The second week of Bible camp was equally as amazing and fun as the first one. As the first week ended I was very tired and looking forward to some time off. We went into town around 9pm and after dropping my stuff off at the house I was going to be staying at, I went with a few others to get some pizza from Peace on Earth Pizza, one of the few restraints in the large village of Unalakleet. On our way to meet some folks at the pizza place we got invited over to a house for a bunch of crab. We had the delicious pizza, and then gorged ourselves with fresh crab until 1am.

I slept in the next morning and Jamie got up early to start picking kids up from the airport. I was set on relaxing as much as possible until as late as possible before going back to camp. Sitting in the auditorium waiting for a trip out to camp I really could have just gone home. On top of finding out I was going to be living in a Costco tent opposed to a cabin, I was still tired, missing Lydia and thought that I should just go home. I asked God for some energy and a much needed attitude adjustment. Once I stepped off the boat and back onto the camp beach God had changed my heart and I was excited to meet my new campers.

Jamie and I counseled together week number two, and it was super fun to have someone else in the cabin with the guys during devotions and it was nice for each of us to be able to take small breaks and know the other one was making sure everyone was staying in line (quite literally when we were waiting for meals). The second week of camp brought more campers and staff to Covenant Bible camp than ever before. With over 120 campers and a very large staff we struggled to fit everyone into chapel and meals.

The first night’s chapel was an interesting one, as a missions team had come from Minnesota for two weeks to present their puppet ministry. It didn’t take to long to realize that puppets probably weren’t going to be the best fit for this age group of jr. highers. Byron (the program director that week) was able to work with the team and come up with a series of testimonies and dramas that would speak to the kids more than puppets. From then on things at chapel were great.

I helped out with water during the muskox run, and was in a different spot during the eco-challenge, and it was fun to see the different parts of the race that I missed out on the week earlier.

We got lots of rain at the end of the week and it caused our tent to start flooding after a overnight plus a few hours of straight rain. We moved some of our stuff out and into a staff cabin, which was ironically the same thing that we had done for fun the day before. We wanted a great score for cabin cleanup and early in the week one of our campers had the idea of packing everything up and collapsing the tent…..really cleaning it up. We did it, got a perfect score and it was lots fun getting everyone to work together taking it down and then putting it back up again.

For our skit the second week we got one of our campers from Elim who looked a lot like Bruce Lee to come up with a “Bruce Lee goes to Bible Camp” skit and made sure we worked in a bunch of camp jokes that made the whole thing funny.
The week ended again on Sunday evening with a boat ride into Unalakleet. I was starting to feel pretty sick with a cold once we got into town and after an evening out with friends I knew my fears had been realized. I spent a very wakeless night on the church floor fighting the beginning of a cold. I was able to catch a pretty early flight back to Nome and was happy to be back home.

I had a great time at Bible Camp and am SO glad I was there, and very glad I stayed for two weeks. It was great to see God work in the lives of these kids and to realize the passion I have for camping ministry is not isolated to one particular location or set of memories that I have from cascades. I know my life has been changed because of the leadership of role models that I had while growing up at camp and the leadership opportunities that I got from working there…. these are role models and opportunities that exist at hundreds of Christian camps across the country.

Alright bloggers. Its been about a week since I got back from Covenant Bible camp and I’ve had plenty of time to digest my experiences and figure out what parts I want to share with you. So much happened while I was gone it would take pages and pages to record everything that I experienced. I had a great time and it was amazing to be in a place so far out of touch with the rest of the world. Covenant Bible Camp is a place that doesn’t obviously have internet or TV but also lacks electricity, telephones and flushing toilets. I was a counselor for 6 high schoolers the first week, and 6 jr. highers the second week.

Here are a few highlights:

Pre-camp:
I flew into Unalakleet on Sunday afternoon, a day before campers arrived. Jamie had flown in less than an hour earlier on a different airline and he was waiting for me at the Bering air terminal. We got a ride with a friend of his that he went to CBC Ecuador with and who lived in Unalakleet. We also went over to Heidi Erickson’s house, she was going to be the program director the first and third weeks of camp. Jamie and I went to the only store left open on Sunday afternoon and got a frozen pizza for dinner. The next morning Jamie woke me up and we started doing airport runs. We drove the Unalakleet Covenant Church truck (which was an automatic…but the transmission was broken, so it only drives in second gear) back and forth to the different airport terminals picking up campers and staff flying in from villages all over the area. Around 4pm the decision was made that staff needed to head out a bit before students, especially so new staff could get a quick orientation.

Week 1:
After driving in the church truck (at a very, very slow speed) for about an hour and then getting picked up by a boat and shuttled to camp I had finally made it. As I walked the trails from the beach to the temple (main meeting and dining area) I was soaking it all in, all the new people, the mosquitoes, the cabins, the mud…everything.

