The Update

Greetings to Northwood from the North Woods.
We made it safe and sound to Bemidji, and after a little trip into town to see Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, we arrived at Splash Camps!
Our first night meant getting into our cabins, meeting our fellow campers, and playing some crazy games.
Finally it was time for Power Hour, the daily worship service here at camp. We were blown away by the awesome music as the camp staff rocked it out, and played Big Big Prizes.
Big Big Prizes is the part of the evening where 3 students are invited to take part of an edible challenge (like eating a sauerkraut and liverwurst sandwich) for a chance to win a “fabulous” prize (last night was a dictionary and some math bingo cards).
The theme this year is “Lost” and has taken a cue from Hollywood in the form of “Bemidjiana Jones.” The skits are great (Dr. Jones Sr. looks strikingly familiar) and the speaker is fantastic.
The speaker this week is Tom Slye, a youth pastor from Milwaukee, and good camp-buddy of Luke. He shared a few stories last night, and talked about a race where all the runners crossed the starting line and stopped to celebrate the fact that they were race runners instead of continuing to run.
It was a great way to describe people who become Christians but stop working on their faith, they just celebrate the fact they are saved and don’t work on furthering their passion, commitment, dependence and determination to follow God. It set us up for a great week of talking about Christianity as more than just being saved, more than going to heaven when you die. It was a chance to talk about the day to day choices that make God the focus and goal of our lives.
It’s going to be a good week.