Mercy Street kids hit Pine Cove!
Last week, Mercy Street Staff and 120 excited kids from our community, loaded up on three giant buses, and traveled the now familiar route to Pine Cove Outback in Columbus, Texas. The partnership that was started with the camp executives back in 2008 has naturally trickled down to the counselors and our kids who look forward to this week all summer. With pillows, sleeping bags and clothes that in a week will all smell like lake water, the kids prepared to be challenged physically, mentally, and spiritually and to see things they simply don’t get to see living day to day in the heart of the inner city.
This year, along with the 4th -8th graders, we took 11 high school kids who we’ve seen the Lord mature over the years as Counselors In Training. It was a sight to behold. They quickly rose to the call of leadership as the younger kids looked to them for help on both the zip line and relationships with their cabin-mates. They were amazing and we loved the privilege of seeing these 11 become what Mercy Street is all about; being used by the Lord to help kids become the agents of change in their own community.
The examples these teens were to the younger kids was astounding and they instilled hope in everyone for the next generation of leaders being raised up in West Dallas. They became rock-stars in the best sense of the term and were, possibly for the first time, held up among their peers for standing against the voices in our community that scream from all sides to live your life for you and you alone. We pray they, that all the kids, will take hold of the beautiful lessons from Matthew 5 that encourage us to stand up in our ‘sit down’ world – to be cities on a hill – and that persecution that comes because of Him is indeed a blessing.
Deep in the heart of the property at Pine Cove, when the sun has set, we looked up at the sky with our campers and showed them the stars that literally fill the night. We pray they will understand that, just because we can’t see all those stars easily in the skies of West Dallas, it doesn’t mean they’re not there . Much like the Lord, we must see Him with eyes of faith, believing He is an ever present help and hope and his mercies are without end. Thank you for all your help preparing these kids for camp. You are pouring your lives into children we pray are becoming a royal priesthood – the light of the world.
from Mercy Street staff
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