kat
07-09-2001, 02:03 PM
The highlight of the week at bible camp is always the late night hike up to the hilltop softball field. All week the campers are making plans about who they will walk up the hill with . I got such a kick out of listening to the girls talk about the guys and who they were going to go with. It was, of course, my good fortune to have the 13 year old group with all their raging hormones.
This year; however, the camp director decides that in keeping with the theme of boot camp that we will have a crucible. The counsleors are assigned to various posts along the trails that lead up to the hilltop softball field. The main road that everyone is used to walking up daily for softball is off limits and that leaves alot of little trails that few of the kids have explored (especially the girls since it is on the boy's hill). The kids will come up half a cabin at a time with their flashlights ( the word ). They will stop at a couselor who will ask a question about what they had studied all week. If answered wrong they go back down the hill to the next counselor. If they answer correctly, they play a game of chance which can send them on farther up the hill, to one of several different paths, or even back down the hill. The games of chance were: rocks, paper, scissors; pick a color red, blue, white; pick a number 1, 2, 3; draw straws, pick a card, pick the hand that has a rock in it. So the kids spent over an hour running up and down the hill trying to make it to the top. They were hot, they were tired, they were frustrated.
What a lesson that was!! In life you need the word to guide you. (some kids did not have a flashlight and were stumbling around in the dark and running into trees relying on light from someone else) In life you may even have all the right biblical answers, but life throws you a curve and you may get beaten back down and have to climb back up (ie the games of chance at each counselor station). It was fantastic!
Then once all the campers were accounted for we had a hilltop devotional. The campers got in a huge circle. The seniors made a smaller circle in the middle and the director gave them each a lit candle and spoke individually about and to each of them. Then each senior in turn spoke to the director and the other campers and told what the camp had meant to them over the years. Many of them had come to camp every year for 8 years. It was so touching to hear these wonderful young people express what God and this camp meant to them.
Finally, all campers were given candles and the seniors went out and lit our candles, and we in turn lit other candles to symbolize taking the word out into the world. I was on such a spiritual high and to be able to share that with dh and ds was so wonderful.
This crucible made a lasting impression on those kids and has to be one of the all time best object lessons I've ever seen. If you teach teens, you may want to try something like this with your youth groups. It was great.
This year; however, the camp director decides that in keeping with the theme of boot camp that we will have a crucible. The counsleors are assigned to various posts along the trails that lead up to the hilltop softball field. The main road that everyone is used to walking up daily for softball is off limits and that leaves alot of little trails that few of the kids have explored (especially the girls since it is on the boy's hill). The kids will come up half a cabin at a time with their flashlights ( the word ). They will stop at a couselor who will ask a question about what they had studied all week. If answered wrong they go back down the hill to the next counselor. If they answer correctly, they play a game of chance which can send them on farther up the hill, to one of several different paths, or even back down the hill. The games of chance were: rocks, paper, scissors; pick a color red, blue, white; pick a number 1, 2, 3; draw straws, pick a card, pick the hand that has a rock in it. So the kids spent over an hour running up and down the hill trying to make it to the top. They were hot, they were tired, they were frustrated.
What a lesson that was!! In life you need the word to guide you. (some kids did not have a flashlight and were stumbling around in the dark and running into trees relying on light from someone else) In life you may even have all the right biblical answers, but life throws you a curve and you may get beaten back down and have to climb back up (ie the games of chance at each counselor station). It was fantastic!
Then once all the campers were accounted for we had a hilltop devotional. The campers got in a huge circle. The seniors made a smaller circle in the middle and the director gave them each a lit candle and spoke individually about and to each of them. Then each senior in turn spoke to the director and the other campers and told what the camp had meant to them over the years. Many of them had come to camp every year for 8 years. It was so touching to hear these wonderful young people express what God and this camp meant to them.
Finally, all campers were given candles and the seniors went out and lit our candles, and we in turn lit other candles to symbolize taking the word out into the world. I was on such a spiritual high and to be able to share that with dh and ds was so wonderful.
This crucible made a lasting impression on those kids and has to be one of the all time best object lessons I've ever seen. If you teach teens, you may want to try something like this with your youth groups. It was great.