Week 3 of Day Camp

Three weeks of day camp down, one more to go. And then one week of VBS, and then we will be done! The time goes quickly, but it’s been a fun and busy week! Day Camp was fun this week – we went on a field trip to the Orange County Fair with all the kids! It was a little crazy, but still a lot of fun, and I got to ride the carousel and the big slide! On Friday, we had Water Day and then a bunch of us went to a Dodger’s game! It was my first professional sports game, so it was really exciting. Saturday, we had the Compton Work Day where about 1000 volunteers from local churches unite and work at various sites in Compton. About 250 of us went to an elementary school and painted all the outside walls as well as a beautiful solar system mural inside a large room. It is amazing how fast work can get done when there are so many working together. Overall, we had a great week, especially getting to know more people from the church. Plus, our friend Rachel came to visit us from Wednesday and is leaving tomorrow morning. It was fun to have her join us! I hope all is well, and I’d love to hear from all of you!

Week 2 of Day Camp

Week two has gone by quickly and it has been getting even hotter! Everything went well, though. It is fun getting to know the kids more and I think that I am up to knowing about 50% of their names. They can be challenging sometimes, but not unbearable for us. We have gotten to know and hang out with some day camp staff this week. They are a lot of fun and a great community for us here. The picture is at a restaurant called BJ's where we went on Thursday before all going to Connect. Our host family was gone the whole week, so we also got to practice our cooking skills, which was a lot of fun. I am looking forward to this week, but I am also very stressed out about finishing my schoolwork. I have a few hundred pages to read and about 25 pages to write, so I am trying not to freak out and just get it done. Just pray for strength and energy to work on it even after a long day at day camp.

We also had a great study on Monday over Mark 4. We talked and struggled a lot with verse 12 which says that Jesus teaches in parables: “so that they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!” We wondered why Jesus would not want all people to hear his truth, but we realized that Jesus wants to teach those who desire to be taught. He did not want to give his teachings to those who would not accept it or who would destroy it (giving pearls to swine). Instead, he taught the disciples the meaning of the parable when they came to him and asked. Jesus wants us to pursue him! It is then that He will teach us so that we can understand, and his teaching will change our lives!

Day Camp Week 1

Wow, the first week of Day Camp is over already, and we are also half way done with our two months in Cali! The kids are fairly well behaved, and they have loved our games so far! Some of the highlights from the games this week – freeze dance, the Macarena, Twister, Chubby Bunny, and Water Day! I love spending time with the kids and getting to know them. Even though we cannot teach them about Jesus in the classrooms, we pray that we can point them to Jesus in the way that we love them. Besides day camp, we have had a blessed week, spending a little time at the beach and getting together with other believers at our two gatherings. I learned that prayer isn’t something that Jesus commanded, but expected. We should pray out of necessity and a deep desire in our hearts; as a response to our lives in this world, we need God’s help. Grace and peace.

Week 3 --

Wow, time has flown! I can’t believe that we have been here for three weeks already. We had a pretty busy week – we had four long days of work, full of organizing supplies for day camp and painting a few rooms that will be used for day camp. We also saw some fireworks on the beach! Day camp starts tomorrow! I’m excited to meet the kids that we will be working with. The day camp is a unique opportunity – the people in charge work both for Emmanuel Reformed Church and the Paramount Care Foundation which is a government-run organization, so while we cannot teach any Bible stories, we can encourage them to come back for the church’s ministries, like VBS held the week after day camp. Pray for us this week as we start day camp, and let me know how I can pray for you!

Week 2 -- Sorry, Flowers, and Tide Pools

Hello again from sunny California! It has been a great week, full of both work and play. We continue to prepare our games for Day Camp in July, and our most recent project is the life-sized Sorry board, about 20 square feet. It turned out to be much more work and planning than we had thought, but it is so much fun to plan out and paint! We also joined two groups at the church. The Mark study is on Monday nights, and we go through the text like a manuscript and also apply it to our lives. The young adults group, Connect, is on Thursday nights and we sing, hear the Word, and pray in small groups. Both have been a huge blessing in our lives and have helped us to meet others. O, and how could I forget – we went with a group from the church to the filming of The Price is Right on Tuesday, and one guy from our group was called up and won a new car! This weekend, we got to help Vicki, our host mom who is a florist, with a wedding! It was so fun to witness all of the work that goes into the flowers, and it was so beautiful! We also went to the tide pools and got to see lots of crabs and sea anemones! Also got our first California suntan :) Please continue to pray for us and let me know how you are doing!

Road Trip and First Week in Cali!

Hey all! California is amazing! Jill and I left last week Thursday, travelled through the mountains of Colorado and hiked a little ways down the Grand Canyon, and arrived at our destination on Saturday night! It was a long drive, but absolutely beautiful! We were so blessed to be able to see so much beauty of the United States in only three days! We’ve been here for a week already, and it has gone by so quickly! Our work started out pretty slowly – we have three weeks to prepare for Day Camp and help out doing other random jobs around the church. Once July 6 comes around, though, we will be busy with Day Camp, which is held every day from 9-3. Jill and I are in charge of games, so we are working on preparing for obstacle courses, a life-sized game of Sorry, and more. We have been doing a lot of sight-seeing (the many sandy beaches, Hollywood, Santa Monica) because we won’t have time for that later. Anyway, things are going splendidly and the weather has been great so far, but they say that it will be hot later. I hope all is well with all of you, and feel free to email or facebook to let me know how you are doing!