Sometimes I need to seize the Opportunities

Sometimes I need someone to get on my case and sometimes I need grace.
Sometimes I need forgiveness and mercy because I feel like shit already, I just need to be encouraged that I can do this, encouraged that I am not worthless and that I have something to offer, encouraged that I won't always be defeated.
Sometimes I need hope!
Sometimes I need to borrow your hope.
Sometimes I have lots of extra to give you.
I was talking about camp a few weeks back to some of my friends over a dakgalbi dinner and it started with the " I am sure you have some crazy stories... It sounds hard... I couldn't do it" kind of reactions. So I fell into that opening of the conversation with going into the crazy times and talking about the problems; hitting, bitting, pinching, restraining, yelling... because that is the entertaining stuff and what they were asking for.
This reminds me of the time I asked a coworker's father for all the dirt on his son, while he joined us on a hiking trip. My friend's father blew me away with his response, making me realize the error in my question without even trying. He started sharing all the good things about him, about his son! Sharing how proud he was of his son! I went at the conversation all wrong, thinking we could get some interesting stories we could all laugh at and make my friend feel a little worse, but in fun. But the father seized the opportunity to encourage and build up with the conversation.
This is also where I and some coworkers went wrong with conversations that almost led to others getting fired. We wanted to talk about all the funny dirt stories that made people look bad even though we love these friends very much. Another coworker caught on to this and knew we were missing something and not heading in the right direction in the convo.
The trick is seeing it and redirecting the conversations. A few weeks ago I realized I had headed in the wrong direction and painted a picture of camp that wasn't true. Sure the stories were true, but the heart of what camp is all about was false. So I corrected it and started talking about the relationships and care and love and success in kids lives. It was only for a few minutes though, and then we had to split. I missed the opportunity to share about the detailed messy stories of how God was working in these kids lives, in mine, and in the rest at camp.
I love laughing having fun random conversations, but I also love having meaningful encouraging inspiring conversations.
Sometimes I need to share those stories.
Sometimes I need to hear those stories.

Build Me A Son

This Prayer from Douglas A. MacArther is on the window as you walk into my school. I noticed it right away and liked it. A month later I was drawn to the words on the window and began to connect to it in a deeper way. It was what I needed this week....

Oh Lord,
Who will be strong enough to know when he is weak,
and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid;
one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat,
and humble and gentle in victory.
Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be;
a son who will know Thee and that to know himself is the foundation stone to knowledge.

8th Album - And Still Great! I Love the new Album!

Many great sounds and like always great messages. I really like the messages and artistry of this 8th Album of Switchfoot.

1. The sound of a dog barking across the street providing a familiar language I can understand.

Do you think the growing dependence on high technology hurts us or makes us stronger? What are the major advantages/disadvantages of this dependence?

Last week I watched an American movie titled “Hannah” that was about this young teen girl that was raised her whole life out in the wilderness by her father. Then she entered into our modern world all on her own. While this movie had many themes in it from DNA altering to loneliness and CIA assassins to friendship, there was one interesting scene that showed Hannah’s difficulty with adjusting to all the noise and chaos of the high levels of technology in our times. There was the buzzing of the lights and air conditioning along with the flashing lights of the television and the telephone that kept pulling Hannah’s attention around the room. Then the voices over the phone, over the television, and on the other side of the door drove her crazy.

Why doesn’t all of this drive us crazy? Not only are we used to the constant noise, but also for some of us we go crazy when there is no noise and when we don’t have access to some sort of device to keep us busy. As I write this essay lying in my bed typing on my wireless keyboard that connects me to my laptop and second screen, which I have to see better from farther away and because it is cool, I am also checking my phone that has access to my email and sports updates for the night, while listening to Switchfoot from my ipod. My experiences in my life also currently have me working in the woods 24 hours a day 5 days a week; in the woods without electricity and cell phones, in the woods lighted by kerosene lanterns and heated with firewood. Is one of these worlds better than the other? What do both of these worlds have to offer us?

