Every summer, on the last day of Staff Training, we have the naming ceremony.

Now the goal is to pick a name that reveals something about that person. Sometimes we get carried away and names just end up being fun. I was named Boo Boo because I was so cautious and needed to follow all of the rules all of the time. Boo Boo Bear is always cautious about Yogi’s picnic basket schemes. “I don’t know Yogi, the Ranger wouldn’t like it” and thus my name was born. Scruffy showed up as a camp speaker with very very torn jeans, ripped shirts, and a tattered flannel. And then there was Rambo. Someone suggested “Rainbow” but the director misheard and she was Rambo from then on.

But once in awhile all does go as planned and a moment of magic occurs. Once in a while the name is so perfect that no one contests it. Everyone stands back amazed.

This summer that moment occurred with one of our guy C.I.T’s. He sat on the stool in the middle of the staff while several good names were suggested. Then Scruffy suggested a name: Orion.

Huh, it was a fine name, time to move on. But then he explained his selection. Orion was a comic book character. There were two warring planets. One evil and one good. In order to save their peoples and bring peace, the leaders of the planets exchanged their sons. The prince of the good planet went to live in darkness. The prince of the evil planet went to live in light. He stepped out of a dark and violent world and was raised by a man of peace. He left the hopelessness of his heritage behind him and became a superhero on the good planet. His name was Orion.

The C.I.T. boy sat there looking at Scruffy, knowing that he knew his story. You see, this young man was part of the foster care system, a lost child, passed from place to place, until he was adopted and given a home. He came to camp as a hurting camper trying to put a finger on exactly who he was and where he fit in. But he came back and chose to be a counselor, to walk forward out of the darkness of his past, and to give of himself to others.

Everyone was silent.

Then they named him Orion. 

Boo Boo

Our last summer camp leaves tomorrow and school starts in three days. But if you want to come up to Camas Meadows before the leaves start turning color, next weekend is your chance.

Over Labor Day weekend we have our annual fall work retreat. It starts with an evening snack on Friday and ends with lunch on Monday. Sweet Tea (our amazing cook) will be providing the vittles and the campers (both young and old) will be providing the manual labor. People come and go as they can, putting in a few hours of work or staying a few days. Whatever works for their schedule. 

Camas Meadows was built and expanded during these biannual work retreats (Fall and Spring) and many necessary projects are completed that help keep camp running smoothly. Fire wood needs to be split and stacked for the long winter ahead, the cabins are deep cleaned before winter rental groups arrive, some work needs to be done on Mountain Panther so that the long awaited cabin bathroom can go in, the grounds are buttoned up for the snows ahead, and hopefully they will get a roof put in for the greatly anticipated new generator. The new generator that will actually be powerful enough to run our dishwasher (and all the summer dishwashers cheered, waving their bleach-chapped hands with elation)!

It is hard work. But when the long day of toil is done, Scruffy will bust out his huge collection of board games and campers get a chance to relax in the lodge before the next day’s toil begins.

So if you are a camper or camp counselor and are missing camp, if you are a parent and kind of wish that you had been the one packing your suitcase for a week away, if you are a dish washer or a board member or a friend of a friend of whoever…come on up. Camp happens because of workers like you. We work hard. We play hard. And it all happens next weekend. So please, consider yourself invited.

Boo Boo

The week of Senior High camp is something that I’m not sure I can explain. How do you express what six days of honesty feels like? Six days of jagged emotion. Six days of weeping and laughing and tearing through scripture and falling on your face before God telling him that you are completely done.

Van Helsing spoke on brokenness.

The first night was about broken bones. The hurts and pains and inevitable tragedies of life that make you want to give up. But scripture is very clear. Trouble and sorrow will come, but God has called us to endure and reach to God. The second night was about broken homes. So many of these kids do not have 2 parents to hold onto. Too many of them have been shattered by the very ones who should be fighting the hardest to save them. Then came broken hearts. We are designed by God to love and trust and thrive. But too few of us are willing to actually set aside our own interests and dare to love. We are a people with broken hearts. And what about broken dreams? There is so much that you hope and dream to achieve and become. What happens to our faith and trust in God if our dreams turn to ashes about our feet? How do we patch our joy back together when life doesn’t work out?

And Friday night…ah yes.

The final lesson was about our Broken Savior.

He was perfect, beloved, unblemished. And then He came, down into our world of dust and blood and hate. He chose the fragrance of smoke and wood curls and the oiled handles of simple tools. He chose the taste of rough country meals. Fish grilled over a fire at dawn, Shabbat wine, and unleavened bread. He chose to hear hungry crowds and hobnailed Roman boots and the bleating of lambs brought to sacrifice. He chose the feeling of gritty roads and weary feet, of course fabric and the pressing desert sun, of fists and beatings and thorns and nails. And Jesus chose to see. He chose to see you and to see me. And not just to see us broken and wandering before Him. He chose to walk our terrible road and rescue us from all the horrors of sin and Hell and a lifetime of death.

Saturday morning was the Revelation Chair.

Kids walked up and sat on a broken bench seat that had been torn out of the bus. They sat and took a glow stick from Van Helsing. Then they broke it. As the broken glow stick began to shine into the room, they told their story. Tales too beautiful and terrible for words. Tales of heartache and horror and God walking here among us. We wept with them and cheered for them as they stood to go. For we are all broken. Broken, bruised, and beaten down. But strangely it is those very shards and cracks which leak forth light. The light of our God, living within, bringing hope to a broken people.

