Life—the anticipation of something better, a child runs, wind, smiles, eyes, trust, love—it ends. Even if you catch it you must one day let it go again. The riches we have are so great I cannot think on them too much or their gravity consumes me. Which of my children could I lose and yet remain alive? But to hold riches as these so tightly brings only fear. No. They must be enjoyed as air—breath that comes in and goes out. And if it comes in again let it go with a prayer of thanks. These gifts so immense and myself so small—I cannot look into his eyes because I am undeserving. I am not big enough or strong enough to contain life when I catch him. Oh God, I am speechless; when you look at me I cannot look back. Give me the strength to endure your presence.
—reh
Knowing Truth
Self deception is native to every generation—culture, tribe, person—me. We are all hypocrites. Though I identify with all of humanity in this, it does not justify my own sin. The one who boasts, “God’s word says it, I believe it, and that’s good enough for me,” unless he speaks it as an aspiration, is likely deceived. So too the one who says, “I can see clearly. I am wise so as to avoid the trouble that comes from awkward and inconvenient beliefs.” If one’s faith conforms perfectly to every trend in natural science it is not faith, but sight. We do look forward to that day when we will see face to face, but the dark glass we see through now is not the scripture—it is our minds and our hearts. All that we look at, all that we hear, all that we feel, enters through a darkened glass. So the light of science is also dim and distorted. But there remains a distinct difference between the two for the latter depends on me, but the former on the character of God himself. A loving father will instruct his children, and when they have misunderstood he will continue to do everything in his power to help them understand.
7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. “ - Matt 7:7-8
Scientism supposes man is the only one who can open the door and when it is opened there is nobody home. I can think of nothing darker, more terrifying, more hellish than that I was God. But the scriptures tell me that his word is living not only in them but in creation itself. When I stray he brings me home. If I am not in the arms of truth then he will not rest until he has rescued me from this imposter—for I know that he loves me. —Ryan Hunt
A Great Flood
The Ark—perhaps one of the best examples of the nature of a relationship between finite man and the infinite God. I’m going to have to trust someone in this, but let’s be clear, my trust in God must, by the very nature of things, be much greater than my trust of a fellow man in order for this relationship to work. My fellow man is finite, as I am. However complex the inner-workings of a man’s heart, his motives, his passions, his wounds—God’s are incomparably greater. I cannot know them all. I can never see him to the end. I am forced to either trust or flee his presence—a reality so awful, so dark, so final, it is not even possible until the end of time where the physics of this world cease. The ancients were not deceived by their wisdom to the degree that we are deceived by our knowledge. We believe that when a thing can be physically explained that we somehow know it entirely—as if it has become our own creation. But we are only observing, and even if we can see a thing in much greater detail, without knowledge of the context, it does not result in knowledge of the truth. The unbeliever hypocritically considers a spiritual truth to be an imaginary truth—not understanding that it is a regular truth, but one which cannot be grasped within the finite context of our physical human experience. It must, therefore, be accepted as a matter of faith in one who can see ultimate reality. It is hypocritical because any “truth” based in an ever changing context with no center is just that—an imaginary truth. The believer is open to a different deception altogether. It is that idea that the things which God has done are simple due to his great power. When we read that he spoke the world into existence we can easily, and wrongly, conclude that it was a kind of magic. It is cheap and disposable. His creations are plastic, like Darwin’s view of the cell—a simple magical phenomena. It is similar to the way we still view gravity. But a brief and honest survey of creation reveals more spiritual complexity, more pain, more patience, more of God, than I have the physical or emotional capacity to engage. Whenever I am faced with the true God it becomes apparent that the material I am made of is inadequate to touch him. Scripture says there was a flood that covered the earth, and that Noah, his family, and the animals were saved by it. I accept that. A scientist says that what he sees in the ground tells a different story. I do not call him a liar or believe he was sent by Satan to deceive me. A scientist can tell me what he sees, but he cannot tell me what it means. The meaning of everything is found in Jesus Christ. He is the context—“in him all things hold together.” — Ryan Hunt
Abraham, Moses, Betty Crocker, and My Grandma
My grandma collected Betty Crocker points and traded them in
for spoons. Abraham and Moses would have done the same thing. She started out doing it for her granddaughters,
and then she did it for camp. She was also a sinner—just like Abraham and Moses,
and probably Betty Crocker. Many people don’t know it, but she was one of the
driving forces behind camp—especially the search for our own camp facility. We
had more than one conversation about the promised land, not having our own
home, and having to clear everything out on the weekends between weeks of camp.
