Well it’s been a long time since I started this post – exactly eight months ago. That was just as camp season was beginning which is what inspired me to write this. Since then, camp season has come and gone again and it was probably the most disappointing camp season I have ever heard of. Since then I have moved to a whole new area and have been told the camp here is still awesome. Hearing that made me almost decide not to finish the post as it had been so long since starting it; however, I thought that the points in it are still valid as the trends I was seeing in the camps from my old area are trends I see in a large segment of Christian society today and would still be relevant to many.
Anyway, on to the post!
It’s a time of year that many kids and parents look forward to, but for me, it’s quickly become a dreaded time of year. The more excited other people get, the more I dislike it. You see – the more others are excited to go to camp, the more they tell my kids about it and ask them to come and then I have to tell my kids they are not allowed to go.
It’s not that we can’t afford camp – there was even one camp our kids were invited to that was free. The problem my wife and I have with camp is the same reason we homeschool – the message they teach.
What Camp Used To Be
Do you remember when you went to camp or a youth retreat as a teen? What was the highlight for you? When you had a teen talk about their experience at camp to your congregation, what did they say? Yes, there were some people who mentioned the food, the games / activities, and the friends; but just about everyone said this was the biggest thing: “I met God!”
In my own experience I went on one retreat and to camp once. I honestly can hardly remember anything about those trips except the experience of meeting God. I know there were all sorts of activities but none of them stand out.
When teens in my congregation spoke of their experience what they spoke of mirrored my own experience. Every year there would probably average three to five teens who would share. I am now thirty-seven years old and until this last year I could count the number who failed to mention meeting God on one hand – and some of those seemed to be because they didn’t want to say the same thing everyone before them said! For the mathematicians out there that is less than five percent who failed to mention encountering God.
What Camp Is Now
Now I haven’t been to camp recently so I can’t say firsthand exactly what camp is now but I can get a good idea based on what the camps and campers are saying.
What campers are saying
The last year has been very different. Not a single teen talking about their camp or retreat experienced mentioned meeting God or any kind of spiritual experience! Here’s what they did mention:
- Food (this was number one by far)
- Hanging out with friends
- Being in a safe place to be themselves
- Swimming
- Games
- Campfire
- Lip-sync battle
- Breaking curfew
- Learning about God
- I’m sure there were a few other things but they were the same type of thing as the first eight.
We also heard from a few leaders and here’s what they mentioned as highlights:
- Had a lot of fun
- When given the choice, about three-quarters of kids stayed around the campfire to pray instead of going to bed.
- Was “different” as a leader
What the camps are saying
Sadly this mirrors what the campers are saying. When we first looked at several websites there was nothing on any of them about what they believe or teach. Now looking at the end of the season some of them have a little information, but it is still usually vague. Here’s what I found on their websites:
- Reaching unbelievers.
- Activities & games.
- Reaching a particular group of people.
- Discipleship / training believers.
- A variety of administrative goals.
- Friendship.
- Safe place.
- Experience God.
- Food.
The Focus
Obviously there is nothing wrong with anything on that list from the camps, but you know the highlight of years past and the most effective outreach to the unsaved in attendance – encountering God? Way down near the bottom at number eight. So what do the camps seem to value more than encountering God?
—- The same goes for fun and friendship. At least food seems to rank lower than God in importance to the camps.
Reaching unbelievers
Reaching unbelievers is great but how do they plan on doing this? As they don’t say directly we have to look at what their other priorities are to try to understand this.
Activities & games
How does playing games and doing fun activities reach unbelievers?
I’ve been part of church sports and while it was definitely a Christian setting with prayer, the focus was the activity. We definitely built relationships with unbelievers and showed them that Christians can have fun too. Did anyone make a commitment to Christ because of the activity? Maybe one or more people were started on a path that eventually led or will lead to salvation but as far as I can tell as soon as the fun was done, the person was gone.
So maybe someone from these camps could explain how they will actually use “fun” to focus on salvation?
Reaching a particular group of people
So often you hear someone say they want to reach inner city youth, or the homeless, or a certain ethnic group, or any particular group or subset of society. I am not opposed to this as every group may have unique ways they would really understand God’s love for them.
The question though, is that if you are adapting what you do for one group, do you alienate another group? Again this is not necessarily a bad thing – hopefully someone else will do something to minister to the excluded group(s).
Where I do have a real problem is when we try so hard to reach a certain group that we water down the gospel or even introduce wrong theology in the teaching. What I see so often is that when people try reaching a group from a different culture is that they try to incorporate a lot of that culture in their theology or teaching. What makes this so dangerous though is that in almost every culture, their religion is very intertwined and sometimes is impossible to differentiate from their culture (even if they try denying this it is true). Native culture is one of those cultures where they have intertwined their religion and culture so closely that virtually everything they do has religious meaning. So when one of these camps says they want to focus on native kids I have to question what exactly is going to happen at the camp and what will be taught? Will they open with a smudging ceremony which is a religious ceremony to “cleanse an area of evil spirits”? Will they do chants which are a way of worshipping their false gods? The reality is that they don’t tell parents so we have no way of knowing for sure.
