Greetings and Happy Sabbath!  I hope everyone is doing well and has been enjoying their summer.  While I think we all enjoy the sunshine, the rain today has been a welcome relief!

Camp Report

As you are aware, last week we were at Camp Cotubic in Ohio.  It was truly inspiring to see so many young people learning and growing in their faith in one spot.  While we tend to think of camp in terms of physical enjoyment, the main purpose and goal behind United Youth Camps is to help our young people grow spiritually and become full fledged members of the body of Christ, and future leaders of the church.  I am very happy to say that I have seen much evidence of this over the years at camp.  Young men and women who could barely tie their own shoes, grew to be teens who asked deep spiritual questions, and those teens grew to be young adults who serve others today, both at camp and at home in their congregations!

Next week, we will be headed down to Camp Pinecrest in Missouri.  This will be my first time to this particular camp and I look forward to seeing it.  While I know the spiritual food will be of the same high quality, I'm looking forward to trying the different activities and physical food this camp has to offer.  

In addition to those things, it will be a whole new set of campers and staff to work with.  While I do know some that will be there, the majority, I do not know, or at least not well.  Going to serve as staff offers a wonderful opportunity to get to know other members of God's church from across the country, and build new friendships that will last a lifetime.  If you feel like you've missed out on the camp experience because you're too old, I highly encourage you to consider going to serve as staff.  Many of the staff are well into their 60's and 70's and I know of at least one staffer who is 80!

Booklet Discussion Series

This week we are set to have our first Booklet Discussion series where we will chat about the booklet 'Does God Exist?'  This will be an interactive roundtable discussion where we will talk about the things we learned, what was re-affirmed and perhaps things we never even thought about.  We will have our first discussion tomorrow in Hickory shortly after services, with discussion in Charlotte on the Sabbath of July 24th and in Columbia on July 31st.

In the mean time, we can begin working on our next booklet, 'Is God a Trinity?' (you can get a head start by clicking here!) We will be distributing copies tomorrow in all three congregations for those who do not already have a copy.  I would encourage everyone to begin reading the first two chapters: 'Introduction' and 'Is the Trinity Biblical' in the upcoming week.  We will schedule our discussion of this booklet for sometime in August.

Sabbath Services tomorrow

Tomorrow we will have Sabbath services in Charlotte at our normal time of 11 AM.  In Hickory, we will have services at 2:30 PM.  I look forward to seeing you all tomorrow!