Today I am missing church camp. I would have been packing for it, getting my Bible class lessons ready, charging my camera batteries, etc. COVID-19 took that away from me and many others.

Camp is a special place for me. It’s where I met, proposed to, and got married to my wife. It’s where met friends during that short week. Some were single serving friends, while others remain a part of me even to this day.

I don’t miss camp too often. Usually it coincidences with me getting a new job or literally being out of the country. Without a doubt most of the time I’m there.

Do I have a bad week at camp? Yet, but those can be rare. The vast majority of the time I come back physically tired, but spiritually refreshed, ready to take on the rest of year running on a spiritual high of what heaven must be like and what we should look forward to.

I wonder about those kids on the fringe this year. They might have been invited to camp this year and found solace from an imperfect world with a perfect will of God through examples learned at church camp. Those kids will not be joining us and I can only hope that they hold on to going next year…that is refrain from getting that summer job, joining a sports team or whatever might keep them from church camp.

Now this summer seems, for better or worse, never-ending without the bookends that church camp provides. You see to me the year is divided into two seasons, the after camp season (where you relive memories of the past camp and keep in touch with old and new friend; promising to be back next year, and then the before camp season (planning for an upcoming year). Now COVID-19 has put in a void this summer for the world to pause, stay at home and social distance.

The only thing I can do is to look forward to camp in 2021 when we’ll have a vaccine and not have to social distance. We will endure and we will learn to love the little things in life better.