Camping Lessons

“How would you like to go camping,” my cousin, who was several years my senior, asked my brother and I one summer afternoon when I was around 13 years old. “Sure,” we both said with great zeal. Camping was always an enjoyable experience. It was an adventure, a challenge and has made for some of the most memorable times in my life, though I firmly acknowledge that on few of the camping occasions were we actually prepared for the many interesting (and slightly dangerous) things that would happen.

I remember one particular trip with my brother, our cousin Larry and another cousin named Jim. We decided to go to a state park about 30 minutes from our house and stay the night. We were plenty prepared with fire wood, food, tent, cookware, and other essentials. What we weren’t prepared for was Jim’s odd “sleeping” behavior. He would snore and talk so loudly (somehow at the same time) that it woke us all several times, scaring us to death for fear some odd half wit band of half man half beast militia were bearing down upon us to consume our very lives. At one point he got up and began walking around and we literally had to chase him. In the same night he tried to take all our sleeping bags and make some kind of fortress for him to sleep in. In the end, he finally came to rest in his own sleeping bag, outside the tent. The only problem was that the sleeping bag was on top of the smoldering embers of what used to be our fire. After about 20 minutes (and I am not sure why it took that long) he blurted out with a clarity we had not seen in him all night, “guys…it seems really hot out here…I am burning up.” We paid little attention, as you may expect from sleep-starved companions, until he jumped to his feet with his sleeping-bag-turned-torch still wrapped about him, running like a mad man…well…on fire. Fortunately for him it was starting to rain and, as you might expect, the rain ended up being one of those 100 year rains that didn’t stop for days and flooded us out.

We quickly decided on a midnight venture to the beach, early breakfast and sleep in the car. What a great time! Serious! Odd perspective you may say. Not really, the moments of time indelibly etched on my mind, I have grown to love them, not because of the circumstance; not because of the memories and challenges; not because it is downright funny. These moments are cherished for the people involved. Life may well be defined by the moments we spend together and the experiences we share as we engage in fellowship. “As Iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens the countenance of a friend,” the wise man once exclaimed.

In this day share your life, love and Lord with those about you. Make the memories. Cherish the moments. It may not be free from challenge or even danger, but you are helping God define a life without bounds. All will work to your good.

Ed