What is Your Best Camping Experience?
Good Morning Friends,
It is getting to be summertime and that usually means camping for the Lawson Family. As a child I began to learn the disciplines necessary when I went camping with my father and have passed them on, with my wife, while camping with my family. Our kids, Stephen and Jessica, now adults, learned these things not because we sat down and said, “let us talk about perspective or delayed gratification or faith.” They learned them by doing, seeing Amy and I, time after time, year after year. They have both developed the rhythm and timing of how things work. Time, not instruction, love not lecture is the way to learn the skills that bring joy. As I contemplate the possibilities of those that camped in the wilderness, my thoughts turn to Jacob and Moses, Jesus and Paul. They all found God waiting for them on the journey out of doors. Then I think of Abraham… He was a camper of the first order. He allowed God to show him where he was going to go. What is Your Best Camping Experience?
Scripture: 8By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. 9By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—because he considered him faithful who had promised.*
12Therefore from one person, and this one as good as dead, descendants were born, ‘as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.’ 13 All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, 14for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. 16But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.
Hebrews 11:8-16 (NRSV)
12Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’*
Genesis 12:1-3 (NRSV)
11He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. 12And he dreamed that there was a ladder* set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. 13And the Lord stood beside him* and said, ‘I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring;
Genesis 28:11-13 (NRSV)
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Message: When I go camping, I usually get away from technology, and breathe in fresh air and exhale the tensions of life trading them for another tension. It is usually a journey of faith that has certain sacrifices. But it is well worth the cost. When I light a camp fire realizing I am connecting to an action done throughout history, somehow this time away helps brings me closer to heaven, even if the bed on which I sleep might be rock hard as Jacob’s. Often I think of the tradeoffs and then of the story of Abraham, who in his seventies took off on what was essentially an extended camping trip. He is settled and comfortable, but God has a plan to change all of that. And then one day, God shares his plan with Abraham to bless the entire world through his family line. Abraham had no idea of what we now know, thousands of years later, that hundreds of millions of people alive today can trace their family line all the way back to Abraham and spiritually so more than 2 billion Christian people. God did end up creating a great nation through Abraham, but it would never have happened if Abraham had not listened to God and made a huge move. He had to obey God and move from the only land he had ever known. They were actually moving from one country to another country. But this was not moving as we think of moving. This was much more like a camping trip. There were no motels along the way. They were not traveling in a recreational vehicle. Every night, they had to stop and set up camp for the night. They lived in tents. The Bible says that Abraham was “looking forward to a city with foundations.” Not a tent city but something of permanence. And here until the City is complete, Abraham is an illustration of how the people who follow God should live. And it seems to me that Christians on this side of heaven really have to live a lot like Abraham….a lot like campers on the journey as the City is built. Yes friends, camping is an experience. It will cost you. It will cost you pride and control. But it is worth it.
Pray we experience Jesus pitching His tent next to us. Pray we realize that we too are aliens and strangers in a strange land…campers holding on to things loosely. Pray we are ready to give things up more quickly so that the experience of camping with Jesus becomes more real. Pray we in due course get to a better campground. Pray we appreciate and see the wonders of God’s creation and the place He is preparing for us…
Blessings,
John Lawson
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