Camp Meeting

7/10/2018

I Was Thinking…

I am a child of ‘Camp Meeting’. As a United Methodist Pastor’s son I didn’t choose my local church…it chose me. I didn’t get to shop VBS or ‘youth groups’…they were assigned to me. It was a given in my life that on Sundays I was going to be in Church ready for Sunday School and Worship.

As I entered the first grade my dad was appointed as a local Pastor to the Pomona/Mt. Zion Charge in Griffin, Georgia. Attached to that charge was a Campground where an annual Camp Meeting was held in August (with school calendars it has shifted to July). Little did I know that Camp Meeting would be a part of my family’s life for more than fifty years. It has been a place of spiritual formation and holy centering for me.

I have settled things with God at the altar of prayer under the tabernacle (some call it an ‘arbor’) at Mt. Zion Campground. I received my call to ministry kneeling at the altar of Mt. Zion Campground. I have experienced the conviction and encouragement of the Holy Spirit on many occasions while in worship at Mt. Zion Campground. I am eternally grateful for the instrument of God’s grace and salvation called ‘camp meeting’.

This Sunday evening, July 15, at 7:30 PM I invite you to Marietta Campground located at 2300 Roswell Road, Marietta just across Roswell Road from East Cobb United Methodist Church. This is the first Sunday evening of their 2018 annual Camp Meeting and they have designated it as the ‘Atlanta-Marietta District Night’. We are to be their honored guests.

I will be preaching, but that is not important. What is important is that we gather to share in this wonderful ministry tradition located within the bounds of our district. It is our opportunity to share our connection with each other through an instrument of ‘revival’ that God has used across the years to renew God’s church and to reach the world for Christ.

The word ‘respect’ (re-spicere) literally means ‘to look again’. The journey of God’s people across time is full of moments when God renewed and reached a deeper place in people’s souls. Various instruments, some that became traditions, God has used…Camp Meeting, a time to step aside focus intently on matters of the soul, has been such an instrument. I ‘respect’ the movement of God’s Spirit across the years and will ‘look again’ for the wind of that Spirit this Sunday evening.

Let’s support this ministry of our district and wait together for the Spirit of God. “…those who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:31)

Let’s join together in prayer for Marietta Camp Meeting and if possible let’s worship together this Sunday evening at Marietta Campground. I hope to see you there.

Always Thinking…