A Very Stuffy Christmas

Anothered scattered week for me as I try to catch up with everyone.  On Tuesday I said good bye to the Barakel people that had visited and then I left to take one of them home myself.  That lead to a whirlwind trip to St. Johns (through Holt and Haslett) where I was able to see some Barakel friends, and a Michigan Tech friend in the morning.  After that I hustled over to Ann Arbor on Wednesday morning and visited U of M.  I got to see a lot of the campus as well as visiting the tree that Tim Houston broke himself on last week.

I didn't stay there long because I had dinner plans in Battle Creek.  So in one day I started in St. Johns, drove to Ann Arbor, and eventually landed in Battle Creek.  Over this one trip I was able to see people from the most important parts of my life (High School, College, and Barakel).  From December 8th through the 22nd I've put a solid 650 miles on the car, and it'll be another 600 miles by the time I return if everything goes as planned.  While driving I've seen some interesting things, but this house that took up most of two lanes was definitely the most interesting.

I spent the rest of the week in Battle Creek.  I had a blast playing volleyball with some folks from Riverwalk church and my Dad.  They've been a joy every time I've returned from camp, always ready to catch up and hear how the work is going at camp. I also went shopping with my Floridian friends, the Knapp's.  It's neat to see them so much over 2 weeks like this.  While at Barnes and Noble I found a weird book with "tickle fingers" included.  I thought I'd try them on and the Cuddle Monster came out for bit.

Christmas Eve is always busy for me.  I went to my church for a communion service and then attended Midnight Mass at St Philip Catholic Church.  I'm not Catholic, but the service is very a very sobering yet joyful presentation.  They have a small orchestra and choir that always does a great job.  Maybe because we stayed out so late, or maybe because of all my traveling I ended up waking up sick on Christmas morning.  Me and Mom slept in til after 10am and I personally spent most of the day lounging around and resting.

So I'm looking forward to getting rid of this runny nose before the New Year rolls around.  I would honestly rather be sick now instead of at camp where I would want to be working.  Here I can rest most of the day and not feel too bad.  We'll be hosting campers at Camp Barakel in less than 2 weeks and I'm already started to get excited.  It's good God glorifying work that impacts the lives of our campers.

My Travels Continue

After returning from Florida this week, it's been a bit of a whirlwind trip across the state.  I was able to spend some quality time sledding, which is definitely one of my favorite activities of the winter and one that I've been looking forward to for months.  Thanks to friends in Rochester that have some of the best hills I've seen since Michigan Tech.  From Detroit I headed over to Lansing for two Camp Barakel events.

First we had the STEP Reunion (Summer Tech and Engineer Program) where we're able to hang out with some of the high school kids that help camp make it through the summer.  Not only does their time at camp support our efforts to spread the Gospel, it also helps them develop work ethic and to learn more about what God can do through them.  The next day we went met with the mostly college aged summer staff.

Over the summer our free time always goes "clean, move, play", but at the Barakel Bash we are able to eat, play, and sing.  It's a great time to maintain the fellowship that we develop throughout the summer.  During the Bash we play games in the gym, meet people from other years, reconnect with resident staff members, sing songs from the summer, and generally encourage one another.  I know I was really looking forward to it and I was not disappointed.

After the Bash some people were able to join me in Battle Creek and we kind of extended the Bash with movies, cards, and we even did some skating.  One of Battle Creek's supposed claims to fame is the International Festival of Lights.  It used to be a huge thing when I was a kid, or it seemed like it at least.  Now many of the displays are falling apart and it's not in the state I remember it.  While walking through town we enjoyed many of the lights they have around camp, and we even got a chance to talk to some of the people that put it together.  They explained that the lights are being replaced with LED lights, and it looks like the Festival will be improving over the next years.

So the lights were fun to check out, and we were able to see how the city is doing.  This break has been a rush and it's going to continue like that for the rest of the Holiday season.  Thanks for following, and have a Merry Christmas!

Freezing Florida

Two of my friends from Battle Creek moved down to Florida about 3 years ago.  They've offered to put me up whenever I can make it into Jacksonville, and I've taken them up on that 3 times now.  This week is the 4th trip down to Florida.  Someone pointed out cheap tickets, so I purchased one and headed down.

