Categories
Journal Joy Notes

Boy Scout troop enjoys Men’s Retreat too

Rhett LaForte served as organizer again this year for KCWC’s annual men’s retreat to Forked Lake in the Adirondacks.     Rhett, his son Ryan, CJ Swain and Pastor Kelvin caravanned up through Barneveld to Old Forge where we stopped to buy local campfire wood.  Then we continued past Blue Mountain Lake to Long Lake where we turned left to find the state campground on Forked Lake.  

We unloaded the truck and car into Rhett’s fishing boat and pastor’s rented aluminum Grumman canoe.   This is a primitive campground where everyone has to bring what they need in by boat including drinking water.   It was a great canoe trip for me with the wind at my back.   Setting up camp was a little bit of a challenge because there were no spots level enough and without roots or rocks.   Finally we picked the least problematic and set up our tents.   Ben Mackey, Anthony, and Thomas Kipping joined us later that evening and set up camp on the adjoining site.   On Friday afternoon Stu Wilkinson brought six from his Boy Scout troop (Caleb, Damien, Jason, Eric, Mike, and Alec) for an Adirondack outing.  John Kipping came with them.   They set up camp on a huge site to the left of us, but even though the site was large, they also had a tough time finding tent spots, except for Stu who uses a hammock for sleeping—there were plenty of trees.  

Now when you go on a retreat, people all come for slightly different reasons.  Rhett is the early morning fisherman.  I relax, read, and canoe.  The boys all loved the swimming this year.   One day they played King on the Mountain on a large barely submerged rock for hours.   But on a men’s retreat, none of the guys plan on going hungry.   Besides our regular meals and an occasional second breakfast, we ate late night snacks.  At our campsite, on night one, we made popcorn over the campfire.   Late the second night we had fresh bass cooked in olive oil on tinfoil over the fire for appetizer and s’ mores for dessert.   The last night we ate peanuts and more s’ mores.  The weather was perfect. 

There were many highlights for me.   I really enjoyed camping with Rhett, CJ and Ryan.  Listening to the boys take their turns saying grace, watching them be responsible in the tasks of the campsite, seeing them thinking ahead on what needed to be done next, all this was very gratifying.  One of the main things I enjoy at retreat is canoeing and this year it was special to take Ryan and CJ each out and teach them about canoeing.  In addition, I caught a 12 inch largemouth with my fly rod last evening.  I also immensely enjoyed the informal worship time we had this morning.   In the Adirondacks on a sunny morning after a starry night, reading the first few verses of Psalm 19 takes on added meaning.   We sang “This is the Day” to celebrate God’s goodness and then we talked about wisdom and learning from mentors and Proverbs 3:5, 6.   Afterwards we loaded up and I canoed back.  The wind had changed, it was at my back again—just another sign of a truly blessed camping time.

They say pictures are worth 1000 words so I took some to share with my readers too. 

Categories
Forward Look Journal

Amended July Schedule

I’m looking forward to the men’s Adirondack retreat this coming weekend.  I usually spend my time reading, helping some of the boys fish, canoeing and watching birds.  It’s a relaxing time.  So this coming Sunday, I will be at Forked Lake, God willing, leading the Sunday service at the Men’s retreat while Larry Nemitz will be bringing the message at Community Wesleyan.   I will postpone the third one of our Kitchen Table Talks on Relationships, the one on the topic of personality differences, until the following week, July, 29th.

Categories
Journal Joy Notes

Men’s Fishing Retreat

For a couple years now, men from Community Wesleyan have been organizing a fishing retreat in the Adirondacks on July 4th weekend.   This year, Rhett LaForte asked me to bring the message at their Sunday morning service, so I decided to go with them.  The retreat was at Forked Lake and required us to boat or canoe to our campsite.   I love to canoe and fish and just be in the Adirondacks.  Just smelling the atmosphere—that hemlock, pine and spruce laden breeze—adds a week to your life, I think. 

This was a real joy for me.  Canoeing on a new lake, new mountain vistas, bird watching—I glassed a pair of yellow-rumped warblers, and just relaxing made the retreat well worth the effort.  There was also the joy of growing friendships, sharing meals, working together, chatting around the fire, getting to know each other better, and building bonds among the six men who went (Rhett LaForte, Shaun Harrington, Bob Kipping, Ben Mackey, Dave Schwarz, and me).   Perhaps the greatest joy of all was working with the four boys that went along; helping them fish, teaching them about boats and canoes and tenting and outdoor life; the joy of passing down what you know to the next generation.  

 

Part of a retreat of this type is meeting the challenges. 

Categories
Journal Joy Notes

CNY Wesleyan Men’s Retreat exciting and inspiring

Every year the guys who go rave about men’s retreat but I have not been able to go before. Usually, the Houghton board meeting and the Wesleyan men’s retreat are on the same weekend. But this year they were not, so I was able to participate on Saturday.   

The speaker, Jeremy Kingsley, was great. His combination of humor, bluntness, and keep-it-simple inspiration communicated well. I was especially impressed with the theme of his last message. “Humility plus service equals spiritual greatness.”  The food was excellent and plentiful.  The snack bar was even open too.

During the day on Saturday, I joined three other men from our church on a team to participate in the nine activities provided—all very male oriented, of course.  Several of them I had never done before.  There was paint-ball target practice, horseshoes, basketball, archery, and the pit crew challenge.  On that one, team members took turns racing against the clock using an air gun to tighten tire bolts and loosen them on a mockup of a racecar.     I was not fast but I got the job done. I also had a chance to shoot skeet for the first time in my life, actually knocking down two of those bright orange clays.   Our team was proud to tour the disk golf course in one over par!  At the balloon launch challenge, we were deadly accurate.  At the air rifle target shoot, my group was not bad for a man with no practice.

But by far the best part of the day was the time spent in relationships. I had a chance to mingle with so many friends, old and new. We helped each other through the day, and enjoyed conversations, some long, some short.   It was the kind of day you wish for and so seldom get.  Now I know why men’s retreat is so popular.