LinK Camp Top Ten

LinK Summer Camp landed toward the top of my youth ministry experiences.  I was considering why that it is and here are my top ten reasons…

10.  Originally, I thought about taking the group to Lost Island WaterPark for our afternoon of water fun.  It would have cost about $400 to do so, and the camp would have been split up all afternoon as people went from attraction to attraction.  Instead of this, we were invited to spend the afternoon at a friend’s acreage and pond.  Our friends provided lunch for us, and I watched as our whole group got to stay together, swim, paddleboat, launch water balloons, even fish together.  This option continued to build community and was SO much better than the water park.  Thanks, Jerry and Laurie for the invitation!

9.  This 3 ½ day camp for 17 people cost $345 total.  Campers and donors contributed $155 toward camp making the total output $190.  It was cool to see this group use wisely the resources in front of us….a church with a kitchen, gym, showers…a local food bank that allowed us to get crazy amounts of food for under $40….friends who provided snacks and sleeping bags….friends who offer their pools and ponds for recreation…friends who gave us a discount at their Tropical Sno business….getting to attend the Teen Serve worship and program each evening for free.  There was much available for us this past week that allowed for LinK camp to be extremely affordable.

8.   The worship (Phil Joel) and speaker (Joel Johnson) at Central Middle School spoke into the lives our team and connected our hearts to the will of God.   Christ’s vision and challenge was made clear to our team through Teen Serve programming each night.  It was also cool to join into 400 other students who had been joyfully serving Cedar Valley residents all week. 

7.  There were good senses of humor and a lot of fun found in this team.   Playing 9 Square, swimming, playing Sardines, cooking meals, playing basketball, fishing, serving together….laughter and good memories built. 

6.  Having two students and two adults lead each meal was amazing.  Loved forming teams for each meal and watching groups cook together and serve the rest of our group.   This helped us form team and community for the week!

5.  It was great to see my own children serve, worship, and play together in LinK Camp.  They expressed being challenged in their relationship with Jesus, making friends, and having a lot of good fun throughout the week. 

4.  The number of people and diversity of the group was a highlight for me.  I continue to feel strongly about programming for a relatively small group of students with a strong ratio of adult guides to students.  Ten students and seven adults was a good strong mix. 

3.  I was in awe of how God put the pieces together for LinK Camp.  It wasn’t even until the end of May that  I seriously began to think that LinK Camp might happen.  God brought adults and students and schedules and serving projects and details all together in so many beautiful ways!

2.  The six counselors were aMAZING!  Awesome young adults who love Jesus and youth and adventure.  These counselors took a leap of faith out of their comfort zones to participate in LinK Camp, and they were tremendous.  Passion for Jesus, fun, responsible, great role models.  As we dropped off students late Thursday night after the Teen Serve program, all the counselors got out of the car to love on the students as we sent them into their homes, and then they went off to Perkins together to celebrate and enjoy one another after camp was over.  It was neat to see new friendships formed among the grown-ups. 

1.  Many times we come home from mission trips and talk about getting our students to serve locally.  We not only served locally during this experience, but the three homes in which we served were in a neighborhood where three of the students live.   As two of the boys loaded up scrap metal on the truck, I watched them and saw their own house in the background.  It was beautiful to introduce them to their neighbors and to affirm them for positively contributing to their neighborhoods by serving their literal neighbors.   Focusing our efforts in one geographic location helps to create momentum and a picture of Jesus restoring hearts, lives, and places!