Week 9: More energy than a hyperactive kid

Thank you very much for your prayers this week. The Lord was very good this last week of JBC. I could tell people were praying and my energy level was was amazing for week 9. Normally by this time you can tell the counselors’ wagons are draggin’, but I had as much energy as I’ve had all summer. Which was good, as I did have a very hyperactive camper this week. He was diagnosed with ADHD, and although I don’t agree with the vast majority of behavioral diagnoses (in my opinion, ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) is better understood as Adults Don’t Discipline)), i could at least see why he would have been labeled as such. He had a lot of energy! But God gave me more, and it was me who was running down the hill while he dragged behind rather than the other way around.

The speaker this week at JBC was Mike Wessburg, he travels as a team with Rich Tozour who was preaching for the teen camp. The juniors enjoyed his magic tricks and dummy Stanley. None of my guys made decisions in the services, but as we talked one on one with several of them decided to get serious about their devotions and other things. I talked with the hyperactive kid after lights out one night (he wasn’t going to sleep anyway ) and he was able to nail down the assurance of his salvation. All the guys pictured above are my ROBOTS, the one in the picture on the left playing tube tug is the same guy that is on the left in the picture on the right. He, the hyperactive kid, and the hyperactive kid’s older brother (center guy, center picture) were all from Wilson, NC, where I used to live, but they go to a different church than we did. Three of my other campers were from the Brevard area, and I actually saw two of them at church this morning.

Well, only one more week of camp, and as I will be on COR (counselor on rotation), this last week was my last set of campers. That’s kind of sad as they may have been my last campers ever, depending on what I do next year. So what is COR, you ask? Well, see my explanation from last year, week 3. Yes, all these notes are posted on my blog for your perusal and enjoyment. So rather than repeat that from last year, I will give you a different “in depth” look of one of the favorite activities from JBC, the game show…. “Spin That Wheel!” Rather than have an elaborate funtime in JBC like we do in teen camp, we have what is known as the JBC game show. It combines elements of several game shows, largely Wheel of Fortune and The Price is Right (and maybe some older ones I’m not familiar with). The standard teams of Red vs Blue are laid aside, and the classic battle of Boys vs. Girls is taken up. The announcer, Abe Abey (dressed to the “kilt” as a Scotsman - ha, ha, sorry bad pun - complete with accent) comes to the platform and introduces the host of the show, Big Bob “Woofer.” One final character is probably the kid’s favorite, Leonard (he’s a goofy brainless character that acts as the stagehand for the game show) Kids are called at random from the audience, introduced as holding the record of shopping for 27 straight hours (girls) or the largest booger collection (guys) and are invited to “Spin That Wheel!” On the wheel are different slices, such as various numbers of points, Song, Spar, and Skit. The kids continue spinning the wheel and collecting points until they land on a song, spar, or skit slice. (yes, the game is completely rigged, but the kids don’t seem to know or care). When they land on the song slice we all sing a crazy song together like…

Oh let me tell you a story about a computer named Charlie,
A computer i used to use
Until one day I fed him too much knowledge,
And he nearly blew a fuse.

(chorus)
He went Beep - O - Beep Beep
Rattle, Rattle Bing-Bang
Bing Bang Boing B-Boing

Then we do sound effect of lighting a match, setting off a fuse, and exploding… something like…

Fwshhhhhhhht!
Fsssssssssssszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!
BANG!

If they land on a skit slice, the team leaders come out and do skit like the wagon ride one they do at teen camp, or a classic, “The King and I” If you don’t know what that one is, ask my dad And if they land on a spar slice, the boys and girls have a little mini-game competition like a relay race to complete a giant board puzzle or a rearrange letters to spell certain words or put the shapes in a skill ball. Throughout the game there are various interruptions such as someone running in wanting to be on the game show because he can do a really good imitation of the chicken (stick a rubber glove on his head and blow is up until it pops), a policeman coming in and calling up one of the guy counselors to give him an “Ugly Violation,” etc. There are also breaks for a message from the sponsor, Jacques and Johnk’s Magic Shop. The great magician, Jacques, comes up to do a magic trick for the kids but messes it up and his lowly assistant Johnk ends up doing it instead. Also something that is said randomly reminds Abe Abey of his homeland of Scotland and he goes into a soliloquy of how great Scotland is and how they were never conquered, etc until he realizes where he is and abruptly stops. It’s a lot of fun! So know you know about America’s most under-watched, overrated game show, “Spin That Wheel!”

