The Kids Had it Great This Week
Since the heat wave is on in Phoenix, my seven-year-old, Bella B,, my five-year-old, Eva G,, and my six-year-old, Luther the dog, all hopped in our minivan and we headed north. Our game plan was simple. (It had to be because Luther is a dog.) We were going to visit my wife, Brit, and my eldest daughter, Layah at the Living Streams Junior High summer camp in Prescott, and then head off to the Royal Family Kids Camp in Payson. The Royal Family Kids Camp is a camp for kids in the Arizona Foster Care system and some of our Living Streams Family are there volunteering.
At the Junior High camp it was amazing to watch my wife and the other leaders get the kids riled up for whatever was going on. In less then an hour I saw them huddled around Brit as she gave a pump-it-up speech Lebron James would have been proud of. I saw them playing soccer while in inner tubes. I saw them do a conga line around the field. One girl was doing a gymnastic floor routine that included aerial back flips. I saw them form a pyramid with their bodies. At one point half the team somehow turned into a ten foot high human tunnel and the other half ran through it cheering. And no joke, that was just one hour of the 14 hours of activity they have each day, all week.
Next, we went to Payson and made it in time for one of the main events of the Royal Family Camp week. Since many of the kids are in group homes or have bounced around, in and out of families their birthdays often get missed. So, at Royal Family Kids camp there is a special night that is a massive, blow out, spare no expense birthday party for every kid. They each received their own cake, they each blew out their own candles, they each received their own gifts, and they all participated in a really great magic show. You could see the deep meaning it had for some of the kids.
The thought that took root in my soul after all this surprised me. I actually thought about how amazing our country is. I thought about how wonderful we and our children have it. The news tells me our country is riddled with tension and division. On social media it seems we have millions of urgent and cataclysmic problems accelerating us towards impending doom all the time. I do not want to make light of the hardships some do endure. But today the reality I saw was the youth of our nation living without fear, without division, able to play and be carefree. I saw people of all walks of life, rich and sophisticated as well as poor with contentment serving kids who have had to deal with heavy adult things way too early in life. Yet, this was just a tiny part of the good being done in Jesus name all over this world, every single day.
Check out Daniel chapter 5 this weekend. We will be looking at how to be rich towards God unlike King Belshazzar who was weighed in God's balance and found lacking.
David