Week 42: Retrospection

Week 42: Retrospection is prompted by a deja vu moment I had this week. Serious deja vu...because in all reality, I had actually been to this place another lifetime ago.

Here's the history...For the past few summers, my brother, Jay, has been a camp counselor at a place called Camp Oro Quay in the hinterlands of the northeast mountains flanking our city. Previous to this week I had possessed second-hand information and experiences surrounding this retreat area via stories told by my parents and my brother. I also had the almost intolerable viewing experience courtesy of a video camera that had accompanied my brother on a four wheeler. That was the extent of my knowledge of Camp Oro Quay...or so I thought.

Jay had been quite persistent in trying to get me to visit the camp with camera in tow; I finally broke down this past week and allowed myself to be chauffeured up to said area. No bells rang immediately, but upon entering a main gathering area I knew instantly: "I've been here before." Shock and ever sharpening fuzzy memories flooded over me as I tried to place my experience there...Retrospection was born.

"Was this place ever called something else?" I inquired. "Singing Hills," came the reply.

I remembered: 15+ years ago I had been to this summer camp with the Chelwood Foursquare youth. 15+ years ago I wandered this property both alone and with friends. It was here I sat around a blazing camp fire watching sparks fly upward. It was here that I stumbled back to the bunkhouse, arm-in-arm with my friends, a shared flashlight with a weak battery bobbing between us. I slept on the triple bunks in rows with those girls whose names I have almost completely forgotten. It was here, for the first time, I was informed that I talk in my sleep. It was here I gazed up at the stars and felt just how big the sky truly is without city lights. It was here that I danced. It was here that I sang. It was here that I first found myself belonging to something bigger than I had ever imagined possible.

It was here that I wandered off into the woods alone and for the very first time understood that God wanted to be my friend...I felt Him tell me about Himself and actually understood Him to be speaking directly to me. In the midst of all of the fun and laughter that summer camp memories evoke, I remembered my spot east of the basketball courts where Isaiah 40: 28-31 leapt off of the pages of the Bible I was reading and rooted themselves into my heart as some of my very favorite verses.

And now I share the Retrospection with you:

"Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, Neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the weak, And to [those who have] no might He increases strength.
Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall,
But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew [their] strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint."
Isaiah 40: 28-31 NKJV

This week has been crazy busy for me...I think I need to post a slide show of all that I've done in the past 10 days. In the meantime, I want to soak Retrospection in just a little bit more...