This coming week is half teen camp, half family camp. Rusty Smith will the speaker for the teens and Jim Binney will be the speaker for their parents. The younger kids will either be with their parents or have a special service with some of the Wilds staff preaching/teaching. It’s much smaller week than the rest of the summer and about 30 of the counselors leave to go home after the last required service and Staff Appreciation Banquet tonight. Oh yes, we have more special eating tonight! Yum, yum, yum! For the Staff Appreciation Banquet the dining hall goes under a major transformation with tablecloths, candles, placemats, etc. At the end of the banquet the Spark Plug awards will be given out as well as the best cabin cheer award. Spark Plug awards are given to the most servant-minded, encouraging op staff guy and girl and counselor guy and girl.

Well, as usual, my laundry is about done, so I’ll end this brief, err…. maybe not so brief note. Thanks so much for your prayers. Next week at this time I’ll be in Greenville, preparing to start another semester.

Week 8: ROBOTS?

Hello all! Wow, i can’t believe there are only two weeks left! What was that about time flying when you are having fun? Well I have certainly been having lots of fun and it does seem that time has just flown right by without even waving!

Ok, so I’m sure you’re wondering what ROBOTS has to do with my week. Well, it certainly doesn’t describe the mechanical obedience of my campers, although they weren’t too bad. Nor does it have to do with any of the skits or other crazy things going on a JBC (other than crazy me ). In JBC, we don’t have cabin names like at teen camp (Varmint, Monsoona, Misery, Toad Island, etc). Instead we just have Barracks numbers (mine is 114). But when you want your campers (and in JBC they have to be with you almost all the time except for when you’re at the GHQ (General Head Quarters - where all the services, store (PX), Canteen, etc are)) (how many nested parentheticals was that?) it doesn’t sound cool to call out “Barracks 114!” so the counselors come up with their own terms to call their troops. So we were the ROBOTS. To everybody else, they thought we were just using the term in its normal robotic fashion - mechanical robots that are really cool. But we knew that ROBOTS was a secret acronym… Royal Order Bearers Of The Savior (which, btw, is not original with me, it come from the BJ film Treasure Map). At the beginning of the week, they didn’t understand what that phrase meant, it just sounded cool, but each night in cabin devotions I explained a little bit more of the phrase and how we are ROBOTS, not just at camp, but that we need to go home and act like royal children of the King, declaring His message to others because of what our Savior has done for us in not only saving us from sin but from self as well. So, now that you know what ROBOTS are, you can put your mind at ease and continue reading the rest of this epistle

As you can probably tell, I had a great week up at JBC. I always enjoy hearing Big Bob Roberts and the Lord used him to work in the hearts of my guys in various ways. Several made decisions regarding their personal devotions and really had a desire to get more out of God’s Word. Several others made decisions regarding their TV and video game habits as well.

One of the things that the WILDS has in place to help us summer staff is a program called PDA (no, they don’t give us palm pilots ) PDA instead stands for Personal Discipleship and Accountability. We are given a notebook at the beginning of the semester that has a bible study for each week we are here this summer. Then on Monday morning after choir practice we meet in small groups to discuss what we learned. This summer we are studying through on how to be a Useful Tool. This past week’s study was entitled “run away” and focused on . We studied how we need to be cleansed from youthful lusts or passions in order to be the right kind of vessels or tools for God to use to impact the lives of our campers. And not only do we need to cleansed of that which is impure, but we need to pursue that which is godly and be set apart and ready for God to use. I don’t have my book right here with me or I would give some more details, as it has personally been a very spiritually challenging study, helping me re-evaluate how earnestly I’m pursuing being a useful tool that God can use.

Yesterday we had our staff parties. Each staff group (counselors, lifeguards, waitresses, landscape, etc) gets together and has a time of eating, relaxation, entertainment, and did I mention eating? As counselors we had steaks on the grill served alongside Owl’s Frothy Limeade (scrabble scramble allusion, maybe the teens will get it). Then the lead counselors did some skits about being a counselor or lead counselor such as reactions to medical slips, giving an honor camper presentation, etc. and we played some games and watched a slideshow of the counselors and ate brownies and ice cream! Afterwards several of the guys got together and began sharing stories of childhood injuries which was humorous as well, complete with Brian Regan imitations (Get some leaves! - and if you have no idea what i’m talking about by that, don’t worry about it ) Basically we just enjoyed some goof off time

Next week we will have Michael Wessburg as our speaker at JBC. I’ve never heard him before so I’m looking forward to what he will bring. That will be my last week in JBC, as there isn’t JBC week 10. I’ll probably be on COR, since I haven’t done that yet, and then it will be back to BJU to get back to work at the Media Center before the semester starts. Thanks so much for your prayers!