Sunday, July 26, 2009

MissionFuge survival


I first went to Centrifuge about 20 years ago. Can't believe that at 57 I'm still trying to keep up with teenagers...but I love it!


We had 4 guys get saved at camp, and the other 3 I think really got serious about their faith at camp.


MissionFuge is like Centrifuge, but with a longer missions component...roughly 5 hours a day are devoted to a mission project. In our case, we had 2 hours of travel to get to/from the site each day, so we had to pack a lot into the 3 hours we spent there.


All this got me thinking about some 'rules' for going to youth camp--some serious, some not.


1. Pray ahead of time, and recruit folks to pray for specific youth while they're gone.

2. Do NOT, under any circumstances, let the youth learn the song named, "This is the song that never ends..."

3. Pick a camp with a staff and a very full schedule, so that you don't have to supervise the kids every second.

4. Go far enough away to be 'away' but near enough to send kids home in an emergency. (Of course, next summer I'm violating this rule by going out west!)

5. Recruit a good person to lead fundraising

6. Jump in to the action, even if it's sliding around on a dark, wet field and getting flour dumped on you. The bruises are worth it.

7. Take LOTS of photos.

8. Don't forget to pray yourself and let God speak to you, too.

9. Help kids put perspective on 'camp romance'

10. Be sure to give a report to the folks back home who helped you go!

2 comments:

Nathan said...

I have to add to this list:

1) Have some sort of food altercation

2) Take a van that has tinted windows and stick a fake arm out one of said windows

3) Don't pack money in the bottom of luggage that is in the bottom of a U-Haul

4) Give great rewards to quiet game winners!

5) Keep camp videoes, your family will never let you live down the awesome looks you had as a gangly teenager.

I'm sure there are more, but those were the ones off the top of my head

keyofdjonz said...

so true and i must add the fact that nicknames are a must, bearhead, bushwoman, rupert inez!!!