Young Lives Day Six: mamas, babies, friends, farewell, the finish line

They pulled out of camp this morning, all of those precious mamas and babies with their faithful and loving mentors.

Our hearts are full – full of joy for all those we met and loved; full of sadness for having to say goodbye; full of thanks for having been part of this amazing week; full of sorrow for the many young mamas and babies in this world who are not surrounded by a circle of loving and caring people; full of laughter for the fun and games and play we shared this week; full of tears for the broken world in which we live; full of hope because of Jesus.

We packed it all up today – all those highchairs and booster seats and pack-n-plays and swings and tricycles and changing pads and napping mats and carpets and blocks and sippy cups and dolls and trucks and playhouses and kiddie pools and blankets and toys and strollers.

It feels like just yesterday – and last year – that we were first staging the strollers for their arrival.

YLives strollers

And already today we lined them up, washed them down, and stored them away for another year.

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Those strollers rolled many miles this week, ’round and ’round the lake, up and down the walkways, back and forth across the halls.

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Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016
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Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016

We cleared off the clotheslines, which looked different than most other weeks at a Young Life camp what with all the tiny little bodies creeping, crawling, and toddling hereabouts.

young lives clotheline
Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016

We took our final walks through the silent prayer labyrinth of trees, soaking up the beauty of God’s creation, considering what He would speak to our hearts this week as we served – which was, in truth, a secondary task (such a difficult reality for those who “feel called to serve”) to hearing from and listening intently to His voice.

prayer trees
Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016

We waved goodbye (and sometimes…often…hugged and held and cradled and cooed and said, “Gracious, you are a beautiful creation of God, you and your mama both, indeed you are!) to the many faces and fingers and hearts we met and loved this week.

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Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016
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Photo: Crystal Kirgiss, 2016

And we felt a little piece of our own hearts pull out of camp this morning with all those mamas and babies and mentors – because how could it be otherwise? When the Lord sends love and grace into a person’s life, how can we do anything but respond with surprise, wonder, and a breathtaking gasp of joy?

The Lord was here this week. And He did mighty things.

But the Lord is also on busses, and in vans, and in cars, and back home, and absolutely everywhere.

We would do well to remember this as we ourselves pull out of camp today and tonight and tomorrow. We were privileged enough to watch – and even be a very tiny small part of God’s big amazing work here this week. Like the disciples thousands of years ago, we were invited to distribute the abundance of his love and mercy to a hungry crowd. He did the work – we simply passed it around, as faithfully and lovingly as we know how.

And now, when the week is done, we – like the disciples thousands of year ago – have been instructed to get back in the boat and go back…back home, back to the other side, back to where we came from, back to work, back to school, back to responsibility, back to daily life.

This was a powerful and amazing week indeed… because God was here. Let’s not forget that God is also here and there and everywhere, and so our service and love and kindness and caring must continue long past the moment we pull away from this place.

Young Lives is a bright and brilliant reflection of God’s love, as so many other things are.

Thank you, childcare workers, for serving so well this week.

Thank you, mentors, for loving your girls and their babies for such long and faithful weeks, months, and years.

Thank you, work staff for pulling out all the stops during this final week of your assignment.

Thank you, camp staff, for once again laying the table for the rest of us to both feast at and serve from. It took everyone to make this week happen.

But it took only God to make it real and sacred.

Bless the Lord, oh my soul – and may He bless the mamas and babies, wherever they are right now.

People worth knowing (in which I consider the active obedience of YoungLives childcare workers and Young Life work staff)

In a world full of bad news, broken lives, battered souls, and bruised hopes, there are still plenty of reasons to rejoice and be glad. Here are 80:

Childcare Workers: Young Lives Camp 2014 TWL (Photo: MKirgiss)
Childcare Workers: Young Lives Camp 2014 TWL (Photo: MKirgiss)

In July 2014, these people paid their way to a week of camp (which they also paid for) to watch the babies and toddlers of over 100 young mothers. Some drove an hour. Some drove a day. Some flew a ways. Some flew more than halfway across the country. All spent 6 days cuddling, cradling, strolling, rocking, soothing, reading, playing, singing, and all manner of actively humble and obedient things in order to love beautiful, wondrous, and miraculous living souls so that those souls’ mothers could live and laugh and play like other teenage girls.

While that group of people was taking care of the babies, these people were taking care of everything else:

TWL July 2014 Workstaff (Photo: CKirgiss)
TWL July 2014 Workstaff (Photo: CKirgiss)

The baking, the cooking, the setting, the serving, the clearing, the cleaning, the washing, the folding, the mowing, the raking, the weeding, the wiping, the working, the lifting, the hauling, the carrying … if it was a task of any sort, then these people did it. Over and over and over again. For a month. Without pay. Because Jesus has done something beautiful deep down inside their hearts.

These two groups of people – plus so many more all across the world, at all manner of camps and schools and centers and businesses and homes –  are who we should be reading about in the news. They are the ones who should be held up as the model of humanity, as the picture of humility, as the image of community, as the example of possibility.

All of the world’s bad news needs an antidote of good news. The cult of celebrity needs an equal measure of homage to humility. The buzz of headlines needs a revised tune of faithful daily living.

For just a moment, let’s stop and collectively consider the amazing wonder of such mundane and quiet things as integrity, hard work, faithfulness, honor, commitment, contentment, service, and sacrifice.

And Love. Love that comes first from God and – if we allow it – then spills over onto those around us. Onto young mothers. Onto babies and children. Onto co-workers and campers of all ages. Onto colleagues and neighbors and family and friends.

It’s a wonder, really, that such Love manages to pierce the hate-filled darkness of the world. But pierce it, it does, sometimes in large swaths of a brilliantly blinding light and sometimes in small pinpricks of a persistently gentle glow.

We are all, each one of us, invited into this piercing Love – both as a recipient and as a conduit. The people in these pictures have experienced both. The people in these pictures have been changed by Christ. The people in these pictures have helped change the world – not by their own might or power (which is the stuff of temporal headline news) but rather by humbly surrendering to the Only Almighty and Powerful One (which is the stuff of eternal selfless being).

We would do well to seek out such people. We would do well to know such people. We would do well to be such people.

The Best Week of Your Life (in which I consider the miracle of summer camp)

Michindoh Day 0 (photo: CKirgiss)
Michindoh Day 0 (photo: CKirgiss)

The miracle that is summer camp defies description on so many levels, even before summer camp has begun.

In 24 hours, 300+ middle-schoolers will descend on a little plot of sacred space in the mitten known as Michigan. So in fact the miracle we await will be twofold as miraculous summer camp collides with miraculous middle-school and creates a breathtaking explosion of awesomeness.

The excitement and anticipation and energy and total stupendousness of what’s to come is almost too overwhelming.

But not quite – because there is work to do. The miracle that is summer camp, you see, does not happen on its own. Not even close.

So today – 36 hours before campers arrive and the collision begins, and 8 hours before the full staff arrives – a small group of people started to work. Hard. Even though the work doesn’t officially start yet. Because that’s how things happen at camp. People step in. People step up. People step out, marching to the sacramental beat of an incarnated Savior who fully embodied and faithfully modeled humble service and grace and joy and love.

Welcome to camp, Day 0. We look ahead. We anticipate We catch our breath in sweet expectation.

And we work. Because without work – sweet, sacred, blessed work – the miracle that is summer camp cannot happen.

Let us rejoice and be glad!