Discipleship / Training Believers
Just how are they discipling our kids? What are they being taught? There is a whole range of possibilities here. Honestly when I see a camp that lasts a week claim to disciple anyone it raises warning alarms to me. Do they even realise what discipleship is? Jesus and some of the apostles had their disciples with them 24/7 for three years though most disciples followed their mentor 24/7 for about fifteen years! There is no way you can disciple someone for a week and to claim otherwise tells me they don’t understand the Bible – at least not very well. (Maybe because they were never a disciple themselves!)
Now that does not mean they can’t teach and train the kids. If they have the kids there for an entire week they can do a tonne of awesome teaching and training! Once again though there is a lack of explanation. What are you going to be teaching my kids? Can you at least tell me what you believe? Before I trust you with my kids I need to know that you stand firmly on the Bible without letting secular ideas change your theology.
Administrative Goals
Good administrative practices are great – necessary even. Is it deserving to be part of your mission statement though? The focus of your camp? More important than encountering God? It’s a perfect example of my issue with the priorities of camps (and churches too but that’s another post).
Friendship
Having Christian friends is a necessity for the growth of every believer. If camp helps to foster those friendships that is awesome.
Building a relationship with an unbeliever is also often something you have to do before they’ll be willing to listen to the gospel message. If that relationship can be built at camp – awesome!
A Safe Place
I have to ask why this even needs mentioning? If any place is not safe then it is not being run Biblically.
Unless by “a safe place” they mean that they will never do anything but affirm the campers including their mistakes and sin. If someone is making choices that will lead to eternal damnation we are called to tell them! We don’t have to condemn the person or go on about what an awful person they are, but we need to lovingly inform and warn them. Did you realise that Jesus (as far as what is recorded in the Bible) spent more time warning people about hell than he did encouraging us about heaven?
Experiencing God
We are finally down to what has traditionally been the focus of camp and the most powerful witness to believers and unbelievers alike. This is the only thing I know of where the nearly universal reaction is “I want more!”. It is less of a priority for the camps than all the other stuff we already went over and it shows it what the campers are taking away with them. At least the camps have experiencing God ahead of the last item on the list of priorities:
Food
Just about everyone loves campfires and cookouts. Good nutrition is important to keep people healthy and active. And hey, the camps even prioritise it less than experiencing God! Even if only slightly. Still, when you see people in the Bible who wanted to encounter God very often praying and fasting, it makes me wonder if food should really be a main priority for camps at all?
The Leaders
The leaders that go with the kids on these trips can make a huge difference. These are the people directly responsible for your kids. When asked about their highlights they had fun but it was “different” than being just a camper. All of this makes me wonder about the kids who stayed at the campfire for prayer – were they wanting to stay for the prayer? Were they wanting to stay for the campfire? Or were they just not wanting to go to bed?
The Results
Lets now look at how those priorities have affected what the campers are taking away.
Food
Ironically the last item the camps focus on is the number one highlight for campers. Must be the campfires and cookouts.
Friends
Sadly this is not making new friends or even growing closer to their existing friends. This is nothing more than the usual after school hanging out with friends.
Safe Place
“Being in a safe place to be themselves” is how one camper put it. If they can’t be themselves around their friends normally or at church then maybe they need new friends or a new church; or maybe they need to stop identifying and living as a person of sin and accept a new identity in Christ. Sadly the response these camps have taken is to affirm sinful behaviour so as to not offend the sinner.
Fun Activities
Swimming, Games, Campfires, and a lip-sync battle are the next four items campers remembered as highlights of their camp trip. Nothing wrong with this except for what it comes ahead of!
Breaking Curfew
At least fun activities came before this. Next to the kid half mooning the camera this was the most shocking thing in the highlight video put together by the youth pastor! Seriously! Breaking the rules was a highlight and made it in the video put together by the youth pastor for showing to the church on a Sunday morning! Plain and simple sin was a leader-sanctioned highlight.
Learning about God
At least it wasn’t a complete waste for everyone as one camper learned something about God that they felt was a highlight. They didn’t encounter God and they probably could have learned about God in church or at home but at least it’s something.
Conclusion
Yes, we are finally almost at the end. At least of this post.
Camps and retreats are meant for us to get away from our daily distractions in order to draw closer to God. Look in the Bible. When someone wanted to get closer to God, to experience God, what did they do? They spent time praying and worshipping God while fasting. Often they would go out in to the desert. This was their version of a camp or retreat and they were life changing.
You can see that as the camps shift their priorities away from God to be more politically correct, the results that the kids take away are also shifting away from God.
I know that not all camps are becoming like this and so I look forward to seeing what the local camp is like while praying for those camps that have lost their way. May those camps, as well as the campers, experience God and find renewal in Him.
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