So Tuesday morning I arrived at church around 11 and started helping at one of the registration tables. The funniest part of registration was probably right after Trevor bought me an energy drink, and Mitch came up thinking he would be funny and shake it all up, and it exploded every where, even with the cap on. Absolutely hysterical. We loaded up, and I was on one of the coach buses, and we headed out for our 8 hour bus ride to Lake City, Michigan. While on the bus, I met all of my students.
Becca, Bethany, Stephanie, Courtney, Megan, Lauren, Tyiesha, Ceri, Emilee, Andrea, and Jaid. Most of them were going into 8th grade, but we had 2 girls going into 6th, one into 7th, and one into 9th. All the girls, our other small group leader Shkendie and I all stayed in one big cabin with 7 different bunk beds. It was huge! The room was shaped like an L, with a bathroom hooked on. 2 toilets, 3 showers, 3 sinks. You would think that would be enough, right? Not. Shkendie and I got up 2 hours before breakfast in the morning just so we could take a 15-20 minute shower. And as soon as the girls were up, our bathroom time was over. Besides the fact it got so humid in the bathroom that as soon as you did your hair, it would curl or frizz all over again. Irritating, so I barely did my hair all week.
When we got there, all 150 odd students got split into 4 teams. Blue, green, yellow, and red. My team was yellow. We had junior high camp olympics, and of course my team, Black Plague Yellow Fever, won. The name was impossible to decide on, so we ended up combining our 2 different ideas. Our motto? If the 1st dont kill you the 2nd one will. Nice, i know.
We would get up, go to breakfast at 9, then a morning session around 10, the students would have quiet times as the leaders met to plan our D-groups [discussion groups] which we would have from 11-12, and then lunch, then free time until 6. Dinner at 6, session at 7, small group until about 9:30, then a late night activity.
Our free time consisted of either The Blob, high ropes course, tubing, a zip line, mountain biking, rock climbing, free swim, volleyball, frisbee golf, ping pong, pool, shuffle board, and the rope swing. We were definitely kept extremely busy.
The first day Emilee, Lauren, and Andrea talked me into going mountain biking with them, which was crazy in itself. i love biking, so i thought it would be easy, fun. ya right. im scared of heigts, and the hills you had to fly up and down were not fun for me. Besides the fact that kids were wiping out in front of you right and left, so it wasnt like an easy glide up and down the hall. you were constantly stopping, so by the time you got to the hill you didnt have enough momentum to get yourself up. we most of us were walking up these ridiculously high hills. our message that day was all about moving to Jesus. Tim gave the message and did an excellent job. One of his main points was about how everyone knows about how Christ died on the cross for us, and we all still talk about it like it's nothing. And it's very true, even I do it, though I don't mean to. So I'm working on that.
the 2nd day I was talked into tubing, which was fun. I went with Becca, and we were flying around those things like crazy. at one point my tube flew up and landed half on hers. good thing we were wearing helmets! Tim also gave the message that night, and he talked about moving to Jesus in community.
the 3rd day I was talked into rock climbing. more like forced to rock climb, or i would be badgered into doing the zipline, which was pretty much my biggest fear. I hardly even got half up the wall before i realized how high up i was and freaked. and, of course, Tim was manning the wall, and wouldnt let me down right away. nice guy, right? gotta love him... that day I also watched all but 3 of my girls and Shkendie do the ropes course. It was the closest thing I have ever had to a heart attack. After just 3 days I had really grown to care about my girls and watching them all dozens of feet about the ground climbing around on skinny wires and having to jump from a post up high definitely got my heart racing. The funniest part of that was when tyiesha jumped and i freaked and pretty much stepped forward to "catch her" [right like i could do that anyway] and didnt see the log bench right in front of my shin until i slammed into it. yep, pretty painful. Brad spoke that night, all about moving to Jesus in community through the holy spirit. It was a really good message about students needing to accept God's gift and how the Holy Spirit will enter us when we do. A lot of kids did exactly that that night. It was very cool.
the 4th day was definitely the most.. challenging. By then all of my girls had been trying to talk me into going on the zip line, but one girl the most in particular, and that was Becca. in case you dont know, a zip line is when you climb up this tall post-like building, and at the top you strap into a harness and hook onto this cable, and go flying down it over water to the beach some odd feet below. I'm horrified of heights, so of course I had no plan at all to do the zip line in the first place. Becca had talked Tim into it, but as soon as he backed out she turned on me. And me, being a good small group leader, agreed to the fate of my death. I was absolutely horrified. Once I was at the top strapped on it took about 15 minutes to talk me into finally stepping off the platform. I havent been that scared because of heights in my entire life. I screamed the whole way down. But hey, I did it. And in the end I was still proud of myself, but still completely scared out of my mind. that night Brad talked about moving to jesus in community through the Holy Spirit with boldness. It was all about standing up for your faith and witnessing to unbelievers, and situations like that.
The last night was definitely a message to me. Although CIY earlier this summer had the same theme, it's always good to hear God saying to get up and MOVE. And I have been, but I could definitely use even more boldness. I'm really excited for this school year to start so everyone can get to me for the 100% real Erin. I've never been fake, but I didn't come out and really show who I am and exactly what I'm living for. And that's for the Lord and the Lord only. I can see the huge change in myself, and hopefully other people will too. I'm ready to lose friends because of it, it wouldn't surprise me. But it will be worth it in the end if I am able to save even one person, because that one person will help me and every other Christ follower change the world. And oh man does this world need changing.
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