In the last two weeks I flew to New York with Indy for medical tests, and Bakersfield with Liam for my Grandmother's memorial service. Tracy is on service now, and I'm trying to get my mind back around my final project.

My proposal was accepted with revisions. I am now a doctoral candidate. I've been mulling the committee's directive that I address the limitations of one week, discuss what kind of transformation can happen in a week, and consider using language more precise than evangelism - I expect because they feel one week of camp is likely too short a time for someone to experience conversion unless it is supplemented (or is supplementing) the ongoing evangelism work of the church.

What are your thoughts? Is it likely that you would experience a conversion to discipleship in Jesus Christ through one week of camp? Driving to the coffee shop, I was thinking that what we were doing when I as at Calvin Crest was not a holistic evangelism program. Rather, we were taking kids who had grown up in the church and giving them an intense opportunity to consider the gospel and commit or recommit their lives to Jesus Christ.

I have a lot of thoughts about what we were accomplishing. Mostly I believe we were giving students an experience of an alternate reality. We were showing them the possibility of the kingdom of God and the reality of God's presence there on the mountain in a way they did not experience anywhere else. They had an opportunity to be someone different in that alternate reality, and from that place they had a new lens to consider their home life with God. When they went home, they kept with them this monumental mountain top experience that they could refer back to as that time when they were distinctly aware of and certain about God's presence with them and in their community.

So, what am I seeking to offer as I consider a strategy for evangelism for camping ministry? I am seeking to offer an experience of the Kingdom of God. This is a powerful addition to the knowledge and experience of God they would encounter off the mountain. It could be the beginning point of a larger experience of growing and learning enough to commit their lives to service and submission to the lordship of Jesus Christ. It could be an experience standing on the shoulders of a robust experience and knowledge of God through the church and be an opportunity to knowingly commit their lives to Jesus Christ. It could be an opportunity to consider the commitments they've made to God before and recommit themselves to the lordship of Jesus Christ as we do when we stand before those who are being baptized.

It could also be an opportunity for someone to receive Jesus Christ as Lord and savior based only on their experience of God at Calvin Crest. This is problematic, though. While God is capable of taking that person and creating a worldwide evangelist like Saul of Tarsus, it seems at least as likely, if not moreso, that this person would be like the seeds that fell on the rock and sprung up quickly and died just as quickly.

I corresponded some with Amy Hall, who emphasized the instantaneousness of conversion in a radically God oriented perspective. Perhaps she will interact here. I do not discount the work that God did in Paul and others through instantaneous conversion. I believe, though, that God also and perhaps more often works through a longer journey like the disciples and their three years of eating and working beside Jesus.

In the end, I want to receive the great commission and make disciples of Jesus Christ. I do not want to settle for making people who utter the words, "Jesus I accept you as my Lord and Savior," though that certainly moves me deeply. I believe Jesus commissioned us to something more, something deeper, something harder, something more abundant... something that looked liked Jesus' life, the disciples' lives, Paul and Timothy's lives, and the many Christians of the early Church who did more than profess a faith....

Congratulations on becoming a doctoral candidate!

I remember when I read the first draft of your proposal, that I had similar questions regarding whether one week would be enough for what you suggest.

I think you'll need to fill this point out: "I am seeking to offer an experience of the Kingdom of God. This is a powerful addition to the knowledge and experience of God they would encounter off the mountain." The danger in this statement, as I read it, is that we can run the risk of equating the camping experience with the Kingdom of God. That's not very far from the danger of the mountain high in which the camper pines for life off the mountain to be like it was back at the camp, which was much of my experience. I think in order to avoid that danger, you'll have to emphasize how camp reflects a part of God's kingdom, just like the tent city down in Skid Row reflects part of God's kingdom. And then you'll have to be clear about what aspect of God's kingdom camp uniquely represents.

I don't discount the punctiliar conversion and in fact, I like that you're offering a matrix of decisions. Camp cannot represent the life off the mountain, nor should it present itself as an ideal unless it wants to follow the Amish or other separatist groups, but I don't think that Calvin Crest seeks that ethos. The question you'll likely have to answer is how does the camp experience fit within the whole of the Christian life of discipleship? Having several areas and types of commitments would appear to help see the camp experience as a part of the whole.

Thanks Tyler.

I am interested in your comment that camp needs to be framed as something other than the whole kingdom of God. I am trying to come up with a good metaphor to express how I think of this. Camp is the kingdom of God in as much as it is a group of people living under the rule of God in grace and obedience. In that sense it is a complete iteration of the Kingdom of God, but it is not the entirety of the Kingdom of God, nor the uniquely correct manifestation of the Kingdom of God.

