Brett and Bronwyn

Most people that know Bronwyn and I well know that we love anything outdoors. Beach, mountains, just hanging out in the park we would much rather be outside than inside. When we first started praying about what a move to Kenya might look like one of the things that most excited us was seeing what Adventure Camps would look like. After all, we ran those types of camps for years in the States. That’s why after we finished our first camp season we began to work hard on launching Adventure Camps. There are way too many amazing places in Kenya not to take advantage of taking students out to see them. So, we are excited that in December we will be launching our first two offerings of these types of camps. One of the things that has been most surprising to us is how few people who live in Kenya have seen some of its most amazing sites. Through Adventure Camps we hope to reach students from a wide range of schools and backgrounds and let them explore the beauty of Africa. Our first trips are to Mt. Suswa and Hell’s Gate.

Hell’s Gate

Mt. Suswa

Yesterday Bronwyn and I went to the new REI outlet in Memphis and purchased six new tents, which if you have followed our story you know we desperately needed. Now the hard thing about something like that is how do you get six tents to Kenya. Bronwyn and I will be maxed out with our weight headed back and mailing just isn’t an option. Well, get ready for a cool story. While we are in the States a mission’s group from Hope Church is going to stay at our house and they graciously are taking two tubs of stuff to Kenya for us. We were able to pack the tents and still had weight left over to get some protein bars over too. God truly works in the details!

Bronwyn and I are hard at work in the States right now, our calendar is filling up but we do still have some times and dates available to speak to groups or whoever. Remember, we are not just support raising but also recruiting staff too. No group is too large or too small and no time slot is too long or short. Thanks for continuing to follow our story.

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I promise to get back to writing about camp but Bronwyn and I have been in Tanzania the last few weeks with very little ability to communicate with the world. I’ll share our experiences there soon but first I’ll give this quick update.

Bronwyn and I will be back in the States October 3rd through November 7th. We look forward to seeing friends and family but we also want to have as many opportunities as possible to share our story of what God is doing in our lives here in Kenya. We are happy to speak to any groups or individuals at any time. If you would like to have us come speak please let us know as soon as possible as our calendar is already filling up.

On top of sharing stories and support raising Bronwyn and I will be recruiting staff for next summer at BlueSky. We will also be looking for opportunities to speak to college groups who are interested in missions in Africa for the summer.

Finally, The Grove at Red Oak Lake has been generous enough to allow us to hold our support dinner at their amazing facility again this year. We hope to have a packed out house so please RSVP as soon as possible. The event will be November 1st 6-8 pm at 849 Rocky Point Rd, Cordova, TN 38018. You can RSVP through the FB event or just email us.

We hope to see as many people as possible in our time in the states, and as always you are more than welcome to visit us here in Nairobi.

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The first morning of camp is always exciting. Most campers wake up ready to go. Each night we hide different colored rocks all over camp and at 7:30am they are allowed to come out of their cabins and start hunting for them. The group that finds the most at the end of the week wins a special bead, so some campers take it very seriously. After hunting rocks, it’s time for everyone to line up for morning assembly. We have a big tower outside our dining tent where we go over information for the day, sing morning songs and dismiss for breakfast.

After breakfast we split Junior Camp and Senior Camp into two groups for morning empower. Empower is devotion where our staff sign up to lead worship and teach through the “Called by Name” curriculum. The first day is Samuel and how God called him in the middle of the night to become a prophet. If you have not read it in a while I would suggest going to I Samuel 3 and reading through it again. It’s especially powerful if you remember everything that has just happened in the book of Judges. After Empower we do Impact Time, campers break into small groups with their cabins and go over what they just talked about. They have a chance to ask questions and delve deeper into each “Called by Name” story.

Next up is Skills. One of the things we think is important at camp is for campers to have the opportunity to choose some of their activities. So, for skills campers get to choose from lots of different activities. Things like Ultimate Frisbee, Soccer, Arts and Crafts, Dance, Wacky Science, Swimming, and American Football just to name a few. Each camper signs up for two skills and goes to one after the other. Then after that it’s time for lunch. After lunch is a little rest time and then what we call MAC/SWAG. The boys’ and girls’ camps are split and girls to SWAG (Strong Women After God) and guys go to MAC (Men After Christ). These are topic-based bible studies designed for our male and female campers. They also play games like dodgeball and have awesome NERF blaster battles. Then it’s onto the main field for our first Chumvi/Nuru large group game. These are games played all over camp, they are so exhausting that there is a halftime/water break built in. After large group games campers have another opportunity to choose an activity, games like four square, volleyball, badminton, and spike ball. Then after a little cabin time it’s on to dinner.

