I feel like I knew about Hannah well before I met her. I should probably explain that thought. Hannah works full time at Pine Cove Christian Camps, which is where I spent the summers from 2005-2007. Back in 2008, I had to make the tough decision to walk away from Pine Cove and explore whatever God had next in store for me. That’s the same year that Hannah came on full time staff with Pine Cove and has been working there ever since. Needless to say, we had a pretty good bit to talk about.
On top of that, Hannah is in charge of Pine Cove’s new program, their Base Camps. Basically, this is Pine Cove on the road. They pack up a small staff of counselors, a few entertainment obstacles to draw people in, and the knowledge of how to run a camp, and they take that to local churches around the south. Hannah has been helping launch this new program they just started this past year, and one of their upcoming contacts happens to be Tina Miller at The Church at Tuscaloosa (my mom and my home church for those of you newbies). Another reason Hannah and I were able to connect immediately was because she had met my mom. If you ever want to know what’s going on in my life, just ask my mom, she’s kind of my PR director. So Hannah knew all about me before our meeting as well.
Hannah was an easy conversation because we were able to catch up on a ton and just trade experiences. She gave me an update on what camp was like since I left, and I was able to tell her about some of my projects going on internationally. I knew when I left Pine Cove that they were going to do great things, but I never expected to hear all the things that God was allowing them to be a part of. Since I left in 2008, they’ve opened two new camp sites, continued their local outreach with Commission Camping (day camps for lower income residents of Tyler, Texas), continued to grow their international camp ministry, launched Base Camps, on top of this, they’ve kept everything else they do (the other six fully functioning camp sights) running smoothly and consistently. I think their model is doing fairly well.
I was amazed to hear Hannah tell me all about what was going on, and how her specific role of overseeing the Base Camps and all those sites was constantly growing. It was almost like God is exploding everything and just giving them enough staff and energy to keep pace with him. Camp ministry may have its drawbacks, but it has played a huge role in my life, and it continues to make a huge impact in the lives of all of Pine Cove’s staff as well as the thousands of campers that attend summer camps, conferences, and various events hosted by this organization. This camp is full of people like Hannah that are able to gain a ton of knowledge and experience as they serve this bigger dream of taking the Gospel of Jesus to the world, one camper at a time if necessary.
This summer will be the second summer Base Camps will be in full swing, and they’ve already doubled their efforts. The weeks of camp on the road were so effective and exciting that God has allowed them to add more to the constantly increasing staff and spread their reach all the way from Texas to Alabama. God has allowed these guys to be stewards of some pretty big dreams, and it was fun to hear about how summer camps are going beyond the hot months, and even the campsites to spread the reach of the Gospel even farther. This will be yet another project to add to the exciting list of the incredible things God is doing here in the States…
