This week.

On a recent trip to Camp McDowell I was talking with a guy who was at Camp for the first time.  He mentioned the sign, shortly after you go down DeLong Road, which reads, “Slow Down, it’s the Camp way.’  I confessed I hadn’t noticed the sign before and another friend said he, too, had missed the sign, probably because he’d always been driving too fast.  Life can be like that; too fast as we hurry and stress to get to the next thing, perfectly perform the next item on the list, all to prove that we matter.

I think that’s why so many people go to Camp each summer or whenever they can; the pace of life once we’re there, the people we meet and form friendships with, the stories we create and tell, all make Camp a place that’s so different from our world in the dorm and classroom.  But it doesn’t have to be like that for us; Jesus asks us to imagine a different future for ourselves and others.  It may not involve eating in Eppes Hall every day but those same friendships can be created in the Caf or your room too. Those same stories which define us are a part of what you find around you in the library, not just the lower camp chapel.  The pace of life you feel drives you now is what you create for yourself, and taking time to have a conversation or play is available to you in the Rec hall or campus.

Advent tries to get us to imagine a different future, and Jesus is inviting you to hear, learn, and then respond in the present to make our life and the life of our community different, not perfect yet, but different now.  May this week be a time for you to take what you learn at camp (the importance of friends, of fun, and of sharing) to live today where you are with whom you meet. As God’s people we can begin today to make tomorrow the way the world should be right where we are.

–Thomas