For the first few days I spent a lot of time relaxing at the house while Steve and Jen worked at their school a couple blocks away.  I spent a fair amount of time reading on the new porch they've added since my last visit.  I was also able to help out with Steve's junior high soccer team.  After the Barakel fun run last week my legs were still pretty sore, and these junior high schoolers took advantage.  Part of helping the team out was watching their game on Friday night.  These talented kids mercied the other team 8-0 in the first half, and that's with most of their players pulled back onto defense.  It's fun to see these skilled kids dominating, but also just having fun playing the sport they like.

The temperature was fairly cold, but not anything like what Michigan has been experiencing this week.  So we made our way around town.  We played disc golf, ate at some fine dining establishments, attended their church, and then Steve had a special surprise for me Sunday afternoon.  I didn't know it, but he'd been planning to take me to a Jaguars game.  So after finding tickets online we ran over to pick them up, then hustled over to the game just a couple minutes into the first quarter.  It's been a long time goal of mine to see a game of each of the 4 major leagues.  I've been to several Red Wings games, a couple of Pistons games, and a Tigers game.  The game was fantastic with lots of scoring and it wasn't decided until the last minute.

It's been a good trip to Florida and we still have a couple more days, but I am looking forward to seeing some snow in Michigan.  Hopefully we'll get another round of disc golf in, and some more practices with the soccer team.  Thanks for following, and I look to seeing many of you over the next couple weeks!

Camp and Campers

So we're coming to the end of the year here at Camp Barakel.  The maintenance department has been punching out projects left and right.  This week alone we've worked on grouting the stone in Crosscut, rebuilding the Boeve's garage door, chainsaw maintenance, and some updates to one of the boxes we store wood in.  The work is good, but it sure has been cold outside.

Speaking of the cold, it's been bitterly cold up here the last couple days.  This morning on the way to church the car said it was 24 degrees outside.  On top of the cold we've gotten a little bit of snow that translated into a sheet of ice on the roads around here.  That led to one of the camp men sliding his camp truck into a tree.  Another guy, Dave Douglas, organized a fun run from Fairview into camp.  We had 4 people from camp run about 6 miles in the chilly weather for what was an average time of an hour.  On top of that we had one other adventure.  Titus Brown has wanted to get into the icy water for some time so he decided the first day of real snow on the first day of December would be a good opportunity to get in the water.

I'll be saying goodbye to camp on Tuesday for about a month.  I'm really looking forward to seeing some campers at camp when I return in January.  Walking through the West Side Dining Hall has been where I've really been missing the campers.  It's a reminder that all the work we've been doing since November is all an effort to prepare for spreading the Gospel to our campers.  So the work continues here, even as the snow starts falling and the temperature takes a bitter turn.

Thanks for following!

Reflecting at Home

That's a picture of the soccer field I played on in high school.  After being home for a week I've walked and jogged past it several times.  It's right around the corner from me and the place carries a lot of memories for me, as well as a lot of fun obstacles for me to climb and jump over.  Not only did I play 4 years of soccer there, I also attended the Math and Science Center on the same property.  It's a great place for me to get some fresh air and take a minute away from the business of the holiday season.  

Another place I spend time is Pizza Sam's.  Our Youth Pastor, two of his sons, and my buddy Rob all work there.  On any given night during the holiday season you can find me playing euchre with friends and eating my Hawaiian delight pizza sub.  On this trip I spent more time trying to clean than visiting with people.  Since I haven't been home for more than a week over the last year, my room had become quite messy.  Every time I stop at home things get rearranged a little, but this is the first time I stopped to clean up. 

It was a year ago that I was considering going to camp for seasonal staff.  I was already planning to apply to work at camp when my engineering project at Post Foods was coming to an end and I felt it was the time God had planned for me to jump into ministry.  Since then I'd like to say I've not looked back.  The truth is I didn't for the first several months, but once money started getting a little tighter I'll admit that I've looked back at a career in engineering from time to time.  It was a financial blessing at the time, but I need to remember that God will provide enough for me wherever I am.  

Now I'm all set for most of another year of serving at Camp Barakel.  Please pray that I would remember the line I drew when I left engineering.  Pray that I'd have confidence in His ability to provide for my needs.

