Back to Civilization

I have returned from the cellular black hole that is Bates Creek Camp.

I had a great week at the Mineral Area Association Boy's Camp. It wasn't a perfect week...but it was a great week.

Here's how the week started: On the drive 3+ hour drive to camp my car stopped running. Yeah, it just quit. I was driving down a state highway and it just stopped running. I managed to coast to a place where I could turn off of the highway and call for help. I notified the camp director of my situation and told him that I'd get to camp as soon as I could. The tow truck arrived after an hour and we took the car to a repair shop east of Steelville MO. Tim's Auto is a one man operation with Tim as the one man owner operator of the establishment. He asks if I'm in a hurry and I said that if it can't be fixed that afternoon, that I won't need it until Thursday afternoon. He says that he'll call me.

The camp sends a guy named Joel to drive the 40 miles to Steelville to pick me up and bring me to camp. BTW, Joel was also the guy in charge of the recreational activities at camp and did a super job of keeping the boys active and burning off their boyish energy in entertaining ways.

Since there were very few places on the grounds that I could receive a cell phone signal, communicating with Tim about what the problem with my car was and when it could be ready was difficult. It was Thursday afternoon as camp was wrapping up that I received a message that the car was ready. Elijah drove me back to Steelville so that I could retrieve my vehicle and return to camp to pack it up and head home.

Kudos to Derick Mickan! It was his first year as the Boy's Camp Director and he did a fantastic job. We had around 80 boys that were third through sixth graders. Eight made decisions to trust Jesus as their Lord and Savior, twelve rededicated themselves to serving Him and many of them committed to telling their friends that Jesus loves them and died for them. We even had one dad (on family night) rededicate to being a godly father and spiritual leader in the home.

Daytime speakers included representatives from the CMA (Christian Motorcycle Association) and a dirt track racecar driver. The speakers brought their bikes and racecar and talked to the boys about how they use these tools to share Jesus with the people that they encounter. The third speaker, a monster truck driver, had to cancel and the boys were stuck with some guy doing a magic show and talking about sharing Jesus through our hobbies and the things that we love to do.

Derick's band, Leaving 99 provided the music each night for the worship service. The boys really enjoyed their time at camp and I hope and pray that they will do a much better job of representing Jesus than my generation has done.

It's good to be back at home and I am catching up on e-mails, blogs and such. I was blessed to have missed the Cardinals getting swept by the Astros and was happy to see that they are still in first place. Now there are calls to be returned, e-mails to be answered and work to be done.

Later,

John <><