Wednesday, November 12, 2008

The Life

Sorry I haven't updated for a while, I have been a little worn out. This past weekend was, as expected, exhausting, but at the same time refreshing and I wouldn't have missed it for anything. 

There are two kinds of staff at the retreat: there is the staff who makes sure students aren't doing anything they aren't supposed to and there is the staff who does all of the dirty work; setting up games, making sure everything is working, and running around doing other heavy lifting. I was the latter of the two. While I wasn't able to actually participate in these activities, I think I got more out of the experience than any camper there. 

On Saturday morning I was woken up by Chris, the slave master of the "dirty workers", saying, "Jordan, get up. I'm putting you to work." No lie, within 2 minutes of being awake I had a 6 foot cross in my hands and was loading it onto a truck. There was an encounter experience where students had the opportunity to carry a cross from one spot to another, it was about a 1/4 mile walk. When the crosses reached point B they were supposed to be returned to point A, but the campers weren't supposed to do it, that was me along with 7 other people. We carried crosses for 3 hours, I lost track of how many I carried, but it made long days of building fence seem like nothing. Needless to say, this station left an impact on me, both literally and metaphorically... I had a nice little bruise on my shoulder. But still I wouldn't have traded the experience for anything.

The band was really good. The speaker was Chris, yes the one I just referred to as the slave driver, he did an awesome job. There was a lot of talk about coming together and leaving an impact on the world. One thing he talked about living "The Life" and how everybody goes through life, but few people actually live. It was a very encouraging message series and I really got a lot out of it.

So now the main thing on my plate is this weekend with my retreat for the Jr. High students. It is going to be great. I think we finally got all of the bugs worked out, so it will be a lot of fun. 

More on that to come. 

I hope you all are doing well and I will do my best to not make it this long in between the next post.

3 comments:

Kristi said...

Good to hear from you again! I'm sure that the cross left an impact. You must have so much of a better idea of what Christ did for us from carrying it so far.
Look forward to hearing about the junior high retreat!

Anonymous said...

Glad to hear you survived "bearing the cross" experience. And now on to another great weekend.

All is well here - enjoying the fall. Yes, Leroy is doing fine. Looking forward to using his chain saw. The surgeon says "Not Yet" Ha

Love Ya
Aunt Deanna

Anonymous said...

Jordan, what an amazing experience to carry a cross - can only imagine the "God" thoughts going through your mind while you were bearing the weight. I'm so proud of you that you are staying so active with youth while you are studying. You are a natural - kids love you...I see it with all of your little cousins.
You know you are welcome to come for a visit anytime you can get away.
Love you, Aunt Saundra