Something interesting happened to me this last weekend. Change came in an unexpected place.
I received a call last week from Camp Courage North, in Lake
George, MN. This is the summer camp that
Monica and I worked at for six summers, where we met and where we were
married. For me it’s one of the holiest
places on earth. It was a very powerful
and formative time of my life—and the lives of others who are a part of the
Courage North Family. But that was
twenty years ago, give and take a few years…but I’m jumping ahead of myself.
Anyway, I received a call last week looking for help. The old kitchen staff had all retired or had
moved on and there was an entirely new kitchen staff. They were having problems with things like
timing and intuition. Cooking at a
summer camp is unlike cooking anyplace else but once you’ve mastered cooking at
summer camp you definitely can cook anywhere, anytime. Since I started my time at Courage North in
the kitchen and ended my time in the kitchen, and since I live nearby, they
asked if I could come and lend a hand.
“No problem,” I said. And so I
took my days off and spent them back in the kitchen at Courage North.
When you hold people and places firmly in your memory, they
become static, unchanging. But
everything changes. Even Courage North,
fixed so tightly in the memories of so many people, changes. This became apparent right away.
Sunday night, I’m working on preparing dinner for the first
night of a new session. New kids had
just arrived that afternoon and there’s always a hum of excitement on “intake
day.” The kitchen at Courage North is a
typical camp/lunch room kitchen. You
stand in the kitchen and look out serving windows and see the entire dining
hall. It’s fun to stop and watch and
listen as kids experience the joy of not just camp but a very special camp. Every session at Courage North is designed to
take kids who usually fall on the margins or in the “outside the norm” category
and give them a place and a time to be completely normal. Everyone, all the same. Physically handicapped adults, deaf children and
teens, hemophiliacs, kids who have suffered serious burns, and kids who fall on
the Austism spectrum. You can see how
important a place this can be for kids who are pushed aside, stared at,
mimicked and mocked. So I always found
myself stopping and watching and giving thanks that such a place exists and
that I’ve been allowed to be a part of it.
And so I did again this past Sunday night. I would pause, look out, listen. The interesting thing is: The more I did this, the less “in the moment”
I became. I found myself being drawn to
the difference between what was happening now and what had happened in the
past, noticing what was “missing” from what I observed more than what was
happening now. I had already come to
terms with the physical differences I had observed with camp: the buildings were no long as new (after all,
20 years had passed since I had been in them), equipment had changed, things
had been moved and updated, and so on.
But…where were the Deaf staff?
Courage North had always been privileged to have a large population of
Deaf staff; it’s how I learned to be cross-culturally aware. Where were the familiar faces? Courage North had been family. Sure, staff would cycle through, but it
seemed like there were always stable and consistent faces who found themselves
drawn back to this place every year. And,
what’s more, campers felt the tug, too, and would rise to the ranks of staff
when they would become too old to participate in the camping programs. Typically, of forty some staff, one would
easily know at least half. Now there
were four familiar faces in the forty.
Change had come to a place that I had always held as
unchanging. It left me unsettled in a
way that I rarely experience. I am a
fierce advocate of change, speaking candidly about its nature and encouragingly
to people who struggle through it.
Change is a reality of life; things end all the time. They have to end for new things to be
created. But for so long I had treasured
my memories of Courage North, out of the loop of the changes sweeping the
camping industry and, in particular, the Courage camps—I have held so firmly to
my memories of what had been that Courage North had, for me, become a place
that existed outside of the world. Now,
however, I stood at the serving counter of the kitchen at the heart of one of
the holiest places on earth and had realized that change had come to a place I
had thought would not and should not change.
Having realized how unsettled I was about these changes and
realizing how hypocritical this reaction was, I began trying to figure out how
and why I could be so upset about change.
I was reacting about change at Courage North the way I see people
reacting about change in the church all the time. Where are the familiar faces? Where are the familiar surroundings? How could change happen to a place whose
existence seems to set it above the tides of change that sweep the rest of the
world? Now, having realized how I was
reacting, I was all the more troubled.
How can I encourage people to be open minded about change and to
consider what may be birthed because of this change when I myself was agitated
about change coming too close to my
sanctuary against time?
I began following my own advice. “Fine.
Change has come and will continue to come. You can’t do anything about it. Things have ended. Now…where are signs of new life?” Such a dangerous question to ask because,
once you set aside your struggle for control and realize you can’t dictate
when, how and where change will happen and you start looking for those signs of
resurrection and rebirth, you become overwhelmed with hopeful assurances.