I come to these questions with two ideas. We all are made to help the people around us and we can all make a difference in this world. If we focus on these we will become stronger and we will cause less hurt. In the woods where I work there are boys that have come and unplugged from everything else to help them grow. Many of my boys have problems with the relationships with their families, and with motivation to work on their education and help around the house. They have trouble building relationships with their families because they keep typing texts while their parents try to talk to them. The boys I work with don’t care about education or helping because they just want to watch the next episode of Family Guy or next Youtube video, or play the next level of Assassin’s Creed. Sometimes my boys text mom and tell her they are running a little late or that they love her.

I also live in a world that I have learned about children in Africa that are being forced to be soldiers from a movie and then I learned online how I can help these kids. While I was online I connect with my old friends that really needed someone to talk to. While I was online I missed out on talking to my friend in the other room and missed helping the kid that is being mistreated next door.

We are all going to be connected to something, whether it is our headphones or the person in our class that really needs a friend. Are we ready to plug into what really matters in the world? Are we looking for the person who needs our help and the opportunity to make a difference? What ever that is we need to go for it all the way. Wherever we are lets be fully there.

Day in the LIFE

what a day in the life a mike looks like... Well... It is hard to describe of
course...

My job consists of being a counselor, nurse, teacher, parent, coach, pastor,
friend, leader, and motivational speaker to a group of 10 boys 24
hours a day 5 days a week with a couple of other adults. We do
everything together and do it all in the woods. We live out in the
open air all year round and learn many things about life and how to
live with many other people, and how to solve our problems. We build
our tent / cabins in the woods ourselves, go on trips and many other
things.

My day usually starts around 5:30am with hitting the snooze button on
my battery powered alarm clock because we don't have electricity in
our campsite. Then around 6am I get out of bed and since it is winter
I go make a fire to warm up to and so the boys can have a place to get
warm when they get up. After making my bed and cleaning my tent, I
talk with my teammate and then wake the boys up at around 6:30am.
Which then means that I help them make their beds and start the never
being alone for the rest of the day.

By 7am The boys have made their beds, cleaned their tents, and we have
gone over all of our individual goals as a group. The boys all have
goals for things they want to and really need to be working on, from
talking out their frustrations to not arguing. So many problems and so
much time. Because by 7:30am the boys have cleaned our entire campsite
which included sweeping out tents, racking trails, cleaning lanterns,
setting up a campfire for the night... It is pretty sweet that we all
learn how to keep out rooms and our home clean even when we live in
the woods.

8am we are eating in our dining hall, with the other groups, food that
our wonderful cooks that we call moms have made for us. Unless it is
Wednesday or Thursday when we cook our own meals in our campsites over
the fire. Can you imagine 12 of us boys around one table trying to
have one guy talking at a time?... sometimes I can't imagine it
either. But it is what we try to do. After the meal we share with the
other groups what we did last night and what we will be doing in the
morning. We also sing lots of crazy songs and sometimes play games or
talk about different things.

9am or 9:30 we either sweep the dining hall out or take out the trash
and then head to the bathroom and then brush our teeth. Then we do
what our group has planned for the morning. This could be building a
tent like I will be doing tomorrow, playing games, carving crafts,
doing academics, canoeing, fishing, planning for trips, packing for
trips, go for a ramble hike... So many things that the boys get to
plan the week before for what we want to do and what we need to do...

that will take us till about 11:30am Because at that time we need to be heading back to the
Chuckwagon for lunch or starting to make lunch ourselves. Making meals
is a lot of fun at camp; the boys and us Chiefs decide what meals we
want and we make a menu for it, including what ingredients we will
need and how much it will cost. They can spend $2 per person per meal.
So lots of math and budgeting skills learned here and we cant for get
the cooking skills we all learn. Yesterday I got to spend some time
over the fire with a couple of my guys making bullseye eggs and
sausage pattie sandwiches. It was amazing if I do say so myself :)
When the meal is about ready at campsite or the chuckwagon we send a
couple of guys to set our table proper etiquette style. And then we
head on in when someone creatively calls us in with a short skit.

You might have noticed I referred to us staff as "chiefs" and that is
because when we work at camp we all get a new first name. And that is
Chief. You might be able to think of it like the changing of names in
the Bible: Abram to Abraham, Simon to Peter, Saul to Paul, little
piece of no good garbage to Child of God :) So we are always referred
to by campers and and staff as Chief or more precisely for me Chief
Mike.

