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Camp NIKOS

Camp Nikos was definitely an experience. but isn't everything in life?

anyway, it was a great time. i had a cabin of 6 girls, ages 11-12 (well, actually 11-probably 14, but since the camp is capped at 12, we'll pretend these kids didn't lie...), plus me and two high school girls to help out. the average camper to counselor ratio was 2:1. pretty amazing, i think. i've never worked at a camp with such a small ratio. it was wonderful.

we only had one problem child. 1 out of 6 isn't too bad. and as far as problems go, i think i'll choose the "i'm 13 and you're not my mom so you can't tell me what to do" attitude over guns and drugs.

as mentioned before, the theme was Heroes & Giants. pretty powerful stuff considering where these kids come from. Tim Pinson did a great job of relating these Old Testament stories to the reality that these kids face every day. i heard one disturbing story from one child about a bruise on her leg. her mother hit her with a belt because she went into a room she was not supposed to go into. she wasn't supposed to go into this room because her step-father was in there with a gun. he was so angry he thought he might kill someone. i don't know which is worse - the fact and reason that she has a bruise, or that she might not even have been at camp. even though this was the only disturbing story that i personally heard, i know there were many more like them from these kids. at least they had one week to be away from it all.

one of the big lures of this camp is meal time. these kids get 3 full meals a day, plus two snacks. not a big deal to most of us. yet most of us didn't grow up hating summer because it meant we no longer got the governement provided breakfast and lunch at school. and most of us didn't grow up having to steel chips and coke from the corner convenient store for our dinner.

one thing i learned during the week is that simple concepts are sometimes all we really need. we sang all the goofy camp songs - many multiple times every day. we heard Bible stories i've heard from the womb. yet because of God's perfect timing, all these simple, yet glorious, concepts came at just the time that i needed them to be reinforced in my life.

here's just a few little blurbs of things i heard repetitively throughout the week:

"my God is a GREAT BIG GOD and He holds us in His hands"

"He's REAL!"

"...but God intended it for good..." (Gen. 50:20, emphasis mine)

"The Lord rescues and He saves. He performs signs and wonders in the heavens and on the earth." (Daniel 6:27)

posted by Alexia & Jeffrey @ 10:49 PM