After dinner we have Tsavo complete with worship and teaching. On the second night of camp I would share more about our “Called by Name” story and share with campers about our house fire right before we moved to Kenya. I also reminded every campers of the most important thing I would ever tell them, God loves them. It’s been the theme of my entire ministry and truly the most important thing I will ever tell anyone.

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So, what do we do at camp BlueSky? Well I think the best way for me to answer that is to walk you through a week of camp and the best way to do that is a day at a time. Registration opens at 2pm on Sunday but the reality is campers and their parents start arriving way before that. Most parents understand that we will not be ready to start receiving their campers until 2 o’clock but occasionally you have some that will test you. I don’t necessarily mind those conversations, talking to parents is something that I have become quite good at over the years. Before campers arrive, we have our staff devotions, final cabin preparations, and lunch. Keep in mind our campers from the previous week have just left on Saturday at 11 so there really isn’t much turn around between groups.

At 2 pm sharp Bronwyn and I would step outside the program office and wave big blue and red flags and registration would begin. One of the amazing things about Camp BlueSky is all the different countries and people groups that are represented by our campers and their families. So during registration it’s fun to meet and talk to parents and hear their stories of what brought them to Kenya. We hear everything from families who are here doing mission work like us to diplomats and members of different government organizations. We had one camper whose family had come from China and were spending four weeks in Kenya, they enrolled their youngest son in two weeks of camp because they wanted him to spend that time working on his English. Another flew from South Sudan just to attend camp. There is almost as many reasons to come to BlueSky as there are campers.

After Registration, the entire camp gets into their Mountain groups. These are different groups based on their age and named after the different mountains in Kenya. For example, our youngest boys cabin is Longonot and out oldest girls cabin is Kenya (the biggest mountain in Kenya). Once in their mountain groups we march to a place we call Impala Grounds to go over expectations for camp, sing some songs and do Mountain Group Cheers. Each mountain group has their own cheer and it’s one of the best traditions at camp, we hear these cheers a lot! In fact, even as I type this I have several stuck in my head.

After that we head to the main field and split everyone into one of two tribes. The tribes are called Chumvi (Swahili for Salt) and Nuru (Swahili for Light). The names are from Matthew 5:13

¹³ “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

¹⁴ “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden.

Once in your tribe, that is your tribe forever so everyone who has been to camp before is already in their tribe but for everyone else it’s an exciting reveal to see who will be where. After that is our first Chumvi vs Nuru games, tribes compete in games all week to be the overall winner for the week. It’s another amazing BlueSky tradition and additionally one of the things that makes Camp BlueSky special. After the games it’s time for dinner and as soon as dinner is over everyone heads to Tsavo.

Tsavo is my absolute favorite part of camp. We start with fun songs and games and are interrupted by our “skit characters” who lead us all week in fun activities. This season it was 2 characters from the 80’s who taught the campers fun 80’s dances and led some games. After that we start to move into our more serious time, we start by singing fun worship songs and then we move into a time of powerful praise and worship. Then I would get up and speak about our theme for the week. This camp season the theme was “Called by Name” out of Isaiah 43. The first night I would introduce the theme and talk a little about my called by name story, introduce the prophet Isaiah and share about how Bronwyn and I felt called to Kenya. We would end in a time of prayer and then campers were dismissed to cabins where they would hopefully shower and as a cabin discuss the things we went over in Tsavo.

So that is day 1! I will be walking you through all seven days of camp in the following weeks and I hope you enjoy hearing about what we do. Feel free to ask me questions through wordpress or facebook if you have them.

Thanks for reading.

