"...the desires of your heart..."

It's funny how you can never figure out God's plan for your life or what's really going on in your heart.  As a teenager I often thought it would be fun to be a camp counsellor.  Hang out with kids, play games, etc... When I became a Christian at sixteen I started to think about it more seriously but never did it because I always felt God wanted me to do ministry at my church over the summer (looking back I think He wanted to teach me some things).  As much as I wanted to be a counsellor I knew obedience to God was more important.

At eighteen I also knew I was going to be a missionary, I just knew it was something God was calling me to.  When, where, how, I had no idea.  I went to Costa Rica for four and a half months for an international development co-op which was kind of like a mission but I knew there was more.

Then at twenty-four a co-worker invited me to go to Spain with her to serve on the service team at L'Arcada, a Christian camp.  My duties would include cleaning bathrooms, doing dishes, mowing the lawn, clearing branches, taking out trash etc. for two and a half months.  Not exactly my idea of missions, but I felt God's leading nonetheless.

For about six weeks I ended up being the head of the maintenance team (and I am no handy man by any stretch of the imagination) and discovered that everything we do is worship to God is we have the right attitude.  Then in the seventh week, a number of counsellors had got themselves in some trouble and were all sent home just before camp started and I was given the opportunity to be a counsellor...in Spanish!  Thankfully I'd remembered much of my Spanish from Costa Rica.

Only God knew that my first true camp counsellor experience would be as a counsellor, in Spain, in Spanish! Incredibly enough, through the grace of God eight of the nine kids (nine and ten year olds) in my cabin received Jesus by the end of the week.  I asked the one boy who hadn't received Jesus why he decided not to, and his response was, "I don't know.  I don't know if I believe this stuff.  Can a man really be raised from the dead?"  For the first time I realized that kids understand the gospel and when explained properly they just don't blindly choose to follow Jesus.

Only a few years after that experience did I find myself called to serve at CEF.  In my second year there I served as a camp counsellor at Teen Camp.  The next couple of years I was co-leading with Leslie Shillinglaw and Bonnie Clark as they trained me for inner city ministry.  To this day I look up to them and consider them the "mothers" of CEF's urban ministry as the continue to sacrifice and reach out to disadvantaged children.  And now for the last four years I have had the privilege of directing Camp Good News, serving with some amazing people, and reaching some incredible kids.  Never would I have guessed that I would be blessed with this opportunity.


"Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart."  Psalm 37:4