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Tyler State Park Trip 2009

Tyler State Park Trip Report

I had been praying for the last couple of weeks about the weather and my prayers were answered!  The day started out a sunny and breezy 80 something and stayed under 100 all day long.  We started out on the bus with Bro. Kannady praying over the trip and everyone was in good spirits!  We had a whopping 43 people on the bus which I could not believe.

I was thinking last night that the Orange bus is going to be a part of the “fleet” of busses we are going to have sometime in the near future.

We loaded bicycles, fishing poles, and all kinds of flotation devices under the bus and headed out.  Bro. Ray only stalled the bus about 3 times down Scyene road and after that we were on the way!  He did a really great job driving the bus and I just like to give him a hard time about driving the bus like a newbie.  After making a quick pit stop in Terrell, TX to pick up Chuck and Becky Kimbly we headed on down to the park.  When we arrived we had to park by the store down near the lake… as best that I could remember, the camping spot was just a 2 minute walk around the corner of the lake.  Bro. Matthew Greiner had setup the Camper he brought down for all of us to use for the day.

To my surprise it was more like a 15 minute Hike around the lake (mostly offroad) and up some
pretty big hills.

When I got to the camper Daniel & Lori Blades didn’t make it with the kids until some 20 minutes later and looked like they had jumped in the lake… Daniel was carrying a tricycle, a bike, 3 bags, and two kiddos! I felt so bad but it was also so funny I could hardly stand it.  Thank you Bro. Daniel for not chasing me down and throwing me into the lake!  We got everyone situated and then loaded the kids up in Bro. Matthew’s F350 and made a couple of trips to get everyone to the swimming area.  I followed down a few minutes later once all the kids were down there and we brought some water & snacks for later in the afternoon.  Tyler has probably the clearest water for any lake that I’ve seen and you can see your feet even 6 or 7 feet down! The kids romped and splashed and several of them tried to dunk me at least 20 times or so throughout the afternoon.

We rounded them all up and headed back to camp for lunch.

After lunch, we split up into three groups.  The large group went back swimming, another group went fishing, and I opted to go mountain biking.  Now, I had no idea that they had actual mountain biking trails at Tyler State Park.  They don’t call it “Mountain Biking” for no reason! I started off down the first hill and thought wow, I am going pretty fast and then a few seconds later I thought I am going way too fast.  “Bam” I flew over the handlebars and ate the dirt… I am still feeling the pain from that accident as I am typing this right now!  I was laughing so hard though I didn’t realize how bad I was hurting.  Bro. Ray was up in front of me and he fell at least twice but we were laughing so hard it really didn’t matter.  Two hours later and about four spills wiser, we finally got out of the woods and headed back to camp.  We decided that swimming wasn’t such a bad idea so we joined the big group.  I was worried like any group leader or person working with Children or youth of any age about fighting and everyone getting along.  Even while playing in the water and being kids they were angels!  I didn’t have a single issue or even argument that I had to referee! Praise God! Actually, that deserves a Hallelujah, Amen, Praise God, Thank You Jesus!  God puts something even deeper in my heart for our children every time that we go on one of these trips.  Now everyone knows that I love to eat, and I also love to cook for other people (when I say cook, I really mean grill out).  We cooked up 80 hamburgers for dinner and served all but 3 which was a blast.  We lined them up single file and they ate hamburgers like they were going out of style.  We cooked some sausage and steak for the parents as a thank you for all their hard work.

“Time to go play on the playground until 6:45!” I shouted with a half gone voice.  We wanted them to get all that energy out before we began to worship the Lord.  TSP has a chapel service area right down by the lake that we used.  We lined the kiddos up boy, girl by row and began our chapel service right at 6:45.  We sang a few songs and I began to talk to about the choices that they are going to start making as they get older in life. I asked them if they knew what the word Character really meant and I got no takers.

“Character is What you do when no one else is around, and determines what kind of person you really are” I said with the most sincere voice I could come up with after 8 hours of yelling “Don’t poke her in the eye and don’t put sand in his ear!”

I want our kids to realize that know matter what age you give your life to Christ that in that moment of time you become responsible for the decisions you make.  If you are only 9 years old and you start to cheat on your schoolwork in later years you’ll suffer because you cheated
yourself out of the knowledge it takes to succeed in today’s world.  At 13 years old when you begin to disobey your parents your heart will begin to stray from God and you won’t be able to listen to God’s word because you feel everyone is out to keep you from having fun!  The concept is true
no matter what age you are.  Even small kids make decisions to obey or disobey.  The commandment was “Children obey your parents” – there wasn’t an age limit given.  A happy home cannot be happy without children that obey their parents and that home can’t be happy without parents who are patient, loving and kind with their children. I saw tears streaming down some of their little faces as I was talking and that was worth every dollar and minute that we put into the trip.

My prayer was, “Lord, would you please wrap your arms around these children with your love
like you did for me when I was there age”

We ate smores and headed the kids over to the bus after our chapel service was over.  The kids looked pretty tired but I had mentioned that we would have church on the bus on the way home.  Everyone knows that God called me to the ministry on a bus trip when I was younger and I think the expectation is set in their hearts that God will also touch them as he did for us when we were younger.  I started to teach them about “Getting in the spirit” and what is means to give over the Holy Ghost.  The kids responded in outstanding way and they gave more energy into praising God and asking him to touch them and praying for one another than they did all day long playing at the park.  After just a couple of minutes the Lord moved in and the tears were flowing and children were speaking in that heavenly language that he gives us when

we move out into the spirit.  We had three children receive the Baptism of The Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues.  You may read this with a skeptical thought or two but when you see an eight year old being touched by God and speaking a beautiful language you’ve never heard before it erases any doubt that the Holy Ghost isn’t real.  Bro. Lloyd and Sis. Mellisa joined us about 35 minutes later and they kept on praising God until we got back to the church.  We ended the night around 10:30 back at the church with all the kids back safely and full of the spirit of God.  Thank you to all those who support the work of the Lord with your efforts and love


6 Comments

  1. I just read your blog about the trip. I was so happy to hear that ya’ll had a great time. Thanks for sharing the pictures. It looked like a great day!

  2. You are welcome Bro chad for not throwing you in the lake, for taking us on a 5 mile hike over terrain than even a trained army ranger would not attempt.

  3. I feel so blessed to have gone with the children to TSP. We had such a blast! I am finally able to walk now!!!!!

  4. This is so encouraging to see the youth and their leader excited! We are trying to make some positive changes in Woodville/Jasper and reading this post just gets me even more excited to see what the Lord has in store for His people. Keep up the good work and keep us in your prayers!

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