The Monster Known as SWAMBA

Now I know many of you unfamiliar with the term are already shaking in your boots. Some may think its a mystical creature that devour your soul in a blink of its eye, thankfully I am able to say that a guess like that is incorrect. SWAMBA is actually an acronym, so it can't really eat your soul (I hope). It stands for SouthWest Area Missionary Benevolent Association. In short it is the youth group of our church here in the southwest region, of which I belong.

This Labor Day weekend was our annual region campout and boy was it a blast. I had some concerns going in that it wouldn't live up to camps of the past but it did. First of all, this is the first time I was attending camp as a married man, which means no more bunking with the boys. It was just me, the hunny bunny, and any arachnids that could squeeze in through the door frame. Secondly, we had a to have a business meeting during campout. Let me explain the gravity of this situation. By having a business meeting during recreation means no basketball for AJ!!! This was upsetting, but I got over it since in the business meeting The Italian Stallion was elected as the new area president and I got to play basketball on Sunday anyways. So thankfully all of my concerns were addressed and it turned out to be a great weekend.

Saturday camp is more or less kicked off since everyone has arrived by then. We have a short chapel service followed by seminars. Since I have the attention span of a 4 year old, I attended the young people seminar. It was awesome. It coincided with the theme "Ye Who Are Called To Labor" and provided just the boost everyone needed. We discussed a gauntlet of ideas surrounding the theme including what holds us back from doing so, where everyone was able to chime in with what held them back personally from serving the Lord.

The night meeting was powerful and was followed by a bonfire where we had smores (yes I know, smores have nothing to do with the theme but they sure are delicious). I was able to do some catching up with my good buddy Emilio and then went to bed early since I'm an old married man.

Sandwiched between our two services on Sunday we were able to fit in the games which I prepared for the weekend. These were straight from the convoluted thoughts of my own head and one of which went as follows. The Benjaminites (one of the 12 tribes of Israel) had 700 left-handed warriors that could sling a rock at a hair and not miss (Judges 20:16). I was so impressed by this scripture I made a game in honor of it. I thought hair...shaving cream. Rocks....hmmm....can't throw them at church....but you can throw goldfish!!! And the game was born. Throwing goldfish and peoples faces covered in shaving cream, just like its depicted in the scriptures. Here were the winners of this event....



If you look close at this next picture you can see the impish grin on my face because all these people let me cover their faces in shaving cream. Success!!



So I think in the end its pretty self explanatory, church camps can be fun even if you can't bunk with the boys, have to go to a business meeting, and certain individuals (Michella and Lucas Aurelius) manage to testify twice in one meeting. And thus its gets no better than "Loving God, Loving Each Other".....