challenging us all to surrender our allegiance and lives to our King! I am so grateful to serve a church that values students and provides us opportunities to go to camp. There is something about getting away and getting out of the 'world' to a degree. The symbolism of being on the mountain - just like Jesus often withdrew to the mountain - was felt in all of our hearts as we had a great taste of His Kingdom and didn't want to leave. But we leave knowing that He is with us and that we can all personally withdrawal to the mountain to maintain a strong connection to our King.

I'm so honored to have the privilege to just love our hs students and have such a great staff team. Again, it was a powerful week and we praise God for revealing Himself and moving among all of us! Let me wrap up the week by sharing the lyrics of a song we sang this week...

INSIDE OUT

A thousand times I've failed
Still your mercy remains
And should I stumble again
Still I'm caught in your grace

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades
Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame
In my heart, in my soul, Lord I give you control
Consume me from the inside out Lord
Let justice and praise become my embrace
To love You from the inside out

Your will above all else, my purpose remains
The art of losing myself in bringing you praise

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades
Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame
And the cry of my heart is to bring You praise
From the inside out Lord, my soul cries out

Elevate :: Day 5

We had an awesome morning today as we traveled to an awesome place called Foster Falls. It was a blue hole (spring) with a nice overlook and waterfall. It was chilly, but a great place to swim and hang out as a church. We had a few brave souls climb and jump off a ledge.

We returned to camp for some free time and to be able to spend a relaxing afternoon together made for a really great day.

Our last chapel and worship time together was really powerful as Tim continued to unpack this concept of Christ as King and living in His Kingdom. Over and over he has emphasized the work of Christ on our behalf and our inability to "be" a Christian. God continued to work in powerful way in all of our lives.

We shared a special huddle time after chapel where I allowed the students to simply share what God had done in their lives this week and any decisions or commitments they had made. It was a sweet time where God's Spirit was really evident and moving in our midst. God is uniting their hearts and my prayer is that this week is more than just a "camp high" but really the beginning of a personal and corporate dependency that will carry us through the year.

We wrapped up the evening with the dodgeball competition and our teams did great, but didn't bring it home this year. And to top the evening off (or actually early morning hours) I shared a special challenge with our upperclassmen.

This has been an awesome week for me personally. I love these hs students and count it a privilege to be here with them learning and growing alongside them. Be praying for our safe return!

Elevate :: Day 4

Well the exhaustion has officially set in for most, but we are still having a great time. We had a fairly "normal" day and schedule, but for our free time - we took the whole group to downtown Chattanooga for a little excursion. We walked around the waterfront, checked out the Aquarium, went across the foot bridge and ended up at the famous Clumpies Ice Cream. Good thing we walked alot, because that ice cream is awesome. We spent the rest of our time down at Coolidge Park throwing the frisbee, sunning, and re-introducing Chattanooga to the Wildwood game of Buck-Buck. It was a fun afternoon in the sun.

The highlight of the day had to have been tonight. God really showed up among our group and some life changing decisions were made in our church huddle time tonight. We had a few students surrender their lives to Christ tonight and others reaffirm their faith. Praise God! This is why I love camp!

We wrapped up the night with some inflatables, Singstar and a Rockband competition. Tomorrow we are taking our own excursion to a blue hole (spring) called Foster Falls. We are looking forward to some alone time with just our students and spending some time away from camp to relax and unwind a bit. Tomorrow is our last full day of camp, so please be praying that God continues to work powerfully in our lives!

Elevate :: Day 3

It's hard to believe that we hit the halfway point at camp already. God has been faithful to meet us here on this mountain and is doing an awesome work in the lives of our students already. Tonight was no exception as we took a look at our understanding of Christ as King and what it means to surrender our lives to Him as He relentlessly pursues us with His love.

But earlier we started our day enjoying beautiful weather and God's majestic creation with morning worship on the overlook. It was a great start to our day and set the tone for a cool day filled with His presence. I am always amazed at how much easier it is to hear God and respond to God when the distractions (TV, music, etc) are gone and we are here on this mountain.

Today we had our caving excursion and although they took some great pics, I forgot to get the memory card so I could upload them. They came back pretty muddy, but had an awesome experience. The rest of us hung around camp and participated in all kinds of activities.

We wrapped up the night with the volleyball and basketball tourneys. We didn't fair too well in basketball, but we had both of our volleyball teams advance almost to the point of playing each other in the semi's, but fell short. It doesn't look like this will be the year we bring home the trophies, but oh well.

Please continue to pray for us as we are asking God to do an extraordinary work in all of our lives. Pray that we would respond to the prompting of the Holy Spirit in our lives!