After a brief walking tour and orientation it was time for the students to arrive. I had 6 kids in my cabin. Two of them were from Unalakleet, one from Koyuk, one from White Mountian, one from Elim, and one from California. Our speaker that week was Scott Nelson from River47, a covenant church in Orange CA. It was fun to meet Scott and hear the messages that he had prepared for the campers. He really spoke about things that kids from this area really needed to hear. He spoke about abuse, depression, salvation and was much more relevant to Eskimo kids than I ever thought a white guy from So. Cal could ever be.

During the week I went fishing twice during free time, got the chance to go into town once during the Muskox Run (the weekly camp run/walk 5k) so I could call KICY about the VHF radio phone being gone. I got up every morning at 8:30 for the staff meeting/devotions and was usually there on time, except for the day that I missed it because a camper had locked the door from the outside. I was always scouting out the nicest outhouse at camp because the closest one to our cabin smelled really bad. I also discovered how amazing mosquito coils could be, and that people in this area call bug repellant “bug dope”. Camp wide events besides the muskox run were hike and the Eco-challenge a long relay race that ended with a rainy fire starting competition.

Our cabin had one of the best skits during the talent show…I had suggested a similar skit to the one that the cascades o-team did last year. It was a rock race that featured characters. We took our cabins acting ability and came up with the following: a Scottish man named Scotty McScottland…a old rich man and his silent bodyguard….a “hardcore native guy” from Little Diomede Island….Chief Honolulu from a tribe in Hawaii who only clicked to communicate, and then the kid from Cali played a redneck.

I’m sitting here in my office at work getting ready for an exciting day. This afternoon I’ll be flying down to unalakleet to work at Covenant Bible Camp for two weeks. I’m very excited about getting out and doing something different for a while, but I think when it comes to camp, the different part is what I’m afraid of. It dawned on me the other day that the reason I’ve been approaching this with sort of an anxious nervousness is not because I’ll be away from Lydia for two weeks, we’ve done that a few times before….its not that I’ll be away from all technology that I’m used to (even here in Nome Alaska), or that I’ll be working primarily with teenagers from a people group that even after 9 months I haven’t connected with completely….. I think my source of nervousness comes from the fact that I’m going to camp……and I have no idea what to expect. I know however that just as God does amazing things in the lives of kids at cascades, he can do even greater things in the lives of kids in western Alaska at camp and that’s exciting.

Be praying for me as I head out and will be there for the next two weeks…. hopefully I’ll get a chance to record my thoughts as the weeks go on, although who knows if they will ever get a chance to get online….but you can count on a great recap once I get back (along with tons of pictures!).

It’s a time of transition and change here at the radio station now that neil has left and gone back home. I’ve started doing the coffee crew with Irene now and that brings a different dynamic to the show. I’m also still doing the edge with Lydia in the evening, although just for an hour a night during the summer…I do the other hour by myself. All this stuff combined with the fact that its always light outside and its hard to goto bed….makes me very exhausted. I’m looking forward to spending some time at Covenant Bible Camp down in Unalakleet, however it will be odd to be away for such a long time….and also to work at another camp that is not cascades. I hear its pretty remote there, I’ll have to be sure and take a journal with me so I can record my thoughts.

I was down in the Anchorage area last weekend with Jamie & Neil before Neil left for Iowa. After getting in to Anchorage last Thursday we made our way down to Soldotna and found Alaska Christian College. We then were on a mission to go King Salmon fishing in a nearby river, the Kasilof. After buying our king salmon license endorsements and special lours we headed down to the river. There were a TON of people there, although no one seemed to be catching much. We fished for a while, although it didn’t take long to realize we weren’t going to have much luck. After fishing we decided to take an impromptu trip to homer, only 80 miles away. We got back to ACC around 1:30am and before going to sleep I was able to conveniently check my email on my pocket pc.

Friday we drove up to Denali from ACC for a 7 hour drive. We stayed at the Denali River Cabins and on Saturday took a very long hike.

Sunday after getting back to Anchorage we went and say “Star Wars” with my cousins Loren and Erik…it was a good flick.

Monday Jamie, Loren and I ran errands and I made some time to see Jessica, who happened to also be visiting Anchorage over memorial day weekend. It was pretty cool to connect back up with someone from Yelm!

Since getting home Sunday night I’ve been working a lot and walking our new dog. KICY has some summer work teams here building a new building for our transmitter and a few people are staying at our house, which is fun.

I hope to blog again before leaving on Sunday for camp…..until then.

Neil Peterson, Jamie Saghafi, and I all went down to the Anchorage for a few days. We drove down to Soldotna and spent the night at Alaska Christian College, then we drove up to Denali for a few nights and did some hiking. New pictures were added!

(click here) for pictures of our weekend.