My First Day Of Camp

Well, all of my fears and anxieties were laid at the foot of the cross when I accepted the challange to teach one of the classes for Bible camp here at Refilwe. I have never lead a class before. I lead a small devotional at youth group one night last year, and it was a disaster. God used even that mess to speak to some of the kids, so I knew He could use whatever I did here. Never the less, leading a class of 12 year olds by myself was a little intimidating.

We all were given a great lesson plan with detailed guidelines to follow. My tendancy is to want to follow it word for word, but we were encouraged to improvise as needed for our specific group. I had no idea how neccessary that was going to be until I was in the middle of it.

When we started the registration, I sat for a while with no kids. I was beginning to think I wasn’t going to have a class at all. I wanted a lot of kids to come, but I was not dissapointed at the possability of joining one of the other groups. I even sat down with Christie’s group and started to help her. Just when I thought I was off the hook, one of the other girls walked over and said, “Here are two kids for group 7”, that was my group. Oh boy, I have a group.

By the end of the day, I had a class of 13. They were only planning on groups up to 10. I was a little stressed until I found out that Mallorie had a class of 21. Yikes! I felt a bit relieved after hearing that.

We spent the first half of the morning playing games with the REC leaders. We did lots of relays. The kids had fun, but started to get a little bored by the end. When we finished games, we headed back to do our lesson. I had no idea what I was doing, but I had to just go for it. I figured all that I can do is try, and God is responsible for the rest.

Our lesson was about Elijah calling Israel to choose between Baal and other gods, and following the true God of Israel. We had the kids help build small alters, one for Baal and one for God. We talked about how the prophets of Baal prayed, danced, and shouted to Baal all day and he never answered. They even cut themselves to try to get his attention, and still nothing. At the end of the day, Elijah rebuilt the altar to God, and even poured water on it. Then when he prayed to God to prove to Israel that He is the only true God, fire came down from heaven and bunt the bull, the wood, and even the stones, dirt, and water. Then Israel knew that God was the only true God.

I had a hard time getting the kids to listen and follow along, but after repeating everything three times, they finnally started to get it. These kids learn early on to manipulate people to get their way, so I had to maintain my position of authority despite my own lack of experience with kids. All in all I think it went okay. Steve, one of the coordinators, did come by once and lay down the law a little. The kids were a lot more attentive after that.

I really did have a great time, and it’s not nearly as intimidating now that I have a day under my belt. They are expecting more and more kids everyday, so pray that we will find a way to maintain order and control as the class sizes increase. We are praying for 600 kids by the end of the week. We only expected 100 today, and we ended up with 200. That’s a pretty good start. Also pray for more helpers to come so that we are not too overwhelmed. Praise God that these kids have this opportunity, and that we do too. I know I learned a lot today, and we have four more days here, and two more camps after this one. I should know what I’m doing by the time we are done. Then again, do we ever really know what we are doing? It’s usually better not to, then we don’t get in the way.