October 2010
Dear Friends,
I can’t believe I forgot to mention something really, really important last month. Last month’s letter was the 100th in a row I had written without missing a month! As some of you know, I’m a fan of comic books, Batman in particular. In the comic book world when an issue comes out that is divisible by 100 it’s usually a big deal. For instance, Batman hit issue 600 recently and there was quite a celebration. Detective Comics (also staring Batman) recently passed issue 800. That’s a lot of months of Batman! Well, you get the idea. I should have had some sort of celebration letter last month in honor of number 100. But I forgot. I guess that means I’m off the hook until letter 200…
Thank you for your prayers during our time at camp. We had a great time, though this year was quite different than years past. At the start of the school year last year we announced that we would not be taking kids with us who were in 7th grade and up. A major motivation for this was to encourage them to get involved with a local church, knowing that all of the local churches have camps in the summer for their youth groups. And it actually worked pretty well. We had nine 7th, 8th, and 9th graders that went to camp with a local church youth group. But that also means that we had fewer children than usual in our summer camp.
One positive aspect to fewer children at camp is that it seemed like we were at camp with every child that came. In years past, I have often asked if a particular child was or was not in camp since I often spent time with some of the kids but not all (since there were so many). But this year, with fewer kids, I definitely had time with each one. I helped to lead Bible studies with the youngest children (grades 1-4). That was new for me, but Ana had prepared all the necessary materials beforehand so it went quite well.
Our Bible study theme was the life of Jesus. We had considered that sometimes we forget how new things are for the youngest/newest children at the center. So we did a sort of “back to the basics” time during camp. The first day we talked about the birth of Jesus. Most of the kids new this one since we make a big deal with Christmas celebrations each year. The second day we talked about Jesus in the temple when He was twelve. One of the questions after we read the text was, “Who was Jesus talking to in the temple when His parents finally found Him?” I loved one of our little girl’s responses. She said he was talking to those shepherds who had seen the angels (from Day 1). Hilarious…
I am writing this letter on the second day of the new school year. As usual, we made a few changes to our program based on who is and isn’t here and based on the children we have/hope to have at the center. Ana and I will be working with the youngest group of kids, first through fourth graders. It will be a bit new for us, but we’re really looking forward to working together again with the same group of children. Pray for us! There are only a handful of children in this group currently, but we plan to take in several new ones. The first few months with new children are always challenging.
In closing, I want to mention that Ana has starting writing prayer letters again. She’s sending hers out by email and you should have received the first one in early September. If you didn’t receive her letter and you would like to have, just email Ana or me and we will be sure to add you to her list.
Love,
Paul and Ana