Fresh, young, passionate, inspired and inspiring leadership
is present. At Courage North, it’s not
Tom and Mimi anymore. It’s Justin and
Emily, Colleen and Charlotte. In the
church, it’s not Pastor So-and-So from fifty years ago. It’s now pastors who are much more aware of
God’s call to the church to not be a destination or a ritual but to be a part
of God’s loving interaction with a broken world. New leaders for a new world facing new
realities, equipped in a particular way to meet those challenges head on and to
see possibilities where others see memories.
Exciting, new approaches to programs that create hope and
life in more and more people. At Courage
North, it’s not just Deaf kids, hemophiliacs, burned kids and physically
handicapped adults anymore. Kids with
autism, kids with ADHD, kids with all kinds of communication challenges are now
a part of the Courage North family. In
the church, it’s not just “our” WELCA, youth group, men’s group, Sunday School,
and so on. Through collaboration and “outside
the box” thinking, more people are brought into community in new and exciting
ways, changing more lives.
An opportunity to examine traditions and why we do things
and how we could do things differently.
At Courage North, it’s having conversations about how meals are prepared
and served and how the buildings can be used not just for a handful of summer
programs but for more gatherings throughout the entire year. In the church, it’s having a conversation about
how things are done (VBS, Sunday School, committees, fundraisers, etc.) and how
our buildings can be used more than a handful of hours a week but, instead, be
opened to more people for more purposes throughout the entire week. The conversation has turned to how we can
make the most use out of the facilities that we have to make the most
difference and provide the most service to the communities we serve.
Investing for the future.
At Courage North, it’s examining and prioritizing what needs to be
updated and modernized, considering facilities and having those
challenging/exciting conversations about replacing and expanding, realizing
that the changes that we make will upset those, who like me, have been clinging
to our memories but will serve people of today better in the future. In the church, it’s the exact same
conversation: We consider how facilities
(our buildings) and their furnishings need to be repaired and replaced (including
the buildings themselves) so that we can better meet the needs of people today
instead of confining ourselves to the parameters established by the memories of
those few people who are still with us from forty years ago.
Through it all, there’s an acknowledgment of the nature of
the organization: It’s alive and, as is
the case with all living things, it changes and grows. I am amazed at how, at Courage North, there’s
a deep-rooted, collective second (or third or fifth or twelfth) wind sweeping
the organization. It’s like the
organization is alive, gearing up to break out in a celebratory dance of
life. In the church, when we step away
from our fears and anxieties and our determination to stand against change, we
are caught in the wind of the Holy Spirit, filling us and inspiring us and propelling
us into the future. The church is alive,
the Body of Christ, reaching out to embrace the world.
Monday night Monica and I were talking. She, too, was struggling a bit with all the
changes. By then I was coming to a
pretty good place. I was accepting the
fact that change had come to a place that I thought would never change and that
it was all right—we would survive this change.[1] I made the comment that it’s a new
generation. And it is. And it’s exciting.
Twenty years ago I felt blessed to be a part of something so
incredibly special in a place that was restorative and inspiring, to be around
people who formed and shaped me and helped to create me the person I am
today. Now I feel doubly blessed—not just
for all of these reasons but for being here, at this moment of time, to witness
and participate, to be a part of the conversation, and to discern the
future. It’s the same for me and my life
in the church: I feel blessed to have
been inspired, shaped and created by incredible people in special places all my
life and now I’m doubly blessed as I discern with congregations and individuals
all the hope-filled possibilities God has placed before the church, expanding
our influence and touching more lives.
Today, almost a week later, I’m okay with the changes that
have come to Courage North. I miss
people. I miss my life there. I miss the
comfort of familiar faces and routines. And that’s okay. But, man, I’m excited to see what comes
next. It’s going to be awesome!
[1] I
want to briefly explain this comment. By
“we,” I’m not referring to just Monica and myself or even everyone connected to
Courage North. And by survive I’m not
questioning whether or not Courage North will continue to be viable. By “we would survive this change” I’m
actually referring to those of us who struggle with the reality of change when
we cling so fiercely to memories and traditions and refuse to acknowledge that
change WILL come. Often times, to these
people, change feels like death. “We are
no longer what we used to be. We are
less. We are diminished. We are losing our life.” That depends on how you look at it. For me,
last Sunday at Courage North, this was definitely what was going through
my mind as I observed the goings on at Courage North. By Monday, however, I realized that we are
not dying—we are thriving. Courage North
has graduated to a new level of existence in which it is not so bound by the
past and constricted by a narrow vision but embraces more people, touching more
lives and bridging them to this incredible place and all that it has to
offer. The church has a lot to learn
from Courage North. Maybe we should send
the church to camp?
