a mind dump before I leave

As far as I know this will be the last post I will have for quite some time. Tomorrow morning I accompany a group of seven high schools tudents on a four day skate trip in Oregon followed by a week-long Young Life camp before I head off to Cuba for a few weeks. There’s something about the pressure of making sure I have everything ready for so many people to have a great week that I thoroughly enjoy. I almost thrive on moments like this. As my night was winding down I was driving along with this weird feeling. I didn’t know what it was. I wasn’t anxious, sad, happy, angry, desperate, or any of those common emotions one might expect when taking on such and endeavor. I called up a friend to let him know about a speaking position he might want to fill. He was happy that I thought of him, then asked if he could pray for me. I pulled over to the side of the road and over the phone he prayed for the kids and me and all that fun stuff. The weirdest thing happened…this odd moist sensation began to develop around my eyes. Suddenly there was this strange trickle of salty water hitting my lips. I finally was able to put my finger on what this indescribable emotion that was pestering me was…JOY. I’ll leave the explanation for it alone.

What this led me to was thinking about what a great responsibility I have ahead of me. I have to be the single adult in charge of these kids for four days until I get to the camp…not a big deal. Once I’m at camp I get a little relief but still the task of making sure the kids come away from the camp week, having experienced God (whether they know it or not), is now on my mind. At Young Life camps, they follow the traditional approach to teaching the gospel - Look at Jesus, this super cool guy…ooh isn’t he awesome, well lets find out what makes him even cooler…first the bad news, you’re going to hell for being a sinner…now that that’s over with, feel bad that it’s you that made him die on the cross…ok, now that you are emotionally broken, he rose from the dead in order that you may have life...don’t know what the hell that means but just trust us, you’re life is gonna be great if you follow our ways.

THIS DRIVES ME UP A FUCKIN WALL!!!

I started thinking how I can balance being contrary to the way they are presenting the gospel but not so much that the kids don’t learn something from the camp or possibly come away as bitter as I am. What is it that I need to say and do in order to make sure the kids have learned about Jesus and God without showing complete animosity toward the way it’s being fed to them from up front? I tried to sleep then picked up a book that I’m reading…Emma Goldman’s autobiography. Right where I left off was where she began her first lecture tour. She began describing her first lecture…she got up and something grasped her…true emotion, true enthusiasm for the subject on which she was speaking. In her following few lectures she wasn’t able to harness that and wasn’t satisfied with not having spoken from her heart. What got her first audience so excited was, as she puts it, ‘strange and magic words that welled up from within me, from some unfamiliar depth.’

I want that. Whether they accept it or not, my job is to let these kids know about a god that they might want to be with, not some god that they feel sorry for. The things that I’m passionate about, involving God, are complex in practice but simple in theory. Most notably, community. Like Mike talked about. A community in which you have to face things/people that you may not like but somehow you enjoy every bit of it. A community where everyone is welcome – even sinners (not something Christians are very good at promoting). The God I believe in loves people. He accepts people. He is patient with people. He also makes it possible for people to know they’ve screwed up (not to be confused with wrath or punishment). People don’t have to know him in order for him to know them. My god probably gets pissed off from time to time. He might even wish bad things on us so that we might learn. But above all that, he loves them and tolerates them.

That’s what I’m enthusiastic about. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…I often think that I worship a different god than most Christians. It’s going to take a lot for me to not be a cynical bastard (outwardly) with a lot of things that I encounter at this camp but I hope that if I can maintain the composure to stay focused on what I’m passionate about, I, and these kids, will have a great week. That’s it. Nothing too profound…mainly just a mind dump.