By Chris Elrod
Two weeks ago, we left for another week of camp! This year our theme was “Wild, Wild World” based on the “Wild, Wild West.” We put the kiddos into teams and played western style games, where they had to shoot nerf guns and ride on inflatable stick horses. It was a fun week of adventure! Most importantly though, we studied God’s Word together, sang songs worshiping our great God, and grew closer to our brothers and sisters in Christ! Camp is always such a blessing!
Our Bible classes focused on various showdowns we find in scripture. We looked at doubt versus the promises of God by studying Abraham and Sarah. We looked at overwhelming obstacles versus God’s strength, by studying David and Goliath (1 Samuel 17). We spent time thinking about faith versus persecution by studying the evil plot of Haman against the Jews in the book of Esther. Finally, we looked at the Word of God versus temptation by looking at Jesus being tempted in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-11).
Our nightly devotionals focused in on Jesus as the only one who could bring peace to our wild world. Night one we introduced our theme and talked about the reason our world is so wild is because of a failure to recognize God as God. Our world fails to give Him the honor and thanks He is due (Romans 1:21-22). We then discussed how Jesus has been revealed to bring peace to our Wild, Wild World (Romans 1:16-17). Jesus is the only one who can settle our lives and our world. This is the big message we wanted our campers to leave understanding.
The next night we talked about Jesus’ purpose in coming to earth! Matthew 1:21 an angel revealed to Joseph that Jesus was to save His people from their sins, before Jesus was even born His mission was clear. Just as a new sheriff arrives to bring peace, Jesus arrived to bring peace between us and God. The third night we focused on our need to have Jesus at the center of our heart. Matthew 6:24 makes it clear we cannot serve two masters. We wanted the campers to know there is only room for one savior in these hearts!
Night four was spent looking at how Jesus was a wanted man (Matthew 26:3-4). It is my hope and prayer our campers left wanting Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Our final nightly devotional was spent looking at Jesus as the one who defeated death. Jesus lives which allows us to have no fear in death!