Minute for Mission: Camp and Conference Emphasis Sunday

Girl and Horse Heartland Crop

As I look ahead to warm days and summer camp, I think of all the lives impacted each summer. I think of my elementary aged camper, Reggie, from Newark, New Jersey, who stared in wonder with me late one night at a luna moth perched on the bath house. It was a beauty of God’s creation we never would have seen had we not been sharing camp together. Or the young woman in my counselor in training group who was having a terrible teenage angst crisis. We constantly had to pull to the side of the group so she had the space to work through her emotions. Three years later I received a letter thanking me, her counselor, for taking that time with her and sharing how camp had given her the confidence to get into college and the difference that had made in her life. Camp is amazing.

But our camps are so much more than camps! Church groups join us for retreats to work on growth or social justice challenge plans, nonprofits join us to learn and grow together, and at times we are blessed to serve those in need directly. I think of Camp Fellowship in South Carolina, which was blessed to be the unintended home for months of a Ugandan touring children’s choir when they were unable to return to their country for a time.

With intentional summer programs, facilitating growth in congregations and nonprofits, and the opportunities to serve directly, I hope you will join me in celebrating all our camps as Centers of Mission and Ministry, doing the work of the church in so many ways.

Please join us on Sunday, Feb. 9, 2025, and celebrate Camp and Conference Sunday with us at your congregation. For more information, see Camp and Retreat Sunday Resources.

Brian Frick, Co-director of Stony Point Center in New York and Director of Camp and Retreat Ministries and Director of Camp and Retreat Ministries, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Let us join in prayer for:

• Kurt Esslinger and Hyeyoung Lee, Mission co-workers serving in Korea, World Mission, Interim Unified Agency 
• Ky Evans, Archive Technician, Presbyterian Historical Society 

Let us pray:

Creator God, we give you thanks for sacred spaces for us to grow in our understanding of you, and to deepen our connection to one another. We ask your blessing on those who will encounter Christ at camp this summer, on those young adult mentors who will share their understanding of you with campers, and for all groups who gather at these spaces to deepen their witness. We love you, Lord. Amen.