What Is Camp? Part 4 “Camp Food”
Getting Camp Right
A final clarification about camp…
All camps are not made the same. Before the shepherd sets out with the flock, he needs to have a good idea the journey will be worth the trip. Are green fields waiting or something less?
A camp run by Christians for Christians where people dress modestly, and don’t use swear words, and have good clean fun is all well and good. But the camp which takes its direction from the Lord Jesus Christ has a distinguishing mark. It is set apart from so many other good and useful camps happening all over the world by what occupies the central place. It’s a mark found in every true church.
The Word on the Word
In Ephesians 4, Paul teaches us what the Church wants and what the Church needs:
Ephesians 4:11–16: 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
The goal for Christians is maturity in Christ which comes through faith in and knowledge of Christ (Eph 4:13-14). Paul tells us where we can expect to the get that. The start of that section lists distinctive officers with a shared work. Each one is a man of the Word. And notice also that the list increases in commonness. Very few apostles, more prophets, more evangelists, and many “pastor-” or “shepherd-teachers”. Those last more ordinary men continue to do the ordinary work in our age of feeding the sheep: of equipping, edifying, and maturing the flock through God’s extraordinary Word. So what does that tell you about camp?
Prioritizing the Word in Camp
When Jesus asked a broken Peter, “Do you love me?” Peter’s profession of love was not a sufficient answer. Jesus repeatedly directed Peter to feed Christ’s lambs (Jn 21:15-19). If the Word of God is not central to camp, both programmers and youth leaders have missed out completely on what it means to feed the sheep. Getting camp right means having God’s appointed man, a true shepherd-teacher, show up and open his Bible to feed the sheep. How fruitless would it be for a flock to travel so far from home to find no green grass, no fresh leaves, no water or food. To be biblically faithful and to fulfill what Scripture teaches us to expect in the wilderness, campers should arrive at camp to discover the Gospel unavoidably present, easy to find, and ready for receiving.
Good under-shepherds purpose to go to good camps chiefly defined by the quality of the preached word. But the shepherding work doesn’t end there. Tending the sheep means leading or when necessary driving the sheep to where they need to go when they need to be there. We pay attention to things like sleep, where a camper sits, giving time for reflection, and community conversations along with asking good questions and being ready to help them dig for themselves and make application where it counts.
A truly Christian camp is a place where the Word of God is read, studied, preached, and prayed over. That, above all things, is what makes camp worth doing. It should go without saying but it can’t go without saying…
A biblical camp must be biblical.
