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Winter Retreat 2022
Rules of Hope
January 28, 2022 • Michael Fitzgerald
What is the first thing that comes to mind when someone says, “Don’t touch!” For most people, it would be “Why not?” This is then usually followed by the desire to…? Touch! People don’t like rules. Why? Because most people don’t like to be limited. They think, “I’ll do what I want! Don’t tell me how to live my life!” Now take that thought and apply it to the Bible. Many people think- “Who is this person in the clouds? What gives him the right to tell me how to live my life?” “Isn’t the Bible just a bunch of rules that limit my life and make it boring?” But are these statements actually true? Is the Bible a book of rules to limit your life? Did God give people the rules found in the Bible to make our lives boring? Or— Did a loving God create people in His image? Did those He created choose to sin, separating themselves from God and opening the door to pain, struggles, and death? Did that loving God make a way to end His creation’s suffering and give His Word to explain how to fix mankind’s problem of sin?
Shadows of Reality: Noah
January 29, 2022
Have you ever been outside in the summer when a shadow crossed the ground? At first, you might stare at its fuzzy outline, trying to determine its cause. Then, looking around the sky, you wonder was it a bird? A plane? Superman? Ultimately, if you can locate the source of the shadow, you can confirm or disprove your original speculations. When it comes to the Bible, the Old Testament is like that shadow. People look at the Old Testament and wonder why God would give these rules and stories. They wonder if any of it is true, especially things that sound like exaggerated ‘fish stories,’ (like the one about a literal giant fish who swallows a man and then spits him out three days later?! And what about that time that water covered the whole earth while people hung out with all kinds of animals? — Lions, tigers, and bears — oh my!). But ultimately, these questions can only be proven true or false if you look at the source of the object making the shadows. For the Old Testament, the source is Jesus. As the theme verse of camp says, “these rules are only shadows of the reality yet to come. And Christ himself is that reality.” The Old Testament shadows cast by Jesus were placed there to get the attention of God’s people so they’d look around and discover the source. Now, knowing the origin of the shadows—Jesus Christ—we can understand how the Old Testament rules and stories, even the seemingly impossible ones, were foreshadows of what would come. Are you prepared to accept Jesus and His Word as reality?
Shadows of Reality: Jonah
January 29, 2022 • Michael Fitzgerald
Have you ever been outside in the summer when a shadow crossed the ground? At first, you might stare at its fuzzy outline, trying to determine its cause. Then, looking around the sky, you wonder was it a bird? A plane? Superman? Ultimately, if you can locate the source of the shadow, you can confirm or disprove your original speculations. When it comes to the Bible, the Old Testament is like that shadow. People look at the Old Testament and wonder why God would give these rules and stories. They wonder if any of it is true, especially things that sound like exaggerated ‘fish stories,’ (like the one about a literal giant fish who swallows a man and then spits him out three days later?! And what about that time that water covered the whole earth while people hung out with all kinds of animals? — Lions, tigers, and bears — oh my!). But ultimately, these questions can only be proven true or false if you look at the source of the object making the shadows. For the Old Testament, the source is Jesus. As the theme verse of camp says, “these rules are only shadows of the reality yet to come. And Christ himself is that reality.” The Old Testament shadows cast by Jesus were placed there to get the attention of God’s people so they’d look around and discover the source. Now, knowing the origin of the shadows—Jesus Christ—we can understand how the Old Testament rules and stories, even the seemingly impossible ones, were foreshadows of what would come. Are you prepared to accept Jesus and His Word as reality?
Useful Truth
January 30, 2022
Have you ever been scrolling through YouTube looking for instructions on how to do something? Once you found a video, did you check the date it was uploaded to determine if it was relevant? Because if the video is more than a year old, its information is probably outdated and inaccurate. Most of us do this same thing when it comes to the Bible. Even though you might believe the Bible is a true account of history, you might view it as exactly that — history — the past, old, out of date, and inapplicable for anything today. You might think “It was written on animal skins 2000+ years ago; what could it possibly have to do with today?” “How can the people from 2000+ years ago even begin to understand the things we are going through today?” While these questions make sense to wonder, there are other questions that need to accompany them to see if these questions apply to the Bible. Do we still have the same problems today that the Bible teaches about from long ago? Do the truths in the Bible still stand true today? Do the principles in the Bible still work today? Do the natural desires of man’s heart today — for companionship and acceptance — match the desires of the heart of man 6,000 years ago? If the answer to these questions is “yes”, it demonstrates the timeless nature of the Word of God. So now we need to answer a few more questions. Is there a possibility that the Bible, while it is old, is absolute truth? Is it true for all people, for all places, and at all times? Is the Bible something that is useful today for everyday life?