I Believe

  This is the ACTUAL camp that I attended.

When I was 12 years old I went to my first Assembly of God youth camp. Turner Falls, Oklahoma is a beautiful place and a place that I was so excited to experience. I remember all the "mountainous" roads that we would wind around and around until we would turn the corner and see it. It was the sign to all in the 15 passenger church van that we had arrived. They stood out above the entire camp. It was 3 crosses on which every camper refered to as "the hill". There was this tradition that every year the entire camp would make a trip up this HUGE hill where we would sit on top of it and sing songs and have a little service up there. It would usually happen every Thursday night. The night before we would all go home with our dirty clothes, exhausted eyes, and stained up tennis shoes from "mud mountain".  The unannounced goal of the week was to have a "date" up the hill. Not sure why now that I look back at it. Not like we could have a boyfriend or anything to take home with us! And good grief, we were 12! (I'm a mom now, so I just seeing this all a little differently)

ANYway, there I was on Thursday night with my flashlight walking up the hill with some guy that I had hung out with all week. That's right, girls, I had snagged me a date. Can't seem to remember the boys name, though. Shame. I do remember everything else about that night so vividly, though. I remember feeling scared because it was really dark and as much as I was fond of grabbing ahold of that boys hand for "assistance", I wasn't real fond of meeting any Oklahoma snakes! The entire hike up the hill usually took about an hour to accomplish but when we did the site was so breathtaking. The sky was crystal clear and all you could see where millions of stars. I remember finding a place to sit next to a youth group from another town as my youth group wasn't too pleasant to be around for me. I don't remember what the leader, Tom Greene, was saying at the time or the songs that were sung. But, I do remember 2 things that I have never forgotten. Something happened to me that night. Something magical and so real. 

I found my faith. It wasn't anything that was said. It sure didn't have anything to do with that boy that I walked up with, which I am not sure what happened to him after that as I don't remember walking down with him! And it wasn't anything that was sung. It was 3 single, most brilliant shooting stars that shot through the sky in the most magical way. I am not sure if I was the only one looking up at the moment, but when I asked others about them it became very apparent to me that those stars were for my eyes only because no one else had seen them. I knew that God himself reached down at that very moment and placed himself in my depth of my soul. It began a life of a lot of hurt, serial loses, defiance, rebellion, blasphemy, and feeling like a utter failure. 

God never promises that his calling would be easy. He never said that life would be all good. What he did promise is to be our strength and in return we share our faith and hope that we have found. That night changed the way I deal with my entire life. It isn't like it was the first time I had experienced "God". I grew up in a pastor's home. But, it was the first time that I knew that my faith was not my own. God had placed a hope in me so that I could rise up in every circumstance of life for others to see that which makes me smile and to wonder. Our faith is never for ourselves. It is for others to see it in us. It is for others to see that they can turn their despair into hope. Christ loves you so much, than he won't let me forget you. 

Hebrews 12/ 12-14

"Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. Make level paths for your feet, so that the lame my not be disabled, but rather healed. Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy, without holiness no one will see the Lord."