Seasonal Stretch and Extra Help

I've been the only Seasonal staff guy all Fall so far, and this week has shown how we could use a couple more.  We worked on four major projects this week, and I ended up helping with all of them in some way or another.  

Most of my work has been with Dan Haines in Crosscut.  We've been putting up stone around the great room.  It's quite a bit of mixing mud and careful placement of pieces, but it looks good with the room.  We've had help from Titus Brown and Brad Smith along the way.  

Mike Baker has been working on the new porch for Pine Cabin, finishing up the ceiling.  His Father-in-Law came for a morning and helped Mike with some of the cutting.  I also helped out with lifting some of the large plywood ceiling pieces that were too big for one person.  In the meantime Mike Alchin has replaced some tile in the East Side Dining Hall while also replacing and repairing many of the lights in Snow Valley.  I was able to use the Skytrak to lift Mike and an electrician that offered us some help this week.  

Even with all the extra workers we had throughout the week, I ended up getting pulled back and forth a little bit.  Sometimes the guys just need an extra pair of hands.  It was the first time I could really see that having a couple more guys on seasonal staff makes it a lot easier to get a lot of work done.  It was neat to see some of the unexpected help that showed up during such a busy week of work.

On Friday I left camp for a week at home.  On the way I stopped in Rochester to see some of the summer staff.  One of the greatest things about camp has been the people I've been able to meet from all over.  I'm trying to use my trips to and from camp as opportunities to keep those relationships up.  With the holiday season approaching, I'm hoping I can take advantage of the opportunities to swing to Grand Rapids, Lansing, and Detroit to catch up with friends.  

That's it for now.

Mostly Pictures

I mentioned last week that we were working on the porch of Pine Cabin.  Well before we had the major support under it we had a collapse.  We were using a couple of support 2x4's and one of them wiggled its way into a hole we had prepared for the 6x6 supports.  Me and Mike Alchin were actually on the roof at the time and thank God we didn't get hurt beyond a couple bumps and bruises.  

So we started over with the porch after that exciting morning and we were able to get the whole building shingled over the week.

With gun season opening up this Monday it seemed like it would be fun to go out and shoot the shotgun.  I'd never shot the double barrel until this week.  It was heavy enough to hold off most of the recoil.  

This is my first full weekend staying at camp and it gave me enough time to play on the piano a little.  Dan Haines and I were able to get together with his guitar as well.  

New Stuff and Old Stuff

We just had our first full weekend off this Fall.  Many of the staff families traveled accross the state to visit family and friends that often get neglected during our 6 day work week during the retreat seasons.  With a weekend off comes a normal work schedule too.  We've now transferred to a 5 day, 8am-5pm work schedule.  A lot of folks around here enjoy going to church like normal for the few weekends we are able to.

I chose to spend my first weekend at home.  When I go home my two main goals are to catch up with friends and to surf the internet.  That's two things I don't get to do much at camp.  So for this trip I stopped in St Johns to drop off a lost and found Bible and then I ended up spending the rest of the day bowling and hanging out at the famous Davis house.  After that, I pretty much turned into a loaf.  I spent Saturday morning waiting for a replacement phone, and trying to get my contacts back up to date.  Sunday was great as I was able to play drums at Garrison Hills.  After church I headed up to camp, hooking up with the Ford family caravan along the way.

As for work, we powered through a quarter of the East Side Dining Hall roof in about 3 full weeks of work.  It's really nice to see the project get so close to the end.  Now, as a break from shingling the Dining Hall we are... you guessed it!  Shingling Pine Cabin.  We're hoping it'll be a much simpler shingling job without a valley or so many pipes sticking out of the roof.  It can't be too simple though, so we're also adding a porch to the front of the cabin.  It'll be a large porch with enough room for benches under, very similar to Heritage Lodge.  I can already see important conversations between counselors and campers happening on it. 

With Winter and the holidays approaching I'm looking forward to several trips home, and some time to relax with friends.  In the meantime the work doesn't stop at Camp Barakel.  Pray for safety as we run around on yet another frosty roof!

