Metamorphosis Part 4: Live the life

For those of you that have been following. I give you mad props because this has been quite a drawn out little series hasn't it? I write today from an excited heart and pumped for next summer's retreat! What? Next summer??! Oh Yeah!

Anyways, The last full day of the retreat was sensational. The students played "manhunt" the night before and pretty tired. We all know when teenagers get tired they have a hard time paying any kind of attention. But, Mike Anderson, our camp speaker brought an intense message of identity and how we choose to live against our God given identity many times.

Mike explained that when he was six years old he had a argument with his mom that caused him to "run away". In reality he just hid under his clubhouse about 200 yards away from the house. He said he endured about three hours before it became dark and, once the bugs started crawling on him, he decided to get out and go back home.

His point for the story was in our desire for "freedom" we do the exact opposite of what we want. We create a prison. Interesting concept 'eh? I think the students really got the messages of Metamorphosis. But the bottom line of Metamorphosis was not just about the one time death/life change in Christ. But about living in the identity that God has placed upon us as sons and daughters.

So my question to them and you is this. So how should we then live? 

Metamorphosis Part 3: The Oak Tree

So if you have been following the last few blogs, you know I have been writing about our great trip to the foothills of the Appalachian mountains. 

Saturday we poured the students into the cars and headed up the gravel road to Bear Creek Trail. One great thing about being in North Georgia is there are beaucoup (for my Nola folks) trails. I mean one could literally hike for weeks. But the good 'ol bear creek trail was one we could traverse in a little under 2.5 hours. 

About halfway down the trail we ran into a big oak tree. I mean this guy was big. I think the students tried to stretch around it and it took quite a few of them to link arms and get around it. I took a picture of it, but my wife has the camera so maybe I will download some later.

If you ever get a chance to hike the trails in N. Georgia you should do it. It was a great deal of fun to hike that trail, but it reminded me of one thing... Man am I out of shape!

Metamorphosis Part 2: A Creek Runs Through it

Good Morning Peeps-

So this morning I realized how far away from the serene forest I was. The city beautiful woke me up with a symphonic melody of car alarms, ambulance sirens and noisy motorcycles. Breathe in... Breathe ou...*cough *cough... out. Yeah.

So in day two of our Metamorphosis adventure we finally settled into our backwood surroundings. There was the beautiful little creek that lazily pushed its way past our campsite. The creek was cool, clear and relaxing. Many of the students walked up and down it finding rocks, smoothed over by time, and skipping them or saving them to take home.

In the morning I had the students get off by themselves to try and spend some quiet time alone with God and nature and their scriptures. As I did this on my own, I began to think of how precious our time with God is. Yes I know that we can speak with Him anytime, since he is omnipresent and omniscient. But how often do I exclude everything around me to really hang with God? 

When my wife and I first met we would spend hours just sitting and staring at eachother and smiling. I remember my face would ache from cheezing so big with her around. We could just sit and stare and sit and laugh. I still love to look at her, but I have to admit I get busy sometimes dupe myself into thinking every minute I have needs to be "purposeful". For some stupid reason I think merely staring into my wife's eyes on end doesn't provide a big enough return... But to her it means the world.

When is the last time my face hurt from smiling at my savior so much and enjoying His company? Do you think He has been waiting for you to stop being "purposeful" and busy and simply look into his eyes? As a parent don't you just LOVE when your child stops, jumps up in your lap and gives you a bear hug? Your kids aren't thinking, "I have a purpose to build a relationship with my father, therefore I must show him an outward display of affection to elicit a favorable response and further my inheritance" (unless your child is an android). They just LOVE you...

After the quiet time was over I heard some of the girls splashing around in the creek. I zoned back into reality and got ready for the task at hand. We were going to go on a hike that afternoon...

Metamorphosis Part 1: Killer Bees

Hey Oh Everyone!

We had a killer time at our summer retreat this past weekend. There are like a bazillion things that happened so I will break up the time into a few blogs. First up to bat is the wicked awesome first day. 

Getting up at 5:00 AM is awesome in itself, but then packing five cars worth of luggage into four and getting ready t drive 9-10 hours made it glorious! I really thought that we were going to have more room than we did, but we fit everything in the vehicles. One thing that didn't fit was my guitar. :( but that ended up being a really cool thing, that I'll talk about later. 

The drive up was pretty uneventful, besides the "watermelon crash" on I-75 that stopped up traffic for half an hour or so. (short story: truck full of watermelons+ speed+wobble=1000 gallon watermelon mush smoothie on I-75.) But once we passed ATL the scenery became more and more beautiful. We rolled into town near 5 and found the cabin and began the fun!

The first night there we found out that our campsite had 3 lb killer bees! Well at least by the time the story gets around Im sure they will be that big. But in reality our campsite had quite a few "bee" looking things hovering all over the ground. (I scoured the internet for a few hours to find what it was, but rest assured they weren't yellow jackets). So a few students were stung and thus we found our nemesis for the duration of the summer retreat.

Besides a few nature woes our city slicker students fared pretty well. I was actually a little proud of them by the end of the trip. Most of the students stayed in the tents, but some chose to brave the air-conditioned cabin. But, all in all, I think we all had two fistfuls of fun. 

I think the first night the students weren't sure what to expect, but since I forgot the guitar we actually started the first session with a few minutes of silence. I told students to close their eyes and just sit. I did not realize how cool this was going to be. There were no snickers or fart noises. The students really spent time in silence. I know it has been quite a long time that I have just sat in silence. Silence is a really heavy discipline that I have barely grasped...

Woah!? This has turned into quite a long blog, so I will cut it short, but I have a few more coming up and Ill let you know a little more about the trip. until then ttyl!!