She bought a plaque for a wall at our house that said, “faith is not knowing
that the Lord can, it is knowing that he will.” I didn’t argue with her. She
never stopped thinking about camp. She scoured the newspapers for real estate
listings about land or camps and cut them out and stuck them in her magazine
table by her chair—along with the recipes she was going to try out on us
before serving them at camp in the summer and the Betty Crocker points.
Actually, there were a lot of things in her magazine table. It was like my
pockets when I was a kid. We all miss her very much. She didn’t get to see the
building of the camp, but she always looked forward to the day it would happen.
We were moving some things around in the storage shed and we found her spoons,
along with the rest of the flatware she got for when we had our own camp, big
boxes of them still wrapped in cellophane.
Hebrews 11:13 All these people were still living by faith
when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them
and welcomed them from a distance…
“Epic.” I normally can’t say it without cringing at its overuse. But the cliché fades away as the beauty and scale of the camp building project is allowed to soak in—wave after pounding wave.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
context and so share in our joy.
Before long even two weeks was not sufficient to fit the children who
were applying. We were limited to about 55 campers and about 20 staff. Two weeks bled into 3 weeks,
and still the wait list was growing. After some years of renting Timber Bay they added a lodge. It was big
and beautiful, and it accomplished two unforeseen tangible benefits. The children’s general behavior
improved significantly. Part of it was because of the extra physical space during gospel meeting and Bible
story time. And part of it was the beauty. During the day, after many kids were tired from games and
swimming, they would gather in the lodge to talk to counselors and staff. The space was conducive to
quiet conversations and sincere questions from timid hearts. The second tangible benefit was the
improved quality of counselors. We’ve never had paid staff. All of our staff volunteers a week or more of
their summer to come to camp and serve as lifeguards, janitors, cooks, nurses, and every other role in
camp life and ministry. With more family friendly spaces, and temporarily, more sleeping quarters, good
staff weren’t forced to sacrifice half of their annual vacation time away from their families in order to
serve. 
The ministry exploded. We went to 80 campers and 40 staff per week, but the waiting list was outpacing
our ability to increase slots. We went to 4 weeks, and Timber Bay informed us that we were maxed out.
After all, it was their camp facility, and they had their own programs to run. Made sense. We started
replacing young families with younger unmarried staff because we couldn’t spare the space. It was a hard
decision. Stories about families who had been trying to get their kids into camp and families who couldn’t
afford other camps kept pouring in. We started looking for camp property to buy. Actually, we had
anticipated the situation for years, and had continued looking for our own facility after arriving at Timber
Bay, but then we really stepped up the game. We looked everywhere—all the while listening to
counselors about the features they thought would improve the ministry. Most camps that were for sale
were in shambles. The buildings would have to be torn down and rebuilt, but the price tag didn’t reflect
that. Few had swimming places that kids would tolerate, let-‐alone desire. Many of the camps had
neighbors packed in on both sides—not offering the feeling of wilderness that emphasizes the wonder of
creation. We heard from a log-‐home-‐builder that there might be some land coming to market soon on
Deer Lake in Itasca County, Minnesota. We were skeptical because we knew Deer Lake had excellent
natural beaches and beautiful water—a feature that usually meant we could never afford it—even though
we knew the children would absolutely love it. The realtor arranged a showing. It was 280 acres (actually
250+ depending on the method of surveying). We thought, “there’s no way this will work out,” but we
were praying. Many of you were praying too.
