Haha..Very Funny?!

This past week I went to visit friends at Baptist Park, a camp I volunteered on Scholarship with 2 years ago. I told them anything they needed help with. I would do whatever. I was expecting they were gonna have me help maintain the camp with the general workers, as they didn't need any teachers for this week. I thought it would be great to work with some old buds I hadn't seen in 2 years.

I pulled into Baptist Park at 12:30am Saturday morning, leaving River Valley Wesleyan at 10:30pm. A nice 3 hour trip. We stayed up watching movies and playing games until 4:30 before turning in for the morning.

Many of you know of my "great fondness" of caring for children. You might even call it a passion....to usher the children quickly into the presence of God. So with this in mind, the next morning I was given an invitation to teach a class to the the gr.4-6 kids for the week. Even though I'm of the persuasion that any children between the ages of 2 and 12 should be caged I figured I would challenge myself, even though I had no material to go on. Attending a Saturday evening service at Presque Isle Wesleyan I was inspired by Pastor Rick's message about Peter to do a whole theme of "Carnies from the Bible", or as the camp renamed it "God's Carnival". So with the week planned out I was sitting pretty right up until 2:30pm Sunday afternoon.

Sunday, There was a 3 day, ages 6-8, camp that came in and all the volunteer counsellors backed out, so they asked me if I really meant "whatever", as they knew how I love "children's minsitry". It just excites me soooo much. With hestitation and terror in my voice I agreed. All I could think was "Haha very funny God! You must REALLY love me to discipline me this much".

Sunday night was full of one camper's continous temper tantrums (discovering later this child was slightly authistic, poor little guy) and a 3:00am Pee Cleaning. I was loving it already.

Monday and Tuesday my prayers were full of pleas for patience and love, as the 3 day camp wrapped up and I waved good-bye to the wonderful flesh bags a group of us jumped into a 1983 BMW and cruised Presque Isle, making the key stops of Wal-Mart and Tim Horton's.

The rest of the week I continued my teaching, of three 45 minute classes each day looking at a different charcter in the Bible who could have been a Carnie. Using various forms of interaction we had a blast watching, lions' devor corrupt officials of the king, sneaking a peak at Samson and Delilah's Romance, walking across tables as Peter walked on Water, and Torching Rocks with Elijah.
In between classes I had a chance to genuinely reconnect with many of my old campers, who are now staff. What shocked me most was I actually was enjoying teaching.. .children. When people asked how classes were going I could honestly answer, "I'm loving it".
It's awesome how when you open yourself up to whatever... God will not only use you, but you end up enjoying it.

For future reference, I stil have no desire to go into Children's ministry. This just means I'm able to tolerate the human vermon, alittle more. I do love children, just not the things they do. Like snot bubbles, and kicking each other, and crying, and whinning and interrupting and....well, you fill in the blanks.