As part of our summer outreach program, YOKE partners with Camp BaYoCa to host a week of camp specifically for middle school students. YOKE staff help with games and clubs, while Camp staff (many of whom also serve with YOKE) coordinate daily activities. The program has grown each year, but we were excited to have more than 70 students involved this summer, with more than half coming from YOKE clubs around the area. That’s nearly double last year’s total.
“At camp kids worship freely, speak kindly, and play hard,” said Katie Grubb, a student from Carson Newman and summer intern with YOKE. “You just don’t get to see kids do that very often.”
At Camp there are no video games, no phones, and no distractions from home life. It’s just students and leaders gathered around a campfire in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains, slowing down, looking up, and making space for God to move.
On Tuesday night, students were invited to share their own thoughts and questions about God as they gathered around the campfire. After a moment of awkward silence, one brave volunteer set off a chain reaction of students sharing how God has impacted their lives – through YOKE, through camp, and through the people God has placed in their lives.
The time for the program was drawing to a close, but hands were still shooting up. Students kept wanting to share. Even though it was time to transition to the next activity, Carter Brown, Camp Director and YOKE alum, invited students to keep sharing their stories. He also encouraged them that this time around the campfire was not the only time they could share about God’s work in their lives.
As students shared, a common theme arose – the love of God that they had each experienced. Some talked about the pressure they’d felt to fit in, until they met a God who loved them exactly as they are. Others said they have learned to care more about what God thinks than what their peers think; and one student was honest enough to say she is still learning to do the same.
“When I started middle school, I really didn’t take God too seriously,” said Lundyn Johnson, a student at South Doyle. “But then this program called YOKE popped up, and we started talking about God. I felt like I had experienced God at the weekend camp. So, I decided to go to this camp so I could grow a stronger relationship with God.”
Another camper, Brynn Lindsay also attends YOKE at South Doyle during the school year. Shortly after worshipping around the campfire and singing the song, How He Loves Us, Brynn put her hand in the air. “Camp and YOKE have both brought me close to God. I’ve learned how He loves me.”
Both Lundyn and Brynn went from YOKE club to YOKE camp and now Camp BaYoCa where they had the opportunity to speak up and share about how God has impacted their lives. Lundyn’s final statement was one that all Camp and YOKE staff and long and love to hear – “I call this home.”