I’ve just finished my second year as a “Cousin” (Counselor) at Royal Family Kids Camp, a week long summer camp for kids in the foster care system. Last time I was at camp, I wrote these words: “I can honestly say that it was one of the best weeks of my life.” This year, I’m singing a slightly different tune. Coming home from this past week, I can honestly say that this was one of the hardest weeks of my life. It was still good. Work like this is always good. But this past week was good in a different way. It was good because God has not called Christians to a life of ease and comfort. He has called us to work, and to sweat, and to go home tired. While one day we are promised a crown of jewels, today we are promised a crown of thorns. Today, in this life, we pick up our cross and follow Christ.
I could write a book about the things that went wrong with camp this week. The kids in our cabin were a rough group of kids, to say the least. Kids would break down left and right. Tantrums were thrown over the simplest of things literally every few minutes. None of our campers wanted to participate in any of the singing or listen to any of the Bible teaching. No one listened. They were up at 6:00am in full-play mode every morning. One kid wandered off into the forest upset, taking me on a very long and unpleasant hike. Once we spent about 10 minutes essentially chasing a child in circles around our cabin trying to get him to put his shoes on. A camper had diarrhea. The longest all our campers were together in the same place was probably about 4 seconds. Some kids sprinted ahead, others lagged behind and pouted about various things. The camp’s behavioral specialist was our best friend. Lying, stealing, and disrespectful attitudes were all-too-common. During the final night, at the culmination dinner and talent show, everyone in our cabin was simply silent and pissed off. Adult counselors included. The kids constantly went through all of our things, despite us repeatedly explaining that it was not okay. Food was thrown, kids fought, f-bombs were dropped, and sassy attitudes were everywhere. I worked harder than I’ve ever worked from the second these kids stepped off the bus. I tried my very best to love on these kids with every waking moment. But still, by the end of the week, as I looked around at other cabins starting to bond and heard stories of awesome experiences, thoughts of this nature began to arise: “How did we fail our kids?” I wondered what we did so wrong in order to have a cabin that was so out of control. It feels like it was our fault, and I ran back through scenario after scenario and thought about how I personally may have failed to make a connection with my camper, and how maybe if the Cousins in my cabin as a group had done a few things differently our cabin wouldn’t have been such a train-wreck.
In order to keep this short, let’s just say all of these things listed wasn’t even the half of it. I was done by the time camp came to a close. Between the normal difficulties that accompany the management of little kids, the added emotional element that comes with a camp of this nature, and the serious behavioral issues some campers in our cabin exhibited, the week kind of kicked my butt. As it did my fellow cabin counselors.
I say all of this not for sympathy. Rather, I say it to remind you of this fact: Sometimes hard is better.
I can say without a doubt in my mind that it was all worth it. My determination to be back at RFKC next year has only been strengthened. Don’t fall into the trap of believing that easier is better. Hard is good because that which is hard is often the most satisfying. And let me assure you, spending a whole week working with kids that have been neglected and abandoned is so much more satisfying than the hundreds of other pointless things we do to occupy our time. Even when your cabin is as much of a trainwreck as mine.
I would rather go to bed exhausted, stressed out, and frustrated knowing I’ve done something real than to go through each day with ease doing something that’s empty and altogether meaningless. Even if I did want to repeatedly bang my head against a wall by the end of the week, I know that I was doing something real. I was doing something that truly mattered. And that makes all the difference in the world.