Wildwood Hills 2010

Orchard Hill supports some of the 74 kids from Waterloo who went off to Wildwood Hills Ranch camp last Monday, and a friend from church helps get the funding, paperwork, and transportation all arranged for these kiddos to go. I loved receiving the updates from camp last week! The following was a report on the first day from a young woman from Waterloo who has previously served on the camp staff and who was instrumental in Waterloo's presence at the camp:

I was blown away by the programming that the Wildwood staff has in place this year. The theme is "Branded." For the evening assembly tonight Cowboy Lynn shared about the real agricultural practices that included branding and what it meant and how farmers used it. His explanation of how excruciating the pain related to branding was followed up by a skit and the men's director, Jed, sharing a message to the kids about how sometimes the world brands us with messages and labels that aren't true or are damaging. Oh wait-- it gets better.

Following the assembly, the kids broke up into their small groups around individual campfires and were given pieces of paper to write down labels that they had been branded by in their lives that were hurtful or not true. I went to the campfire (set on top of a hill overlooking rolling Madison County hills and a beautiful sunset) with one of the middle-aged group of boys. One of the boys who has been trouble in the past, Bookie, finished his paper quickly and, of course, began distracting the others immediately. I pulled him aside to chat in an effort to keep him from distracting the other boys (some of which I could tell were pouring some serious hurts out on their papers). I asked him if he'd written anything down and he handed me his paper-- My heart broke. His paper read, "Being hit and told that I am not worth anything."

This particular boys group leader, Andrew, was amazing. After all the boys were finished writing-- in the short 2 minutes that he was able to grasp their attention (9 and 10 year old boys have such a short attention span!), he was able to share the Good Word with them. He told them that the things written on their papers were lies and that the truth was that there was a God who loved them and that they were worthwhile individuals. Then they burned their papers in the fire as a symbol of the past being gone. It was a beautiful moment.

This is just one specific moment to share with you about how great this cause is. There were so many other little ones-- a smile from ShaQuan, the thoughtfulness of the LiT boys to invite me to join them for lunch (this is a big step for some of these guys), fear of leaving home being overcame by smiles... The need is big but our God is bigger!!