4th and 5th grade camp

Back from a week at Crooked Creek Christian Camp where I was the "camp pastor" for the 4th and 5th grade camp. In spite of the heat, the bugs, and the storms the kids had a good time and seemed to enjoy themselves. Thought I would share a couple of happenings which I found interesting.

The theme for the week had to do with "reaching the promised land" so I told some stories from the Exodus. One morning I said something about reading other stories from the Old Testament
One young boy who seemed to take my little talks rather seriously, came to me that afternoon and said he had read the story of Noah and the ark. I asked what he thought and he said it was interesting and wondered what it would have been like to be on the ark. Then he added, "I read the part where Noah planted a vineyard, and then he got drunk, and then it got sort of gross cause it said he was naked." He started to ask a question, but I discovered this age group is easily distracted and he ran off to participate in the next activity. Frankly there are a lot of stories in the Bible which people find embarassing, though I guess it is helpful for moralistic Republicans who have "fallen into sin" to compare themselves to King David.

There was one young African-American boy at the camp which I imagine would be hard and so it was probably no surprise that he was homesick much of the week. He stuck it out and as the week went on he seemed to be enjoying himself. For the last evening meal of the week, the camp had a "mystery meal" where the counselors served the campers. The kids sat with their cabin mates and were supposed to have dressed up a bit. For most of the boys this meant clipping a tie onto their sweaty t-shirts. What I found interesting is that as I walked into the room, a table of boys invited me to sit at their table "so I could sit and eat with the President." I asked who was the President and they all pointed to the head of the table where the lone black young man was sitting with a big smile. I asked the rest of the boys, all white, who they were. They announced in unison, "we're his bodyguards." They decided I was someone important from some other country who was visiting for the evening. As we ate I wondered if something like this would have happened a year ago.

It just so happened I have been reading Barack Obama's book, Dreams of my Father, where he spends a lot of time talking about finding his place in society. It is an interesting book. As I read it I realized it is nice to have a President who can write so well and who has spent a lot of time thinking and reflecting about who he is, about society, and the problems much of US society faces. It will be interesting to see how former President Bush's book compares and to realize he will have at least one other person actually doing the writing.

I don't know what the boys in the camp thought about their place in society or matters of race. During the week they were more concerned about swimming times, which cabin would get to go first to lunch, and if their cabin would "win" even if there wasn't a competition at the moment. Perhaps that is a good sign for the future.