I am striving for an English word for telios. It is sufficent, perfected, completed, as a manifestation of the kingdom of God and yet there are many other very different and still sufficient, perfect and complete manifestations of the Kingdom of God. Together, I guess you could describe them as the whole of the Kingdom of God.

The question you'll likely have to answer is how does the camp experience fit within the whole of the Christian life of discipleship?

I still see camp as a pilgrimage. It is a journey to another place for the end that you can be personally transformed. It is not living back at home, but it is one of the vehicles by which we are formed to live back at home. Though I didn't think very much of the movie Kingdom of God, I do think it did a decent job of capturing the rounding, developing nature of a pilgrimage for a person.

I suppose I would disagree with you that there are perfect and complete manifestations of the Kingdom of God. I would say that camp, a homeless shelter, a shared meal around the table with neighbors, reconciliation between victims and perpetrators, and even the Church are signs and partial manifestations of God's kingdom. Even if we were to combine them all, I don't think the sum would be God's kingdom. That is not to discount their worth or the grace we receive in being a part of them. It's just that I don't think we'll see the fullness of the kingdom until the eschaton.

That being said, I love the idea of camp as a pilgrimage, especially if we take the idea of the Christian life as a pilgrimage. There is no sense of this (camp or home) is real life and the other is less than real. Both home and camp are spaces where we interact with God and are shaped by him and our surroundings. I also like the idea of camp as a pilgrimage in the traditional sense that the Church has used it.

Bill,
First of all, I love the premise of your doctoral work. The question of, “Just what happened there?” hits me mostly as I think back to my time as a camper (although I'm sure the answer had an impact on my time on staff and on ministries that followed).
It seems to me that it is correct to say that the ministry of Calvin Crest is not strictly evangelical; although clearly evangelism occurs, there seemed to be a stronger Kingdom-minded focus (especially when compared to other camping ministries). By my experience, the emphasis was always the camper's continued life with Christ: both in our Savior's continual redemptive work and in our role in that work, the growth of the Kingdom. But of course, this raises the murky question of just where does CC fit in this Kingdom? Clearly it is not, in itself, the Kingdom. But does it provide a clearer view into the Kingdom than say, the church? Perhaps, but do you want to spend your dissertation explaining why?
I think you're on to something with the imagery of the pilgrimage. Certainly biblical mountaintops were always in relation to a greater journey, but they were significant moments along those journeys: “This was where God spoke to us.” They were commemorated with altars so we could remember and revisit those important moments, but we continued on the journey. Calvin Crest was certainly not the only altar I've built, but it may have been the first.

Thanks for digging into this Brian. You are even deeper and more insightful than I remember. This reminds me of sitting on the back patio smoking cigars and talking through our theological papers together.

I've tried to respond to you and Tyler in the next post.

Please keep interacting with me on this. It is very helpful to me.

Your questions remind me of my wife's questions after we went to a Billy Graham crusade. (I'm really not sure why we went.) A place where conversion takes place not in a week bout theoretically in a few hours. The one we went to was in 05' in Pasadena. The sermon wasn't particularly moving or "great", but it had it's desired effect, as thousands came streaming forward. My wife found the whole thing puzzling and even annoying. Mr Graham really said nothing more than "God loves you". There was little (though some) about sin and repentance.

The only way I could account for what happened was the power of prayer, and the idea that for many what happened was more of a ceremony, putting the finishing touches on a journey that had started some time ago for most. I haven't read your proposal, so maybe you have already addresed this, but I would consider looking at conversion more as process than decision.

At what moment is someone married, much less choose to love that person. For many exactly when they fell in love is up in the air. And as for the wedding, is it the "I now pronounce you man and wife"? The signing of the certificate? The consummation, one flesh thing? Point is: it's a process. So my question would be, where does what you do at Calvin Crest fit into a larger process.

I should add that none of this process talk should detract from a moment of decision. It's just that recognizing when that moment was may require 20/20 hind site. Much like saying yes to a marriage proposal, its confirmation of what you already know, or at least what was already true. When she says yes to him, were they any less in love the day before? They may not realize that they have quite exactly that commitment to each other until the moment of proposal, and yet they do/did.

You already addressed some of this I think, but it has to do with where kids are coming from prior to arriving at camp. The input of the Church before and after they hang out with you. You may be simply facilitating "wedding ceremony" commitments to Christ. Which, don't get me wrong, is great. Someone else is making the "dates" happen. And someone else will have to do the "marriage counseling".