Jack and Jill Weekend

If you live in Michigan then you probably know about the wind we've seen this weekend.  Around here the wind knocked down so many trees that it would be hard to count them all.  Out of the thousands of trees that fell, we had almost no damage.  We had a couple close call like a tree that broke some fencing in front of Heritage Lodge (pictured), and another that landed on the West Side trading post.  I think the only thing that we had to fix was 4 lengths of split rail fence and a bit of retaining wall that we pushed a tree down onto.  Because of all these trees, the construction crew spent most of the time cutting wood.  We probably ended up cleaning up about 20 trees of all sizes before the week was over.  

All these trees ended up being a blessing as we had about 50 people coming to help out for the weekend.  It's called Jack and Jill weekend and we welcomed 25 former summer staff along with a work group from Five Points (a supporting church).  Camp organizes and assigns the work projects while providing meals and snacks for all the help.  My work group cleaned up and reset the targets on the East Side Archery range, seeded the range, raked leaves around the East Side cabins, and mauled wood to be shuffled to buildings all over camp.  I also took a small group of folks who fixed the split rail fence and the retaining wall that were damaged by falling trees around Heritage.  We also picked up a tree off of a walking path and dragged it back to the maintenance yard. 

  

I don't even know the complete list of projects that were completed in these 8 hours of hard work, but it's very evident as you drive around camp and it looks good.  Piles of brush have been dragged away, leaves have been raked, and all the buildings have big stacks of wood in them.  It's a huge help to have so many people come up and volunteer time for the weekend.  The work isn't all though because Saturday night and Sunday morning we are able to just hang out.  It's funny to think of, but even though we spend the summer working together we don't really get to relax together much.  Friendships are renewed over this weekend, and I think many people get a small bit of Camp Barakel that they've been missing since the Summer ended. 

Thanks for following! 

Upcoming Reading

We had a cold and wet weekend here for our Men's Retreat this weekend.  That doesn't slow us down too much here at camp though.  We still saw Bain, a German Shepherd in with the Michigan State Police K9 unit.  His partner performs a demonstration of the dogs tracking ability as well as his ability to aid in apprehending a suspect.  The men really enjoy seeing the dog run at full speed, grab a mans well padded hand, and drag him to the ground.  We also enjoyed a good game of flag football in the Saturday afternoon drizzle.  The weather turned out great today and the sun even came out in the afternoon.

As we wrap up the fall retreat season I've been looking at my reading habits and considering how they'll change in the next couple months. I'm working on an Old Testament reading plan that includes a Psalm and a couple chapters from the rest of the books.  It's spread out over the year, so it will wrap up in December.  In January I'll be starting over and this time including the New Testament readings.  Otherwise I've not been reading much consistently and I plan to change that.



These are the books that I plan to read over the next 6 months:

Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Timothy Keller:  My dad suggested this book and I can go either way on biographies.  I'm hoping this will fill in some of the pre-WWII details from a new perspective. 

Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis:  I've read these many times and the allegory is great in them.  They add up to a lot of pages, but I can usually scoot through them pretty quick when I get into the stories.

Peter Pan by JM Berrie:  One of my favorite fairy tales and one that I can relate to in many ways.  I love the picture of the boy refusing to give up his youth.

The Civil War by Shelby Foote:  A set of 3 ridiculously large books.  My friend Rob McAdams owns them and I've gone through them once before.  The narrative covers the war from a very neutral perspective while keeping me interested in the people that fought in it. 

It'll be a long shot to complete them all, especially with the Civil War series.  I also have a bunch of other books I might get into over that time. 

Next to the book shelf I have what Rob calls my "Pop Tarts Shrine".  It's not quite that, but I do love to eat pop tarts.  I need the energy anyways with all the work we've been doing and that we plan to complete this fall. Last week we spent time fixing some ceiling paneling in the great room of Crosscut Lodge.  We also moved in 3000 pounds of tile and we'll be moving more in over the next weeks.  We're also looking for any chances that the weather will give us to shingle another corner of the East Side Dining Hall roof. 

We're staying busy up here at camp in the Fall.  Please pray for guidance and safety as we attack a long list of projects this Fall.



