“On the Last Day at Camp, I Got Saved”
These kids all courageously got up in front of everyone to share their experiences from the Kids Across America camp you helped make possible for them to go to. They had such great stories to tell. (The audio starts a little loud with one of their camp chants, but then you’ll definitely want to turn it up!)
Remember when you went to that summer camp as a kid? The sights, smells, the food, all the crazy activities—that glorious bus ride. I bet you wanted your kids to experience the same thing, and they in turn came home with crazy stories that made them smile and laugh.
Well, our donors helped kids do this very thing this past summer with Kids Across America.
A little over a month ago, over 30 kids from Frontline Outreach got the chance to go to a life-changing Kids Across America camp! We had a fun night with them a couple weeks ago as they shared their stories, and we wanted to share them with you, too.
The kids at Frontline Outreach are often underprivileged—lacking enough money, enough food, enough support in their education. They definitely wouldn’t usually get the chance to go on a trip with a bus full of kids like them to a camp where they get incredible mentorship. But through Frontline Outreach, Kids Across America, and the Heart of the City Foundation, these kids got to go and have the time of their lives.
At camp, the kids got to enjoy over 30 different sports and activities like basketball, archery, canoeing, music, poetry, dance, tubing, weight lifting, and Bible study. This exposure to new things not only takes them out of their comfort zones, it helps them to grow and learn more about who they are and what they’re passionate about. And they got to do all these things with awesome young adult and adult mentors.
While we were all together, one of the kids’ leaders mentioned that hearing gunshots and watching people get into bad fights is not uncommon for them, and almost all of the kids were nodding their heads and murmuring in agreement. The leader said a lot of these kids don’t get to just be kids. The leader said these kids don’t always get to see people living a different kind of life.
At camp, they did. At camp, they got to just be kids. At camp, their stomachs were always full. At camp, they got to see people living lives of peace, faith, joy, hope, grace, and love. At camp, they became (even more) inspired to live their lives in the name of Jesus Christ. And at camp, some of these kids met Jesus Christ intimately for the first time.
That was Morris’s story (starts at 4:55 in the video). This was his first time at camp, and the start of his relationship with God.
Thank you to all our Heart of the City Foundation donors for helping to make this possible for these kids and for being the heart of your church, city, and world! It’s amazing what we can do together for the sake of God’s kingdom.
Check out this awesome video the kids created to celebrate their camp experience! They even wrote the lyrics and did the special effects themselves.
