I just returned home from the first week of Lakeside a few hours ago. I'm trying to reflect back on this last week. This week was nothing short of amazing! I sincerely love my youth group!! God moved in so many ways in my life this past week as well as the lives of my youth group and other youth and adults!
First of all I'd like to give a huge shoutout to God, because without Him Lakeside wouldn't be possible. I'd like to thank Him for the many many ways that He moved this past week!!!! I'd also like to give a shout out to Neal, Kim, Renee, Pastor Todd, Jamie, the houseband, all the CIT's, our chaplain, and all the counselors for making this such a great week!
God is soooo good and He moved in mighty ways over the last 7 days and to be honest I'm still trying to process everything. As Lakeside approached I'll be completely honest in saying that I wasn't as excited as I normally was, but then I went to one of the planning meetings and when I heard about our evening programs I was completely excited and my excitement and enthusiasm for this camp was back! The weeks leading up to camp I was soooooo excited. I think I drove people crazy because all I could talk about was Lakeside. But a few days after I got to camp I was questioning why I was there. I couldn't figure out what my purpose was for being there. I mean I knew that I was at lakeside for a reason otherwise God wouldn't have brought me back again for my 11th year. I kept praying about it and BOOM! it finally hit me yesterday morning during chaplain's hour with Keith!
The reason why I was there was to watch the kids in my youth group grow in there faith. I was there to be blessed by everything that they were experiencing. We had about 5 or 6 youth in our group that had never been to lakeside before and it was just soooo amazing to watch them grow in there faith and to learn. The reason why I say it took me until Friday morning to realize my purpose is because yesterday morning during Chaplain's hour, our chaplain Keith, did an alter call. The first one was for first time commitments to Christ, and the second one was for people to rededicate there lives to Christ. One of the girls in our youth group made a first time commitment to Christ and many others from our youth group rededicated there lives to Christ, myself included.
I guess I need to back up and explain why yesterday was so amazing. At the beginning of the week some of the kids in my youth group didn't really wanna be at lakeside and some of them were struggling with the fact that they had never felt God or "heard" Him. On monday night a group called white collar sideshow was at LAkeside. There whole "show" was about addictions. If you haven't heard there story you need to look it up. Anyways during there show a guy wore a pig mask and that symbolizes an addiction in our lives, or anything that keeps us from God. On Wed night during devos our group finally felt comfortable enough with each other to share what our "pigs" were in our lives. Walls were finally being brought down and were getting real with each other. It took great guts for some of us to share the things we shared with each other, but thats all being part of a family. We are there for each other.
During Devos that night one of the girls shared how she couldnt feel God and that she had never really heard His voice. The reason why friday was so special was because God showed up big time!! He made His presence known in a mighty way yesterday. There is no way that anyone inside of south could NOT feel God's presence!
Wed night was absolutely amazing as well! Recording artist heather williams was there. She shared her testimony and performed a few songs for us. It was def an emotional night because her story was so sad but yet many people could relate to her story. I'll never forget before we were dismissed neal came up and we began to sing a song and then he asked for a few moments of silence. It had been raining that night and as we quieted our hearts the loudest rain fall came. Neal said he wasnt sure how long we were supposed to be quiet but he knew immedietly after the rain stopped that our moment of silence was over......Wow God how powerful that you made your presence known!!
This week was nothing short of amazing!! From playing "things" and "apples to apples at sat night's devos, sundays shaving cream fight, staying up late with the girls, playing cards with everyone, laughing so hard your almost in tears,crying and gettin our Praise Jesus on!
Romans12:2 Do not conform to the ways of the world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is-his good, pleasing and perfect will