Letters

At the end of each week of summer camp each counselor is given a list of their campers with mailing addresses.  It's a great tradition that encourages us to keep in touch with our campers.  Even with the list it's still hard to write all the letters.  Hard for me at least.  To help motivate me I've decided to break it up a little and send to 2 campers per tribe until I finish everyone.  With 4 tribes that adds up to about 32 letters before the new year.  I've found that 8 letters is manageable in about an hour.  Then I just need to stock up on stamps.  All that said, I've sent out 10 letters so far, and have heard no responses.  I think it's good for me to learn to pray over a letter and just trust God to handle the rest.  I'm sure some letters won't reach campers, and that if they are read the camper still may not respond.  I'm praying that God will use the letters with the kids that may need to refresh their memory of what they experienced over the summer. 

This process also reminds me of the different needs of my campers.  Most of them claimed a relationship with Jesus when I spoke to them about it, but some had some unique situations.  Writing these letters reminds me to pray for their relationship with God.  Several of my campers didn't come from homes that attend church, and some didn't even know the emphasis we put on establishing and growing a relationship with God when they sent their children here.  One particular 5th grade boy found us on the internet and chose our camp because we offer 2 chapels a day.  He comes from a family that has never been to church, yet chose us mainly because we have so much teaching.  Another camper invited his unsaved step brother and asked his family to pray for his salvation.  After talking on the bus ride this 5th grader had his step brother prepped and ready to talk to me about accepting the Gospel on the second night of camp. 

Glory to God for working in the lives of these kids!  After the effort some of them put into spreading the Gospel at their schools and with their families I feel it's an important part to try to encourage them through letters. 

Whatever season it is, we're always trying to proclaim the Gospel here at Camp Barakel.  We had about 350 men up here this weekend.    Many of our campers invited their friends to camp so that they could be exposed to the Gospel and Tom Harmon carries that task very well.  It's amazing to see so many men singing and worshipping in one room.  Their excitement is contagious and you can see it spread to many of the staff that just love having such a big group of men gathered in the name of Jesus.

Fun in Fairview

As Seasonal Staff at Camp Barakel I stay very busy all day, then I try to figure out ways to fill my evenings.  It's not hard!  I spend a lot of that time driving kids to town, and watching local sporting events.  In the Spring I helped to coach the under 18 AYSO soccer team and now I help to run the clock at the Varsity games this Fall.  Basketball is kind of the main sport around here and I've watched staff kids play.  There is also a pick up group that plays basketball on Friday mornings.  It's great to get out and run around for an hour, even if it's at 6:30 in the morning.  Having grown up in Athens, it's a blast to be involved in this community that comes together around their kids at the local sporting events.

As for Camp, we've been working on the roof of the East Side Dining Hall.  It's one of the largest roofs on camp so we only do a quarter of it at a time.  A summer work crew finished a quarter of the the roof and had leaking problems that led to a big mess in part of the dining hall.  Well this week we were able to finish and clean up a whole quarter of the roof so that campers wouldn't have to deal with the construction in progress.  I was able to strike back at the bees in the progress too as we found 3 nests in some of the venting. 

We were planning to start the roof last week, but with the fire we were hopping for the whole week.  We were thankful for all the help we received from programers, a staff kid, and even a part time staff volunteer that got here early on Friday.  God chipped in with some beautiful weather, I even got a little bit of a sunburn.  Now we'll take a week away from the roof to catch up on wood cutting before trying to find another week to try and roof another quarter of the roof. 

We said goodbye to our last women's retreat this weekend and we'll now welcome two completely packed men's retreats.  We'll be spending time trying to finish outdoor projects and preparing for the winter.  Join me in continuing to pray that God would work in the lives of our campers.  Thanks for reading!

Ghost Camp

The Fall retreat season is quite a change of pace from Summer.  We go from having campers 7 days a week, to 3 days a week.  Over the summer a day off is a misnomer, it’s really about half a day off.  Now in the retreat season we get a full day off on Mondays.  In these down times I find myself walking around camp and thinking of the summer.  I can almost see camp humming along around me, even when no one is here.  I see campers playing horseshoes, buses pulling around to drop kids off, and benches where I was able to have sweet conversations with campers.

It reminds me that the summer is the focus around here.  Programers are already working on all the events and activities of the summer, leadership is preparing to staff the camp with an army of volunteers that will work here for a week or even the whole summer like many of the college aged summer staff.  Most importantly the staff and many supporters are praying that God will provide the workers that will proclaim His Gospel next summer.