So after another great meal with our boys talking about their favorite
superhero, or what trip we want to take and what we are going to need,
or some other story telling time about the man that cut trees into
shapes of turtles and spirals then we have a couple of guys clean the
table off and we do more singing and telling the other groups what we
have accomplished and what we will accomplish in the afternoon. If it
is Wednesday of Thursday and we are at our campsite we will have some
people doing the dishes while the rest of us are usually doing some
paperwork / academics. They have to write plans for what we will be
doing the following week, and articles on things they are
experiencing. Writing really helps the learning sink in as I know for
myself also. It also helps them learn how to write and spell and to
express their thoughts. So during this time I am usually checking the
guys work. I need to check for sppelling and an grammar mistake that
they might had. Give them suggestions and all that fun stuff that
isn't always fun.

So after the dishes are clean we take more bathroom breaks and brush
our teeth to prepare us for a SIESTA from 1:30pm to 2:30pm! This is a
great way to spend an hour. The rest of the world sees the importance
in siestas and so do we. This time for me is usually spend doing some
paperwork of how the boys are doing, reading, napping, working out,
preparing for the rest of the day, and/or like yesterday sitting with
a boy who had an attitude problem and wanted to be stubborn.

Then after Siesta we get the guys up and continue with our afternoon
plan which could be chopping wood, fixing up campsite, looking up maps
of places we want to canoe, planning a skit to share with camp,
designing a tent we want build, cutting down trees to build a tent,
hiking with our sandbag filled packs to explore our 900 acres of camp,
or swimming in our pond and jumping off the high dock. We are getting
so close to being able to do this!

When 4:30pm comes around we need to be getting close to our shower
house so that we can shower and clean our shower house after we make a
mess of it. We should be done with that by 5pm so we can make it to
table set at 5:15pm and be eating again the most amazing food at
5:30pm. We do the normal eating fun and sing and share with the rest
of camp what we are up to. This leads us into about an hour and a half
to take bathroom breaks, brush and do a settled plan for the evening.
These plans are usually personal academics, crafts, or settled group
games like homemade bounderbash. We then wrap up the fun by finishing
the day off with Pow-Wow a little after 8pm.

Pow-Wow is like sitting around the living room, or in our case a fire,
and talking about the day. We try to talk about the good things of the
day, what we learned, where we grew, what we liked. Even if it was a
really hard day and didn't seem like we were very successful we can
still learn from it and look for some positives. We even referred to
it last night as the sports center highlights of the day; there is so
much that happens all day long and we can't see it all but we can try
to recap the best parts of the day and feel good when we go to bed.
At pow-wow we will also read the plan that one of the boys wrote about
what we will be doing the next day, pray, and How out the day! Putting
the boys to bed and hugging them between 8:30 and 9pm on a good night.

"How out the day" is a term you might not understand. We at camp like
to "How" when we do something good, or welcome someone, or
congratulate someone, or honor someone; which is this loud cheer
"1-2-3 How How How." It is putting our mark of approval on something.
We also do a lot of evaluating throughout the day. Before every
activity including riding in a van and eating a meal or taking a
shower, we get a plan of what we expect from each other as a group and
maybe how fast we plan on doing it. This gives us something to measure
ourselves to and challenge ourselves and something we put our word on
that we will be successful in. So after we follow with our plan we
evaluate how we did as a group.

After the boys are in bed, we as Chiefs get a few things ready for the
next day and do some fun paperwork and maybe do some reading
ourselves, writing, working out, and/or talking like the great friends
we have become. These friendships are so important to our health. Just
like if there is problems with a married couple it can tear apart the
family. In the same way if the chiefs are loving and supporting each
other it can make for a loving a supporting group.

