From the Camp Director,
What an unbelievable summer! Around the end of April or the first of May, I was thinking this was going to be a low attended summer. I even shared my concerns with the Board and the staff. I was trying to prepare myself. Registrations were just not coming in very fast. But, "Oh YE of Little Faith" We ended up with 2,287 campers this summer!
“O you of little faith, why did you doubt?”
Jesus said to Peter, Matthew 14:31
These words are spoken to Peter by Jesus, but through Peter, they are also spoken to us. Our doubts are caused by something that is addressed many times throughout Scripture: fear.
In this passage, we see the fear of the disciples based on the difficulty of their situation. They have been sent by Jesus out onto the Sea of Galilee, and this body of water is known for being dangerous and even deadly when sudden storms kick up.
I tend to start looking at my circumstances and start getting afraid – our dwindling budgets, the overwhelming tasks we have to do, our own personal shortcomings. If we look at anything other than Jesus, we set ourselves up to sink.
I’m not saying we don’t need to be realistic about facts, but we have to remember to keep focused on Christ.
“O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” is a great question for us to continually ask ourselves. In our lives, again and again, he has been there to save us when we call out to him.
When they got back into the boat, “those in the boat worshiped him, saying, ‘Truly you are the Son of God'” (14:33). The Lord Jesus Christ knows us very well. He knows we have little faith, and we have fear and doubt in our struggles. We are called to trust in his name and power, He will be there to save us every time we call.
This was a great reminder for me and hopefully you will be encouraged by it as well.
As summer camp comes to an end. I just want to thank our team this summer for all they did to help make camp possible. Our year around staff and our summer staff worked around the clock for 12 weeks. They really stepped up and made sure all the things like: food, cleaning, mowing and recreation were done with quality.
I want to thank all of our Event Coordinators who put together fantastic weeks of camps. I want to the thank all of our volunteers/faculty who sacrificed your time to come and teach and counsel all of the kids that came to camp.
Most importantly, we had 68 kids give their lives to Christ and be baptized at camp. We had a number also go back home and get baptized and others who rededicated their lives to Christ and others made decisions to go into full-time ministry or missions. WOW!
What unbelievable summer!
Gary Baker, Executive Director
garybaker@hangingrock.org