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Someone asked me this summer “why camp”? It was a good question and one that I had thought about many times but never answered in a way that was complete. At some point I will delve more into that but for now I know it’s a calling that God has placed on my life. I am here in Kenya running a camp and working with students and for me it’s the most fulfilling thing in the world. I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else. It’s actually as simple as Psalms 37:4 “Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart”. So, for me I am working every day to delight myself in the Lord and here I am receiving the desires of my heart.
Over the course of the next few weeks my plan is to map out what it is we do at camp every day and through that explain why I think it’s so important and why I think it’s worth spending most of my life focused on it. The reality is Bronwyn and I have lived in Kenya for a little over five months and three of those months we didn’t live in our own house but in a cabin far from our house. However, I would not have wanted to have been anywhere else.
I didn’t grow up going to camp, in fact the first time I ever went to camp it was as my first day as a camp counselor. But I know in my heart that the experiences campers get cannot be replicated anywhere else. Camp challenges, it molds, it forms who young people are and want to be. These are bold words, but I absolutely believe them with all my heart. So be sure and check back next week as I begin to tell the story of what we did the last 3 months and why I believe that you should support us in this great undertaking.
Finally, Bronwyn and I are making our plans to be back stateside in the coming months. We will be having a support dinner and speaking at a few churches and schools. We are looking for more opportunities to share our story for the purposes of support raising and to recruit camp staff for next season. Once we have those dates finalized we will be sending it out.
Please continue praying for us, I know we have been here for what seems like a while, but this is the first time we have tried to figure out what living in Nairobi will really be like. We have been so focused on camp that we haven’t really had time to begin building a life so pray for us as we transition into that. Thanks for everything!

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I know I have not updated here much, that should be a testament to how insanely busy we have been. As of today, Bronwyn and I have worked two months straight without a break. I mean unless you count the day she was sick and the day I had a migraine. I’m not complaining, I absolutely love it, but I am a little weary. We have this session left and one more. After that a small trip with our summer staff and then we can crash. I promise to tell lots of stories about the camp season after that! For now, just know that when it’s all over we will have served over 800 campers, the most in BlueSky history. We have seen campers in tears making decisions to follow Jesus, we have heard the prayers and worship each night of young believers and watched as God moved in unbelievable ways. I have been at times humbled to my core and watched in awe as God moved in ways that I will never be able to describe. I know I am forever changed because of these last few months and here is the crazy thing. This is just the beginning. This is just our first taste of serving God in Kenya. The future belongs to God and we give it to Him freely. However, I am excited for it and can’t wait to see what’s next!

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As some of you know I had a frustrating day yesterday and I can’t pin down exactly what it was but it’s possible it was because Monday we got Typhoid and Yellow Fever shots and one of the side effects in irritability. Not that I necessarily need that excuse to occasionally be irritable, but it isn’t my usual. This morning I was determined to have a great day, I woke up at 5 am and went into the living room for some crescent rolls, milk, and my time alone with God. My crescent roles had a few ants in them, but they really don’t like the microwave, so I think that took care of them. Extra protein.

During my quiet time I started a new series having just finished Hebrews. I usually give myself a few days to read some random parts of the Bible before I jump into a new book, so I started a study by John Piper called “God’s Glory and Your Purpose” on my Bible App. Well, guess what the first reading was, go on just guess. If you said Isaiah 43 you have definitely been following our story. It also reminded me that everything we do we should be doing it for the glory of God so that’s how I spent my day.

These are the things I spent doing for the glory of God today:

• Working through our camp budget. This was honestly the bulk of my day. That includes tracking down things that were spent last year and what we are paying on things like software and rent. It is not fun, but I did it for the Glory of God today.
• Helping Bronwyn set up, repair, and clean tents. This was a little aggravating mostly because we have a system for how we like gear to be packed up and whoever packed it up clearly had no system whatsoever. Bronwyn with some help from our awesome day guard, Nicolas, did the bulk of this while I sat at a desk but we did it to the Glory of God.
• When we needed a break, we drove to the post office to check the mail. They don’t do mail delivery to homes here, you must have a P.O. Box. We received some mail today which was exciting however it looked like one of the pieces had been opened. (I’ll drop a reminder here, don’t send us cash to Kenya, we have a US address you can send it to but don’t send it here.) It was great getting mail and troubling that some of it was opened but we still did it to the Glory of God.
• The mall we went to a had delicious stir fry noodle place, so we ate noodles to the Glory of God.
• After we got home Bronwyn kept working on tents and I helped some parents register their kids for camp. That was also done to the Glory of God.
• We have another big storm coming tonight so I have a strong feeling that shortly we will be sitting in the dark, but we will do it to the Glory of God.

