Washing pots and pans probably isn’t anyone’s idea of a terrific summer job, but it was my opportunity to work at camp.
I loved my years as a camper, and this was a chance to relive some of it—only to be involved in the campfire play instead of watching it. I would have taken any job just to be there.
What was not evident on my first day was where it would lead.
The next two summers, I was a camp counselor with added responsibilities and more complex leadership situations. My last summer, I was boy’s director and the leadership requirements were kicked up a notch across the board. This was especially true in terms of leading a group of counselors who were at or near my age, and a couple of whom could just as easily have been asked to be director instead of me.
Summer camp gave me, by age 21, more opportunity to develop leadership skills than just about anything else I can imagine. In the course of providing an awesome experience—physically and spiritually—for young people that is unmatched anywhere, our youth departments do the vital work of developing the future leaders of our denomination.
And that leadership comes at them fast because, for many, the year after they finish their camp work experience, they are in front of a classroom or standing in a pulpit or auditing the financial records of a church. The ones who developed leadership under the direction of an attentive and caring conference youth director are not as deep a shade of green when they take that first job out of college.
Camp isn’t just the best summer a kid can have; it’s the best development a young adult could hope for.
Doug Inglish is Rocky Mountain Conference vice president for administration.
