Its summer and I started to think about children going to camps. Of course I reminisced about my going to camp. I only went for 1 week at a time. A friend of mine grew up in New York, and his parents shipped he and his sister off to camp for the whole summer. When I heard that I wondered who had more fun. He and his sister at camp, or mom and dad at home without children for the summer? Anyway back to my train of thought.
The camp I went to most was the camp the foursquare denomination put on for the district that we were part of. The camp director was named Roy Hicks Jr. During mail call after dinner Roy called out your name if you had mail. You wanted to get mail, but it was a two edge sword. You see Roy was a complete nut bag during this time. He was a wild and crazy. You were laughing so hard, your sides hurt. Ant the same time even though you wanted to get mail, a part of you was praying to God please don’t let this be the day I get mail. Some kids prayed more and harder there than they did in chapel.
When I think back to those events. (Oh yea I never got mail thank you God). I remember the fun times. And I remember the times that I learned about God more. That was the start of me on my own deciding to follow God. I thought if a nut bag like Roy Hicks can serve God and have that much fun and be cool. I want that for me. I found out later that he was following another camp director. And some of my friends (those who got embarrassed at mail call) said he was copying the guy before him.
If he did that’s OK. You see we as Christians are called to copy Christ. He’s the guy we follow and imitate. The meaning of Christian means “to be like Christ”. The first thought I had after I wrote that was “be like Mike” from the Nike commercials and that’s not it. Sorry I wondered I do that if you’ve noticed. Any way I’m back, there is a verse in the bible Psalms 51:12 it says “Restore to me the joy of your salvation and make me willing to obey you”. I asked God to do that in me and he is.