Today has been filled with action and LOADS of FUN!

This morning we did our typical morning activities such as eat some breakfast, clean up our cabins, head to chapel and explore our bible study! Our bible study for today is from John 14:26-27 and our theme for today is conquered. We learn that Jesus doesn’t give as the world gives. This reality is going to challenge us to understand what it means that he had conquered it. Now this can seem confusing, so we share with our campers that its okay to be confused and that Jesus’ disciples who were in a place to understand what Jesus was talking about, were also confused. But to keep one thing straight, when Jesus is talking about “the world” in the gospel of John, he’s not referring to the natural world-the world God created out of love and called good (and the world camp gets us closer to). The world he’s referring to in this section of John’s gospel is the world of systems and societies–the way human beings tend to sort ourselves into hierarchies of power, control and status, where there are classes of people like haves and have nots, citizens and foreigners, good guys and bad ones.  “The world” we’re born into gives us these categories, as well as our particular place in them. We start learning the rules of this world when we’re very young. We start to sort ourselves into its categories and think our places in the pecking order are natural or somehow our destiny because of the color of our skin or our gender identity or what we can do or where we were born or how much money or food or power our family has. These rules and this way of sorting and selecting is the world that Jesus warns us about in our week’s theme verse–the one that gives us trouble and troubles our hearts. The one that people sometimes call “cruel.” This world often views human beings, and assigns us value, based on what we can do for it, not for who we are or what we need or how we want to live on this planet. Jesus offers something different. He tells us that he’s not going to do what the world does. He’s not handing over to his disciples a blueprint for making a society of insiders and outsiders – of people who are close to and cozy with God and those who are somehow unholy or unlovable because of who they are or what they’ve done or not done. Jesus is here to help us imagine something else. He’s offering a way of seeing and trusting beyond the world’s opinion about whether or not we should matter. He’s here to open for us a whole new reality and trace a new line through all of history.

This afternoon, we had a fantastic free time with options like tie dye, basketball tournament, swimming, boats, or hanging out with the new friends that have been made this week. We then headed back to our cabins to get all dressed up for our Luau themed banquet where our counselors served the campers their meal! We ended our last full day of camp with some funny skits and campfire before getting to experience the foot washing devotions! Now it’s off to bed!

See you all tomorrow!