In life we will have trouble, in life we will have pain, but we will also have joy and continent. You may sometimes sit in the dark and eat ants, but you will always be comforted by the creator of ants and light. God loves me and He loves you and I hope you already knew that, but if you didn’t know you do now. Go do something, anything to the Glory of God.

I Corinthians 10:31b “Whatever you do, do it for the Glory of God”

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As a Camp Director I have a lot of jobs. More than I can even begin to list and some that often surprise me. In my experience I have been a nurse, plumber, carpenter, banker, logistics coordinator, bus driver, garbage man, cook, pastor, teacher, coach, salesman, marketer, lifeguard, finder of lost clothes, and many many more things. However, my most important job is that of spiritual leader. The camps I have run proclaim Jesus as King of Kings and Lord of all. I believe firmly that the only way to salvation in to come to a relationship with Jesus Christ. That being said it all has to start with me. This summer we will have over 600 campers and around 30 staff all of whom I know from the bottom of my heart need to know Jesus. My desire is that all of them would leave camp not only knowing Jesus as their Lord and savior but being certain of it. And again, that all starts with me.

I must give myself to prayer and fasting, I must live out loud a life that is worthy of being imitated. The last few nights God has woken me in the middle of the night for prayer. Last night God took me on a journey through the bible that eventually brought me back to Exodus 17. This is a powerful chapter that has 2 big stories. The first is the water from the rock story where the children of Israel are complaining that they had been brought out of Egypt to die because of lack of water. Moses was then instructed by God to strike a rock and water flowed and people drank. Moses named the place Massah which means testing. The second story is about the battle with Amalek. During this battle Moses was instructed to go to the top of a hill and hold his arms up and when they were up the Israelite’s were winning when he didn’t they were losing. It got to the point were he was exhausted and others held his arms up for him. The battle was actually being fought by Joshua and this is the first mention of him in the bible.

Both of these stories describe the kind of leader I want to be. One who listens to God and does what he says but also a leader who is honest when people are not obeying. Ultimately its the second story that really resonates with me. I actually used this as my verse last summer for camp, the idea that I would hold my hands up and as long as I did we would prevail. God, surprisingly, brought me back to this last night. So again, this will be stance. I will hold my hands up to God, so we can have victory, however that is a lot to ask of one person and if you are reading this, its where you come in.  I will get tired, I will grow weary, I will get faint and you have to hold my hands up for me. Pray for me, lift me up, encourage me.  I’m not asking for myself either, I’m asking because I care about these campers and staff who are under me. Pray for me because I need it, pray for me because what I am doing in Kenya is important. God has called me here to lead and God is calling you to help me lead. So, I am asking you in all boldness to pray for me every day because I know there is power in it. (James 5:16, I Tim 2:1, Eph 6:18, Phil 4:6)

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Here is something I didn’t expect, we have had a ton of rain. Like an unbelievable amount of rain. I’m typing this from our front porch or I guess more accurately our side porch and I am watching the storm clouds roll in again after a night and morning of extremely heavy rain. Fortunately for Bronwyn and I, our house sits up on a hill so we haven’t been too effected but down below us there are streets that have been flooded for days. We pass a house whenever we go into the office that had three pumps working trying to get the water out. We have heard of roofs of houses collapsing and people have lost their lives in flash floods. Everyone keeps telling us this is the most rain Nairobi has had in years, here are a few things I have heard or experienced.

• We lose power every day for least a little while. I started following the local power company on Twitter where they tweet out problems. Some are routine, but many are being caused by flooding either from poles falling or from what they describe as “water damage”.
• One of the Safari guides we have befriended took a group out last weekend, he has been taking groups out for a long time and said it was the first time he had ever been nervous in the bush. The water apparently flooded their first camp site and passing through what he said were usually streams had water running almost over the windows of his Land Cruiser.

  

• The year around camp team went out where we do camp and the road we usually use to get out there was gone, just washed away. So, we doubled back and found another route but on the way in a bus was stuck in the mud. In the process of trying to get around the bus we got stuck. Keep in mind we were in a 4-wheel drive Toyota 4Runner. Fortunately the guys on the bus said, “We are here for you”, and helped push us out. One of them even had a shovel to help dig the loose mud out from around one of the tires. I have no idea why I didn’t take more pictures of this process.

