Strong Mercy

Smelly socks, late nights, huge meals, wide games in the dark and campfire songs – this last week of hanging out with 21 Hume School grade five students at Sunnybrae Bible Camp near Salmon Arm has brought back a flood of memories. It was a short twenty-three years ago that I was working at a summer camp just up the road from here along the Shuswap Lake. It was a place where my life changed direction.

You see, I wasn’t supposed to be a Pastor. A Coast Guard Captain was my first choice, or perhaps a Conservation Officer. Something with a military feel that didn’t require killing people. Not a Pastor. But one night, during the summer of 1989, while preparing some inspiring thoughts for my cabin of boys, I stumbled upon Matthew 6:33: ‘Seek first the Kingdom of God’. I had read the verse many times before, even sang it a time or two, but this time it hit home. We can seek the life of the Kingdom of God in any occupation, but, for me, in that moment of epiphany, it meant one thing – vocational ministry.

So, this week, as I once again share a cabin with ten-year old boys, listening to their war stories and smelling their socks, I smile to myself in gratitude that God has, with humour, imagination and great faithfulness, brought me back to this place of new beginnings. In many ways, it’s kinda like spiritual deja vu.