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| From rena |
Well I just got back from a week in the Cambodian Jungle and I made it without catching Malaria! I was one 8 leaders for a high school Bible camp out in Jombok Hoos Wilderness Tree camp located about 5 hours North of Phnom Penh. The focus of the camp was to preach the Word of God and help students from our school understand Leadership and Unity. This camp is very unique here in Cambodia because it has all types “fear factor” stations like a zip line, rappelling from 25 m high trees (the size of Whistler trees just different looking) , trapeze jump, tightrope walk at 20 meters, etc…. The camp itself is very primitive and we slept on a platform with a mosquito net over top of us. There was some electricity for about 4 hours every day (produced by a generator). The camp surroundings help provide a message to students to deal with and overcome their fears as a life parallelism in overcoming the fears or obstacles that stop them from following God’s plan in their lives. The camp was initially set up by an Australian group and is run by the Seventh Day Adventists.
Even though the facility is very good for Cambodian standards, you always know you are in Cambodia when you are here. Things like, they give you a helmet- it just might not have a buckle to clasp up or to get to the top of the trees where the activities are, you have to climb up these metal rebar pegs that seemed genuinely part of the risk where suddenly it may or may not be there where you think it should be. Everyone was fine, and they have you roped in the whole time, it just made me think how different it would be back if this camp were to the standards of Whistler, Canada.
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| From bible camp |
I will just give you one moment that I found impacting. This camp is fenced off and on a large hill and about 5 km from the closest village. At our school, many of our students have had less than ideal family lives. Over-all the whole group was terrific. However, some of our students got into a bit of trouble at the camp and did not come back before dark. (Four boys were gone, it was very dark outside, and nobody knew where they were at that moment. So a few teachers and I set out to find them with the van. Within a short distance we found them hot, tired, and sweaty). Once back at camp, I and another leader had to deal with these 4 male students from grades 11-12. Before we handed out the consequences, we decided to let the students sweat it out a bit and we said we would deal with them after devotional.
Later after devotional, we gathered the boys together to hear their thoughts.
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| From bible camp |
Outside of one particular individual, the rest had good intentions. The main premise is that one particular student was determined to get something cold from the village and set out by himself close to sun down. The other boys did not want this particular student to be left alone so they went after him. So because they could not convince him to turn around even though it was getting dark they decided to stay with him. As a result, this one student put the others at risk. The group of boys could have done things differently and admitted so.
We tried to let the boys know that the leaders care for them and do not want to see any harm to them. So after they suggested they do dish duty for the remaining two days on behalf of all 60 campers and an additional few other consequences, we hugged them and thought it was over.
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| From rena |
What I didn’t realize is how we handled that situation would play such a strong message to those boys. On the last night, the one boy that had initially set off alone opened up during the group devotional time. He shared from his heart how it meant so much to him that the one leader and I said we loved him and cared for him even when he had made a poor decision. He was tearful and I have to admit - so was I. It was only afterward that I found out that all four of those boys had no father figure in their lives. From being orphaned, to work-a-holic, to alcoholic, to just leaving; all those boys had not experienced an older male who showed them he cared. I thank the Lord for the opportunity to be used. It is times like this when I am really thankful to be in Education and impacting young people!
Blessings to all of you who impact others!
Deano
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