As far as the kids in my cabin goes, it was as if I had gone through the list of kids and picked out the kids that I wanted. This didn’t happen, it just worked out that way. We had a broad age range. Even though it was supposed to be the younger kids cabin, we had anything from 4th graders to 8th graders. We had no troublemakers. And surprisingly no homesickness, even though there were some relatively young new campers.
The big thing in our cabin was hearing the talks about Revelation during our nightly cabin devos. I’m afraid we opened a can of worms, especially with the younger kids. Torture and destruction during the end times? No wonder they had trouble sleeping after that one.
I visited the Centerville Pamida at least 3 times throughout the week. Monday, Wednesday (twice), and Thursday (twice). It was to drop off pictures and get some other supplies for camp (oven gloves, clothes pins…). The store was never crowded. However I did have some problems with the pictures. I dropped the rolls with the cabin pictures on Monday, yet they didn’t get sent off until Wednesday. Argh! Barely got them back in time to give out to the kids Thursday night before they left.
Pamida seems to be such a small town operation. This one was built away from the road off to the side behind a house. You might miss it if you are are too busy looking for the McDonald’s across the street.
I think I have gotten back my faith. Before camp I was kinda cynical toward church in general. Now I realize that no matter what others may think of me, God still loves me. There’s no stopping that.
There’s a sign as you go out of camp which reads “Building Boys is Easier Than Mending Men.” How true that is.

Throughout my years at camp I have experienced just about every circumstance. I have had some really lousy camps. The ones where there’s some bad attitudes and really bad pranks. And then again I’ve had some wonderful camps. Those camps where your best friend at the time was baptized. Or the one where the kid in your cabin is baptized. I thought I had experienced it all. Until now. There was one thing that I hadn’t done. This year I did that one thing.
Waylon is a friend of mine. I’ve known him for years. But I hadn’t really become friends with him until last year at camp. He was a camper in my cabin. We seemed to hit it off. This year Waylon was back. And he was spiritually motivated. He kept mentioning to me that he was concerned that he wasn’t baptized. I studied with him and on Tuesday night I baptized him into Christ.
Friends, it doesn’t get any better than that. I’ve pretty much reached the zenith. The apex if you will. I never thought I’d be doing that. It’s very heartwarming. You really feel like you have made a difference.
Yet I need to remember that it wasn’t me. His parents may have planted the seed. I may have watered. But God gave the increase. This is God working. I can’t be bold and say Jeff Whittle converted Waylon. Because it didn’t happen that way. Waylon showed up at camp knowing what he needed to do to gain salvation. I just played a minor role in it. Mine will be the asterix at the bottom of the page of his spiritual life. Something to say “Oh, by the way Jeff baptized him.” Yet I feel like screaming out to people, “Hey I baptized a friend!” But that would be boasting. And none of that had to do with me. It was between Waylon and God.
And I was pretty nervous when I knew I’d need to get together some scripture to study with him. It was around midnight on Monday night when I started to try to find scripture references on salvation. I knew if I didn’t find them, or if I showed him the wrong ones he could be warped spiritually. Isn’t there a verse in the bible about teachers being judged tougher than regular people? If I didn’t ask the right questions and show him the right verses did it mean that I was responsible for him not knowing the right things before being baptized? I couldn’t sleep that night because of that fear.
Yet, the Bible study itself was quite easy. It is easy to talk to friends about God, especially when your friend already believes what you believe. And I did have a backup plan. I had our camp director study with him as a follow up. His study was pretty much a carbon copy of mine. So no worries.
Then when he asked me to baptize him, I was somewhat expecting it. He isn’t close to many of the other adults at the camp. It could have been the camp director to do it, or anyone else more qualified. I guess he thought enough of me to ask me to baptize him.
Throughout the day while we waited for his dad to arrive that evening I was nervous about baptizing him. He weighs more than I do. Could I possibly pull him up out of the water?
But it was easy. Ironically baptistries are made to easily baptize someone. There are probably plenty of preachers that are the same build as me who are doing plenty of baptisms. If they could do it, surely I could do it. I did get plenty wet during the whole process. Matt, one of the other campers present, joked that I baptized myself in the process.
And I didn’t have to do it in front of so many people. Waylon was kinda shy about being the center of attention. So only a handful of people were invited, which was fine by me. I probably would have choked in front of so many people.
I’ll take this experience to the grave with me. Apart from being baptized yourself, baptizing someone, especially a friend, is pretty much the ultimate experience. I feel so good about it.

Tomorrow I am going to my church’s summer camp. It’s sorta a end of the summer type thing, even though seemingly we just entered summer a few weeks ago. I’ve got no specific duties, except for driving the church van going up there and taking pictures. (Although I don’t classify myself as the official camp photographer and I hope no one else sees me that way).
And I don’t know how tired I’ll be for DCI Friday. Scott really wants me to go. I hope I’ll be awake for it. Comes at an inconvienent time.
And there are alot of things that I could say right now. But I’ll keep them to myself. We’ll see how camp turns out….

Wow. I’m tired. Tired from all the fun at Short Mountain Bible camp on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. But not as tired as some people. Some people stayed up til 5:30AM this morning.
When i first arrived, I told Darrell to put me in a cabin where I could get some sleep. The easiest solution: the younger kids’ cabin, AKA “Flying Squirrel.” The Squirrels did sleep. Usually they went to bed at around 11:30 or midnight. Peaceful easy feeling. About the only problems these kids caused was rolling their towel up and snapping each other with it. “Rat tails” they called it. And I thought rat tails were those long strands of hair on the nape of your neck from the 80s.
Joseph was a talkative kid in the cabin. He was from Athens, GA, but wore a Tennessee hat. He was born in Tennessee, so I guess that’s his reasoning. The kid seemed to talk nonstop. Even knew that R.E.M. was a band from his hometown. Pretty good for a 10 year old, I guess. Oh yeah, he’s adopted. But I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. It’s just something he tells everybody. “Hey, I’m adopted.”
And there was a kid named Jeffery in the cabin. This is one of the few times which I’ve met a Jeffery significantly younger than myself. I think the name is old school. You just don’t hear of people naming their kid Jeff anymore. What a shame.
Darrell used that big 7 step ladder in his sermon Wednesday night. And yes, he did get to that 7th step when he was explaining 2 Peter 1:5-7. And that ladder will go back to whence it came. To the Gallatin Porter paint shop, as Darrell has no need for a 7 step ladder, unless he needs to explain that passage again.
I’m glad I went. I think my past experience there last year was just one part of the whole. The counselors do try to get to know the kids. They do care for them. At least that’s what I saw this week.
Tons of pictures. Not by me. But by the other counselors. Everybody and their brother had a digital camera up there. Some used theirs more than others. Enough to make 3 CDRs of them. Everything and everyone. Good thing we had a computer and a card reader which would read all the different types of media. We haven’t exactly reached a universal media option.
Darrell invited me to stay up there and go to a Mexican restaurant with the rest of the camp group. Prolonging the magic, I guess. But I decided to get back here. I figured the combination of the Mexican restaurant (not my first choice of food) coupled with being with a big group of people who I don’t know…gave me enough of a reason not to hang around.