There is so much more I am sure that we do and that doesn't make much
sense in writing. It took me 3 or 4 days of visiting camp to really
start to understand that this place was something that I could do and
wanted to do. And now a year and a half later I am still learning what
camp is all about. Any Questions? :)

Beaver Beach

Yadkin River (West of Winston-Salom, NC) July 10th 2009 7:30pm

So many cool things have happened the last couple of days on the river, but I want to write about what happened in the last 10 mins. The boys started writing articles from there experiences on the river so far, and I had to grab some of my stuff about 50 ft down the river bank. I saw a little beaver swimming a little ways down river and heading my way. I decided to stay still and wait to see how close it was going to come.
I was about 5 ft off the river and on a bank that rose 3ft up off of the river. The beaver swam 3ft off shore right pasted me and slowed down. I didn't want ot move at all, not even my head, because I didn't want it to notice me. But, it let me turn my head a little at a time, and then an ammo can slammed by my group of boys and the beaver turned around and swam away faster than it came. It stopped about 15 ft down river from me and came to shore and I couldn't see it anymore. So I walked very slowly over to where it was to see if it had went in a hole, swam under water, or maybe was chilling by the edge.
I came up to where it disappeared out of my sight and still didn't see it so I inched my way closer to the edge and saw some of the leaves of the weeds moving; the beaver was right at the top edge of the slope, 4ft from me, munching on the leaves. It didn't notice me and I watched it slowly eating the leaves for 10 mins. I slowly inched my way to get a better view.
I was 3ft from the edge and standing very still when the beaver saw some better looking leaves right in front of me. The beaver, with its short front legs, climbed over the edge and stopped to eat more leaves 2 ft in front of me. I was struggling to stay still this whole time because of bugs landing on me and the natural sway of my body, but now adding the raised heart rate and excited nerves made it really hard to not move. If I would have moved the beaver would be gone.
A few more minutes passed as I got to see its flat paddle tail up close and its little front paws feeding its buck teeth. The beaver was grazing and inching its way closer to me, focusing only on the food in front of him and ignoring the big tree of a man standing now only 1ft in front of him. I was enjoying this too much to disrupt the beaver, of try to catch it, or to punt it half way across the river; I only wanted to observe this awesome creature up close it its own habitat, doing its own routines.
I wasn't sure how close it would get or how close I wanted it to get. I know I didn't want it to walk over my foot if it got that close. I was thinking it might get that close because the leaves went right up to my feet. It did get closer and started walking past my foot only 6 inches away and I diceded that that was close enough. I stepped away gently and the beaver franticly ran away tumbing over the edge of the slope into the river water and then dove out of sight.
I had the biggest grin on my face as I walked back over to my group of boys who were writing their articles. I couldn't stop grinning and had to break their hard working silence and share what just happend. I then joined then by writing this great experience down.

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed

I just watched the Expelled Documentary and I thought it was great. I have been very effected by creation and intelligent design and evolution debates or lack of debates. I have always been very open minded to peoples thought and get turned off to people who know without a doubt things and call people stupid if they don't believe the same thing, what turned me off was the lack of questions they seemed to ask or acknowledge. Since I grew up in the Christian community with creation facts or theories I have heard many people call other theories stupid.
When I heard of some Christians embrace evolution ideas I wanted to understand that more and really see what this was all about. I know I don't know everything! (not even close) I need to keep learning and keep questioning. I need to seek so I can find out what things make the most sense and what things may be stupid and be able to understand why, not just because that is what I grew up with or the people around me believe. Being at camp in a very conservative environment of North Carolina, where people "know the facts" and have really been able to explain a lot of good evidence of an intelligent design, after being in the Northwest in a open minded no body is wrong unless you are arguing with or for Christianity or any Religion, has really rattled my brain again. I always liked to say sure why didn't God create the world using evolution, why can't we be both right. It all depends on your definitions of creation and evolution.
This documentary which is very well made in my opinion explores people being fired from jobs as scientist or journalist because of not completely denying some sort of intelligent designer because our science society has forced creationism to be taboo and stupid with know evidence. It also explores the questions that are not answered in Darwinism because no theory has all the answers even though some try to say it does. The film also explores the consequences of peoples beliefs. Many great interviews throughout this documentary. It is fun to watch.
I was at the North Carolina beach this past week with my kids and others form camp and we got to do a Behind the Scenes close encounters tour of the aquarium. it was a lot of fun and got to feed the largest tank with sharks and many other awesome fish. Our tour guide marine biologist Wayne made an interested comment about how we really don't know a whole lot about fish and are always trying knew things to take proper care of our tanks. Science is fairly knew in a lot of sense and we are trying to figure things out. It was definitely a humble approach to something that is way bigger than we can get our minds around.
Things are unpredictable at times and many are trying to force us to believe something that they admittedly don't have all the answers to prove. It really made me kind of angry / frustrated that many people try to force their own agendas that are harming us. Why can't we have freedom to speak and explore and publish our ideas and finding.