You also might have heard we had a fire this week.  There was a small fire in one of the bathrooms in the cabin I clean.  God came through as the fire never really got started because there was a fire retardant spray that was used throughout the cabin.  We were able to put it out and quickly clean and remodel the area so it was ready for retreats about 48 hours after it started.  Almost every family was represented in the cleanup and repair.  There are a lot of things to be thankful for, but thank God especially for safety and for providing the workers to clean and fix everything so quickly.

It’s getting cold up here and I’ve been replacing the screens in the trailer with another layer of glass to keep my trailer a little warmer.  Retreats are getting colder too, and you can tell because the coffee mugs are flooding in during snacks and at every meal.  We’re happy to welcome retreats for the rest of the month.  It was quite an exciting week here at Camp Barakel, thanks for following!

Signs of Fall

The trees are starting to change up here in northern Michigan.  

Little patches of color show up, but we haven’t seen the dazzling display we’ll get over the next month.  One sign of Fall is the staff hay ride last week.  Mike Alchin drove the tractor as we rode around most of camp.  We had word puzzles up on some of the trees and the pre-school kids would start yelling “Clue!” while the elementary kids would guess at the puzzle.  |R|E|A|D| would be read between the lines for example.  It was a nice night for riding around, not too cold but crisp for sure.

Another sign of Fall is the yearly zipline refresher.  We train in the Spring with an outside company that sends a trainer, but in the Fall we like to make sure everyone is fresh on the procedures.  It’s all to make the zipline a safe and smooth experience for campers.

On the first trip up the tower we experienced some excitement.  And when I say excitement I mean about 3 seconds after that picture was taken a wasp stung me about 3 times.  It turns out that the second deck of the zipline had a large wasp nest under it.  Training went on well after that though.

It’s probably for the best that I got stung.  We were able to knock the nest down, and kick it into the woods.  That could have ruined a campers weekend.  As for my hand, it's almost normal after 5 days of the club.

This weekend we said hello and goodbye to a Ladies Retreat and a Father/Daughter retreat.  It was nice to see Fathers that want to work on their relationship with their daughters.  Thanks for your interest in my ministry!

Wood and Stuff

If a tree falls at Camp Barakel, will Mike Baker cut it into pieces?  The answer is almost always yes.  Not only that first tree, but any dead ones that we find in the area.  So we'll often find a fallen tree, then end up taking about four trees to the wood pile.  Leaving with two chainsaws, a can of gas, a bottle of oil, a pick up truck, and the sky track, we'll make short work of a lot of wood.  Just last week we started the day by cleaning up a tree that fell on the bike path, along with some trees that were leaning over the path.  In about 45 minutes of work, we gathered a good load for the sky track.  We add the big pieces of wood to the pile that the high school Engineers will work on next summer and we'll burn some of the brush in the new burn bunker.

Speaking of the sky track.  It's kind of the "do all" around camp.  Any job you can think of, the sky track has an application.  It helps us change high up light bulbs, move large pieces of wood, push stuck cars out, clean up trails, and lift the zipline carts.  You can probably see how it becomes a favorite tool around camp.  I'd personally love to use it for a temporary rope swing at the water front.  The possibilities are almost endless,  although this week we experienced one of the rare occasions where the tree was so large it was just easier to pull it with a truck.

The sky track can also be a glorified ladder sometimes.  So much so that you wonder how you did jobs without the sky track before.  We've been working on demolishing a small portion of the garage that was damaged over the summer and replacing it.  We used the sky track to reach the top of the 14 foot section we needed to tear apart.  Mike Baker pulled off the paneling and we discovered no less than 20 bats, and a wasp nest that was about 9 inches in diameter.  After taking care of the damaged wall we've framed the new section of the wall and started filling in the gap with paneling.  

Well, when I mention that we cut a lot of wood around here that's a little summary of it.  We also have a lot of little projects that we dive into throughout any given week, like reconstructing a corner of the garage.  This weekend saw about 150 campers go through camp during a Couples Retreat and a Mother/Son retreat.  It was a lot of fun seeing sons having a blast with their mothers on Thunder Express and on the Zipline.  Thank God for a place that people are able to rejuvenate their relationship with Him.