Remember, Remember

Today I got a chance to go to Baskinta, the campground owned by the church which is about an hour away by car. When we lived here before, the youth would have a 7-10 day camp there and I always wanted to go with my friends but my dad never allowed me. When the opportunity came up to camp overnight, I was so excited. Finally, 20 years later, I'd have the chance to do what I'd always wanted to. While the group going up was different, three of my friends from back then were organizing it so I was happy.

The guys bought the groceries and sorted out the table and chairs on Friday. Right after lunch, we loaded up the cars and headed off down and then up mountains towards the campsite. The last part was a dirt road with some pretty deep ruts so we got out and walked while the drivers carefully maneuvered their compact cars down the dirt & gravel.

We busied ourselves setting up camp and tents then waited for the final car to arrive with the table and chairs so we could start barbecuing our supper. Meanwhile, we gathered small dead trees and branches to keep a campfire going all night. One guy had brought his rifle in case of wild animals but he was pretty certain we'd be okay if we had a fire. Apparently 4 years ago, a huge wild jackal had walked through camp in broad daylight so he was prepared. The gun wasn't loaded though; he kept the cartridge in a separate pocket.

Finally we'd gathered the equivalent of what looked like a small forest and settled down to wait some more. Marisa had been playing some praise and worship music but then one of the guys who'd been invited along turned on his music to show off his speakers' quality and sound. Soon it drowned out her music so she turned it off. I listened to the lyrics, I always do, and I had no idea if the songs were religious or secular. Unfortunately, a lot of Christian music today can be mistaken for secular songs and not knowing, I didn't say anything. I felt uncomfortable, though, and after putting my headphones on and listening to my own Christian music while I cut up vegetables for dinner, I decided to leave the camp and walk up the hill a little ways so the music wouldn't bother me as much.

Soon, Marisa joined me. We sat overlooking a beautiful valley, watching the sun set into the Mediterranean Sea behind a pollution haze, and she suggested we read our favourite chapters in the Bible. We did, then shared thoughts about why those verses were special. We talked about learning to rely on God and tell Him our struggles first before going to family and friends.

We thought about how hard it must be for God not to see us face to face when He has the power to do so. Think about someone you love dearly, not only do you want to see their face, you want them to see your face too so they can understand the depth of your love for them or how much you care about what is bothering them. Then imagine God, having the power to allow us to see His face yet because of sin being separated from us, so we cannot see His face, we cannot see or hear His deep love and care for us.

Instead we have to rely on faith and what we know from the Bible. Which led us to another point, that one of the reasons to read the Bible is so that when we are in difficult times and are wanting to hear from God, we can remember promises or passages from the Bible. And in a way, it is a conversation with God because He is speaking to us through His Words.

Around sunset the final car arrived and we helped stoke the fire, bake the potatoes, and in any other way we generally could. The bathroom situation wasn't too frightening, there was an actual cement bathroom with 3 non functioning toilet stalls and lockable doors, not ideal but doable. We sat around the campfire and then the stories began. For some reason, when it came time to tell scary stories, everyone had a story related to the paranormal, demon possession, evil spirits, and so on. After the second story, I began to feel uncomfortable.

I didn't grow up around campfires so while I know people like to tell scary stories, I didn't know if those were mostly silly scary stories or those bordering on the dark side which most of these were. They didn't all end with "and then the pastor and three elders anointed the young person and prayed in Jesus' name and the demon was cast out" similar to Bible stories. Eventually, I turned on my Christian music again on my little mp3 player and put my earphones in.

It wasn't even midnight when Marisa began to feel ill. Unfortunately, she seemed to have caught the stomach flu that a student had come down with earlier that week and she was starting to feel worse and worse. After a hurried discussion, two of the guys decided to drive her back. I asked to go too. I'd had my fill of frightening stories and irritating music and was ready to go home. One of the guys and I hiked the rutted road back out while the other guy drove his car and Marisa rode along. When we reached the paved road, we hopped in and drove all the way back to campus. After dropping us off, the guys returned to camp.

While I didn't pay an exorbitant amount of money to camp, I agree with my sister who would say this was tuition in the school of life. I was so excited to go but I didn't realize that there would be people going who didn't share my values of honouring the Sabbath to the best of our ability. I'm thankful for my friend who encouraged me to keep close to God as we closed the Sabbath by sharing promises from the Bible. I'm thankful for the guys who drove us back in the middle of the night without murmur or complaint. They were kind and thoughtful.

I will be perfectly honest and say that it is tiring to practice Christianity when others don't respect it in a similar way. I understand there are differences, for example I'm not going to judge someone who eats meat. But when people know clearly that something isn't honouring God, for example listening to secular music on Sabbath afternoon, and they persist in doing it, then I struggle with how to relate to the situation. Do you ignore it or do you address it?

In previous posts, I mentioned some challenges I've had living in a conservative Christian community for the past 17 years. After this experience, I've been able to be grateful for those years because the peer pressure was positive. Of course it wasn't perfect; no place and no person is. But being around people who share similar values makes it easier to practice those values. Being here has given me opportunity to see the differences and I'm thankful for that.

I think too often it's easy to forget what we are asked to do with the Sabbath. God said remember to keep Sabbath holy. Holy intimates reverence, respect, honour, value, awe, pure, higher than us, and sacred. I think God is sad when we disrespect the Sabbath because in doing so we are disrespecting Him. I'm thankful for a continued reminder of His love through the Sabbath and that God has given us a special day to remember Him.