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| Warren W. Willis United Methodist Camp |
Saturday Kathy and I traveled to Leesburg, FL to attend consecration of Barnett Lodge at Warren W. Willis United Methodist Camp. My nephew, Mike, is director of the camp. My brother Bob traveled from Georgia to attend the consecration. The service included a sermon by Florida UMC Bishop Timothy W. Whitaker and music by the band that will lead the music during all the youth camp sessions this summer. About 300 people attended the consecration from all over Florida. After the service we enjoyed lunch in the cafeteria.
The
Camp at Leesburg has a special place in the lives of both Bob and me.
In the 60's as a young man Bob received the call to preach in the
chapel there. He went to the chapel alone after midnight and God
told him plainly that he should preach the gospel and that the Lord
would lead him each step of the way. Since Bob had a young family at
the time in Ellenton and was working for Florida Power Corp., the
call required many challenges and changes. In preparation for the
ministry he attended Fl Southern College and followed by studies at
Emory, concurrently pastoring churches to pay his way. In Atlanta he
met Martin Luther King, Jr. and his father—saying the senior King
reminded him of our father. Saturday we stood in the chapel at
Leesburg where Bob remembered his calling as well as his later
preaching (along with his wife, Linda—also a minister) in the
chapel during youth gatherings.
For
me Leesburg also has special meaning. First and foremost, it
represents the considerable practical investment made in my life by
the Methodist Church and my family. Over the years, one of their
primary objectives was that I live in the will of God. I suppose,
in this sense, one can shorten it to the simple desire of many that I
be a “good guy”. The church and my parents exercised great art
and skill in this undertaking for the challenge was great.
Obviously, they had to work with fairly intractable material. But
beyond that, the Christian faith allows for specificity—but not too
much of it. The challenge that confronts is how to teach principles
without becoming legalistic, how to implant ethical boundaries
without staunching freedom of the spirit, how to communicate that
while the answers to many questions have already been answered by our
faith, that yet one must creatively consult the Holy Spirit to meet
each challenge with fresh perspectives and vital approaches. At the
camp is the Path of Silence—a small isolated path that winds
through the undergrowth near the lake. It eventually terminates at
a clearing—a small meditation area opening onto the lake. An oak
tree there has a limb that bends down and across the opening where a
cross stands. I have been down that path alone as a child, teen,
young adult, adult, and senior citizen. It represents to me the
duality of my faith—it arises from the past yet yearns to meet the
challenges of the future, all within the present will of God—it
joins together set current reality with eternal purposes and divine
assurances.
When
we attended the services Saturday Kathy required a wheelchair
supplied by the camp. (She recently had a bicycle accident in Saint
Petersburg and cracked her knee.) Sitting in the wheelchair she had
to extend and keep straight her right leg—meaning that her leg had
to rest awkwardly and painfully against the foot rest. By reflex
those standing by set out immediately to find some cloths to fold and
put under her leg to cushion it against the foot rest. Such
reflexive considerate action symbolizes to me one of the key missions
of the Warren W. Willis United Methodist Camp.
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