  

• Our camp has a pit where we do archery and I’m turning it into a slingshot range hopefully. However, at the moment that pit is a pond. And this isn’t just a small pit, it’s really deep. I am trying to find a side by side pic, so I can show you just how much water is in it.
• I am planning an entire second blog about driving in Nairobi, but all this rain has made one thing especially challenging. There are pot holes everywhere, well potholes don’t really cover it, more like places the road no longer exists. The challenge with that is when they are full of water it’s impossible to tell how deep they are. Sometimes you just go real slow through them and other times you really have to do everything you can to avoid them. The roads here aren’t especially wide to begin with so you really have to watch not only your side but the fact that someone on the other side may dart straight at you to avoid their puddle/pot hole.
• Finally, and this one is more amusing, Bronwyn and I went for a run the other day and although it was fairly clear when we started the bottom fell out when we were about as far from the house as we could have been. Our house serves as the hub for all the BlueSky vehicles and so when we got back the guards and mechanic were very concerned about us. While we were running we mostly just got lots of looks from people who just thought we were stupid. It was the fastest we have run our loop so there was at least one positive. To say we were soaked is an understatement.

I know the rain is good for Kenya, so all my little issues are barely worth complaining about. I know in some places it’s been too much rain, but I think that is still better than the alternative. It has made everything unbelievably green and beautiful.

Thanks to everyone for their continued love and prayers. We are doing great and adjusting to life in Kenya. God has been gracious to us and the transition so far has been remarkably easy so far. Things are about to get crazy with May hitting us tomorrow. Camp staff arrive at the end of the month and then we will start our first week of camp!!

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It should come as no surprise that the camp theme for BlueSky this summer is Called by Name. Bronwyn and I have known from the start of all this that God had not only chosen us to become the Camp Directors for BlueSky in Kenya, but that God has been preparing us for this for years and years. I remember when I first felt called to ministry back before I even knew Bronwyn that God had made it so abundantly clear that getting on my knees in my parent’s house and surrendering to ministry was the easiest most obvious thing I ever did. Bronwyn felt her call to ministry before she met me as well and following His perfect path together has been when we were at our best. So, this summer we plan to share our stories, and we plan to have our staff share their stories as well.

We also have this really cool time at camp called Empower so I spent part of Monday and all day Wednesday writing the curriculum we will be using. I chose 7 Hero’s from the Bible who God called to do something amazing. Nothing we do will ever be as important as what they did but it is awesome to know we serve the same God as them. After much prayer and thought and even a little debate these are the seven I chose:

• Moses
• Samuel
• Elijah
• Mary Jesus’ Mother
• Peter
• Mary Magdalene
• Paul

It honesty wasn’t easy to decide but when I started writing, it came out pretty easy. All these men and women were not only called by God to do amazing things but were called by name. I honesty go back and forth on which ones are my favorite, but my prayer is that they will all be impactful and ultimately point campers towards Christ.

As I was writing the first one, Moses, I was so struck at how God had prepared him for something he could have never expected. The first 40 years of Moses’ life he received the best education, he was would have learned diplomacy and how to lead. After he ran away for committing murder God spent another 40 years teaching him how to survive in the wilderness and without this skill set he never would have been able to lead a million people in the desert where he spent his last 40 years. Sure, God was with him, but he still prepared him. Bronwyn and I have a skill set that ranges from camp programming to working with teens to outdoor adventure. But we also spent time working on staff development and care, working on budgets, recruiting, marketing, and all these things are skills we need to be successful here in Kenya. And sure, God is with us but that doesn’t mean He hasn’t been preparing us for this position for most of our adult lives.

So, where are you? Are you frustrated with your present situation? God probably needs you to learn something from what you are doing so you can take the next steps. Be aware of His call and when you hear it don’t be afraid to step out in faith. In fact, you should be more afraid of not stepping out in faith. I know I’ve said it in my blog before and there is a very good chance I will say it many more times, God Loves you and God has a plan for your life.

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I did most of the heavy lifting here

I wrote some outlines here