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.