The World According To Chris Brewer

As the list winds down, here are two more outstanding camp memories for me…short but sweet.

Memory #3: The Church Service, Junior Camp 1994

Junior Camp 1994 was an interesting year. Weather-wise, we broke all sorts of temperature records for the camp with it being over 100 degrees for three days.

The weather meant we had a bunch of campers and staff get sick. We prayed for them one day during the class session after lunch, and two of the staff members who had been laid up sick in the nurse’s cabin all day were perfectly fine come church that night.

Shane Pooler was the camp evangelist and that night at service, after we sang a few worship songs, he had Aaron Bear pray a prayer of thanks that the Lord had healed the group leaders (Aaron had laid hands on his group leader earlier and he had been healed, I think it was Jerry Becker).

Aaron was praying, and all of a sudden a couple staff members felt a wonderful move of the Holy Spirit and before you knew it we were all praying, campers were receiving salvation and the Spirit was moving freely. It was rambunctious, yes, but at the same time it was a wonderful spiritual experience for many of us.

The church services of the next two nights were great as well, but I remember that first night where Shane had Aaron pray as being one of my favorite church moments at Camp.

Memory #2: The Softball Game, Senior Camp 2001

We had only started holding an annual softball game in 1999, and it grew to include a full 10 players for either side in 2001.

I don’t remember too much about the early goings-on of the game, but I do know we were getting walloped 17-4 heading into the home half of the final inning. We got a few runners on base and slapped a few hits, and before you know it the score was 17-14 when I stepped up to the plate, thanks to Jason Weisenhaus and Kevin Seebeck hitting mammoth home runs with two men on.

With the bases loaded, I laced a triple down the right-field line that the right fielder had trouble picking up. The hit cleared the bases and tied the game at 17 apiece. I decided to break for home, but somehow the fielder had thrown a laser to Al Kenning at home. I knew I’d be out by a mile but I decided to try to take Al out and knock the ball loose.

He was waiting for me as I dove headfirst toward the base, and I didn’t even try to avoid contact with him. I crossed my arms and gave Al a big shove as I jumped across the plate, and he flew backwards. I think it was the hardest hit I’ve ever delivered on the sports field.

I missed the plate initially, but I looked over and saw that Al was writhing on the ground with presumably the wind knocked out of him…I thought he had still held on and I was out. Everyone on his team cheered and gave each other high-fives. Al took the glove off his left hand and let it fall to the ground, and tried to stand up.

I watched the glove fall to the ground. So did everyone else.

Nothing fell out of it. I reached back, slapped the plate, and the game was over — we had completed one of the craziest comebacks you’ve ever seen or heard of, with a 18-17 victory — we scored 14 runs in the final inning and 9 with two outs.

Joel Senior and Caleb Alexander found the ball later, about 15 feet behind the backstop. Seebeck told me that as I hit Al, he tumbled head over heels and the ball went flying out of his glove, over the backstop and partway to the bat barn.

As for Al, he would be okay.

Incredible. Best sports memory I have of camp. Bittersweet though, because of what I shared in an earlier post regarding Al.

Now stay tuned for tomorrow, when I share my #1 Camp memory of all time.