No, I can’t really explain. For I am broken too. But sometimes it is enough just to know that. To see the broken places and watch a God of love as He gathers us up and works His glory. 

Boo Boo

We have a tradition up here at Camas Meadows.

The first flowers of spring belong to Grandma Autumn. There is still enough snow on the ground for my sons to dig snow tunnels, although I see bare patches beneath the trees. But spring is here. The first flowers never appear up on the top of the hill where Winter’s grasp takes so long to loosen. They push through the loam on the banks of Camas Creek Road as it twists up the mountain toward the meadow. For the whole month of March and sometimes into April, we drive by these sunny roadside banks at 5 miles per hour looking for splashes of yellow. Finally the day arrives. Bright yellow pine lilies appear on the banks and we gather the first few blooms of spring for my grandmother, Autumn Griffith, one of the camp’s founders.

When the first blossoms finally came this year, I handed the small bouquet to my youngest son and he took off like a shot, barefoot and coatless, for Grammy’s house. Because she had been waiting for this moment all month.

Just so you know, it is spring now at Camas Meadows. It may not look like it. But soon the melt will reach the top of the mountain and we will have flowers of our own blanketing the forest floor. Even though my boys are busy digging forts in the snow banks, we are confident that the advent of spring has occurred. The pine lilies have been found and presented to Grandma Autumn. The rest of the season is soon to follow.

Boo Boo

Scruffy has been cutting boards and sanding and painting on coats of polyurethane for the past two weeks. Now I am happy to report that his project is finished. Two beautiful wooden benches now grace the shower rooms of the main lodge. I present to you: The Shower Room Benches of Camas Meadows!

In the Boy’s Bathroom

In the Girl’s Bathroom

Boo Boo

The Boys at Lake Valhalla

Our family just went on a hike to lake Valhalla last Saturday. We donned our packs and herded our three wild-walking-stick-wielders and headed up the trail. There were heavy rains the night before and a plethora of strange and lovely mushrooms carpeted the ground. Each mushroom was considered a photo worthy event and I took 28 fungus photos before I finally convinced the boys that we had properly documented that particular mushroom bloom.

This adventure did take away my blogging time. But it also reminded me of why we have camp. Well, one of the reasons at least. And gave me something to say.

Romans 1:20–“For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made….”

God is here, right in front of us. He can be clearly seen in the shocking variety of mushrooms, in the cold rocky stream where the boys floated sticks, in the long lean mountain lion and the puffy whistling marmot. He is in the crisp alpine wind snatching through our hair as we topped the ridge and finally looked down upon lake Valhalla and His handiwork is spread out bold before us in the deep crystal waters that plunge suddenly into darkness two feet out from the rock where we ate our lunch.

And we hold in our hands a small bit of God’s glory, here at camp, to share with each camper who comes.

God is in the croaking chorus of frogs in the pond at night, the bright spread of stars across the sky, and in worship songs sung outside at Inspiration Point. His glory is clear in the soft rustling of meadow grass under a summer sun, the bright clean blue of the sky against ponderosa pines, and the elk that walk through at dawn.

When your world consists of the inside of a house, a school bus, a car, a classroom, a gymnasium, and the carefully fenced recess toys…it is hard to see God. At camp we are privileged to offer up some of His beauties, and to give campers just a glimpse of God’s many splendors. 

Bull elk during the fires last fall

Boo Boo

Sometimes you can’t see the beauty of camp until it has been going on quietly around you for a number of years. Ministry can be big and loud and brash and beautiful, like that angry kid who falls on his face before God during the last day of camp. But much of what occurs is done with a quiet power in the background where only a few get to see.

Such is my story for today. The quiet ministry of connections. A few years ago Scruffy was at a loss. He had 16 girl campers at the Sr. High Teen camp and only one solitary girl counselor. And so he took over my parenting duties for the week and sent me off to camp to be a counselor for the first time in ten years. It was a terrifying and marvelous week and I still have contact with those eight wonderful girls.

Several of my campers became counselors themselves with campers that they prayed for and maintained contact with. The other day I came home to a message on my answering machine. I never call people back right away when they leave messages. Talking on the phone is a difficult proposition with three small boys roaring through the house and my phone messages can stay blink blink blinking at me for days. But this call was from one of my old campers and so I called her back right then.

She was scared because she had just gotten a text message from one of her campers. A young girl who had just taken a bunch of pills in an attempt to kill herself. But after the pills were downed, she was terrified and needed someone and remembered her counselor from back at summer camp and texted that counselor, my former camper.

Together we were able to infuriate the poor girl by contacting her mother and getting her the medical and emotional assistance that she required. She is mad, but doing better and it is all because of the quiet beauty of connections.

God is busy and at work in the dark and deadly world around us. Occasionally He shows His power in a large and mighty fashion. But so often He comes softly, in the background. Appearing in a summer of fun, a girl who grows up from camper to counselor, and a desperate text message to the first person that a kid can think of who just might care.

I Kings 19:11-13—“The Lord said, ‘Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.’ Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.”

Boo Boo

I’m sorry you guys. I don’t have anything for you this week. Check back next Saturday or better yet call me at 509-548-6553 with a memorable camp moment.