Impact

"We ought not be be weary of doing little things for the love of God, who regards not the greatness of the work, but the love with which it is performed." -Brother Lawrence 

 The overarching goal of all that we do for the kids that step into our camp each day, is to make an impact in their lives. Surely we desire for them to be better athletes at the end of this summer, stronger and faster than when we started, but much more than that we want them to be one step closer to being the young men God created them to be. To the best of our ability we try to encourage and build them up in every drill, lesson, and game we play. There are times when we ourselves can be encouraged by progress such as one mom telling us that her son asked to pray for the family the other night and prayed that he himself could be a man of God (our theme for the summer). Other times our impact can be felt when one boy shared with us after camp that when he’s at camp he feels at peace and our hope is that we can connect him more with the Prince of Peace. With the goal of impacting these kids lives in mind some of the smaller tasks of the ministry can be done cheerfully and joyfully. Setting up chairs for a bible study, putting cones away, cutting paper for an activity, and sorting through the flood of registration forms can be done with love not because the task itself is great but because if done lovingly, just one more kid might feel and know the love of God.
In the past couple of weeks we have realized some of the limitations of our impact on these kids and have changed some of our strategy moving forward. In just a few more weeks our camp will be done and although many of the kids will come to our bible studies throughout the year, we will not see most of the kids consistently until next summer. With this in mind our strategy has become to inspire and excite the guys to pursue Christ on their own once camp is done and also to support and equip parents to train their sons in righteousness. The first goal did not require much change because much of what we do is to show the guys that the love of God is something very real and can be experienced on their own. However, the second goal required some new changes. Last week we began to email the parents a full break down of what we would be studying and talking about each day that week at camp as well as questions they could ask their sons about the lesson that day. With this information parents can be better equipped for discussions and doors would be opened to future conversations. Our hope is that this change will facilitate great conversations in the home and allow the boys to see their parents as sources of knowledge and guidance for their walk with the Lord. With this small shift our aim is that despite our camp ending in a few weeks, the kids spiritual growth would continue under their parents guidance at home. With impact as our goal, we hope and pray that this is one step towards making it longer and more lasting in these guys lives.