A Summer Full of Smiles
A Summer Full of Smiles
Ron Humphrey
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Crouched beneath a clump of thick bushes, the boy carefully pointed his gun in the direction of a tree where he had seen movement. A figure slowly stepped out. The boy aimed and squeezed the trigger. Splat! Angel Tree camper Andrew had just eliminated his best buddy from the camp paintball competition! The two boys howled with laughter; another round would begin soon.
Andrew, 14, has a father in prison and lives with his grandparents. In July, he joined with a dozen boys and girls like him to experience a week of fun and fellowship as “mainstreamed” Angel Tree campers. Only senior staff could identify them amid more than 100 campers at California’s Wolf Mountain Conference Association, a Christian facility located in the mountains north of Sacramento. “I thought it would be boring,” Andrew admitted in the midst of his exploits. “But it isn’t. It’s really a lot of fun.”
Other activities at Wolf Mountain included horseback riding, rock climbing, golf, swimming, and hiking the 640 acres surrounding the camp with dedicated and skilled staff members.
Andrew’s experience this summer was multiplied thousands of times over. As of this writing, Angel Tree projects that some 8,000 Angel Tree children will have attended camp this summer. The vast majority of these children will have received scholarships from the Rich and Helen Devos Angel Tree Camping Scholarship Fund, which covers roughly half the cost of a child’s camping experience.
Joyce Biggs of Grass Valley’s Calvary Bible Church serves as Angel Tree coordinator for Nevada County in California. Andrew was one of 50 youngsters that churches in the county sent to camp in 2003, as a follow-up to their Christmas ministry to prisoners’ children. “It’s wonderful to get gifts at Christmas,” says Joyce, “but spending a whole week at a Christian camp can change a child’s life forever. Many of the kids look forward to it all year, and one girl said it gave her something to live for.” One mother told Joyce, “Thank you for the best week of my child’s life.”
Angel Tree camping happens all across America each summer—and sometimes even into other seasons! These reports from Northern California, Arizona, and Colorado provide just a glimpse of its impact.