When my parents were shown the property they were
blown away by the beauty and fitness of the property for a camp. The asking price was significantly lower
than we thought it would be—well below market value at the time—but still more than we thought we
could afford. We put in an even lower offer, thinking it would just be flat rejected. They counter offered
which gave us a 30-day window to pray more. We did, and the Lord provided the funds we needed. On
September 30th, 2000 we closed on the property. We were speechless. It was impossible, but we now had
a huge property with over one half mile of lakeshore on a pristine lake in northern Minnesota. Things
were going amazingly well, but we were naïve regarding the posture of local politicians and the political
climate we were about to encounter.
We applied for all the permissions to build the camp, and at the first
county meeting my parents showed up, bright eyed and bushytailed, ready to answer questions.
Somebody in the zoning office had prepped them: “include your wildest dreams when you present what
you want to do at the meeting.” Until that point we had mostly just thought of something like Timber Bay,
except we were going to have more, and smaller units. They were going to be spread over about 15 acres.
It was like a trap. They tore into us with accusations about the environment. A guy even wrote a letter in
that said, “We are against any such plan 101%...most importantly they would be allowed to bring up poor
disadvantaged inner city people. In other words, possible delinquents and people with criminal records.”
Someone said they thought we were actually the Radisson Hotel posing as a children’s camp. They made
so many accusations we couldn’t keep up. It spread like wildfire.
That was the beginning of a 14 year battle for everything.
We were in court all the time. It was hard. But
slowly we began winning the contests. After countless county meetings and local court hearings, 8 trips
to the Minnesota Court of Appeals and one trip to the Minnesota Supreme Court, we won. It was so long,
and so unpopular . . . We were looking, and some of us were praying, for an exit strategy, but because of
the political nature (not to mention spiritual, which is the topic of an entirely separate chapter) we could
not talk about it. And anyway, there were none to be found that our conscience would allow. Many people
didn’t and may not ever understand this. During the process we had ruthless enemies. They were
working to make life difficult for everyone who would not join their cause. In the beginning they started
by calling people at the school where my dad was a teacher—trying to dig up anything that could be used
against him politically. They didn’t find anything. One commissioner, in particular, went out of her way to
bring county employees under scrutiny and tried to force them out of their careers. The court finally
censored her from the process. Many of these same people who were being attacked because they
refused to pervert justice were praying for us. Many more local members of the community were praying
for us, and they told us they were watching to see what the Lord would do. At no time did our family have
peace about quitting—given the circumstances at the time and the testimony that was at stake—we knew
it would be wrong.
Waking up from war has been slow, but the Lord has not been quiet. In the past year much has been
happening. It has been hard to tell you everything. For the first months we were a bit gun-shy. We didn’t
want to make too much public about what stages of building or planning we were at because we thought
perhaps the opposition would try to find some way to interfere. Now the building is in full swing, and we
cannot contain what the Lord is doing. If you want your heart to explode, let this soak in and come and
stand under the timbers. See this work. It is real. If the Lord leads you, then become part of it. This work
is the Lord’s. It is so far beyond us; it cannot be any other way.
1Chronicles 16:8-9 "Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts.
That was the beginning of a 14 year battle for everything.
1Chronicles 16:8-9 "Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done. Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts.
P.S. My mom has one other addition. “Please continue to pray for me and Ron since we are both still
suffering from PTSD...” she said with a chuckle. When I told her I included her chuckle she said, “it’s not
funny.” Then I read that to her and she said, “you see, I can’t say anything without the danger of being
quoted,” and she was laughing really hard along with everyone in the room. I didn’t tell her about that
last part, but she’s going to find out soon.
Sincerely, by God’s grace, Ryan E. Hunt
—If you read this here please go back to FB and like and share. Thanks.
Sincerely, by God’s grace, Ryan E. Hunt
—If you read this here please go back to FB and like and share. Thanks.
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