10 years - Party On

I just listened to Mars Hill message celebration of 10 years that was a couple weeks ago and am inspired to enter back into the woods this morning to love my kids to life. Join that party I just remembered about and wrote about by being active in this world, and joining the things that God is active with.

November 8th 2008 - Sunset Wednesday

Tunnel Park - Holland, MI
I saw an amazing sunset last night at the state park and took a lot of pictures. Tonight no camera and another great sunset. It is also a little more peaceful at Tunnel Park. Beautiful Blue and shade black waves. The blue shimmers and calls out to walk across. The definitively straight horizon asks if there is anything to the west. The endless water reminds me that I am small part of this big world. The endless water tries to prove wrong the title of Lake. Growing up 30 mins from this, for 20 years of my life, makes me ask why I haven't come to more sunsets here. I wish I was surrounded by people that wanted to see this every night. The purple, pink, orange, yellow, green, blue sky above that perfect blue water draws me out of this world I am in, out of the worries, out of the cares, even out of the celebrations into a celebration that is way bigger that I can create, inspire, or even imagine. I hope I am never distracted enough to miss this celebration. I hope am never busy enough to not join this party.

Lake Michigan Winter Beach

Jan. 28th 2009 Journal

I thought that was a really good reflection on some of my thoughts and my group. I wrote this in my bed in the woods of the Rangers campsite at Cameron Boys Camp.

This is my home, the woods, and these chiefs (co-workers) and these boys are my family. The passion to be the best that we can be is going to change my life! These boys are pumped and excited about being the best and going home the right way. They are sick and tired of guys, who they have invested so much into, leaving before they are ready. They care for each other and want the best for each other - people see it, and I am beginning to see it. I am beginning to see what being a ranger is all about - what camp is all about - what life is all about.
I understand why these guys get frustrated when things aren't right "The fruit of righteousness will be peace; the effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever" Isaiah 32:17. I am understanding some of my weaknesses, by some of the things they are calling out in each other. " Oh that is not that bad" I think to myself - I am just protecting my own weaknesses. Rangers are not going to let anyone stop them from being the best group they can possible be... the best group ever. I need my groups passion!
My co-Chief Adam told us about a friend Shane who once said to him "Oh he is just a new Christian, that passion will go away" Adam then grabbed Shane and said "Are you kidding m?! That is what you need man!" We should be excited like a new believer follower of Christ. My boy travis accepted Christ last night, or as he says it "I got saved last night," I dont like how that sounds for different reasons, but that doesn't matter. I need to be excited with him and for him and keep encouraging him! I am not excited because I fully don't know what it means to him and I do know that there is a lot more saving that God is continuing to do for him. And for me. That doesn't matter! I need to let myself be excited!
We had a boy go home for good this past week who was not ready to go home. We all knew he was not ready to go, but he convinced himself and his parents that he was. You should have seen the passion the group showed him to try to convince him to stay! It was very intense and not very gentle most of the time. One of the things that the group keep pushing him on was his lack of passion for anything. They kept pushing him to get passionate and let it show, but he didn't because he was taught to hold it in. He is just bursting inside because of this! He wont get passionate because he doesn't know how! I see a lot of myself in him in this area. I am very calm and patient, and I thank God for this gift, but I am also learning and reflecting on how this has been a weakness of mine. I need to get passionate about life, passionate about people, passionate about living life right to the full! I need to get passionate about being the best I can be and helping others do the same! I can't be lukewarm anymore! I can't let others ruin their lives if there is something I can do about it. and leave the rest up to God.