The "Jesus Camp" Part Three, and Final Posting - "Finding Jesus"

 

The Cast of Characters. 

Boys from the Greenbank/Easton/Whitehall districts of East Bristol. Some were members of the "Brethren Assembly" (see earlier posting about the Brethren) which met at Chelsea Gospel Hall. Others were local kids who attended the Sunday School but whose families were not Brethren.

Back row l-r

1. Jeff Davies. (my lifelong friend) -  we became friends when I was 6 and he was 5. He was not "Brethren", but in due course he married Mary, a Brethren woman, approx. 55 years ago. They are dear Christians, though they (like me) left the Brethren. 

2.Phil Wraight, our middle class Tent leader  - a good bloke. 

3.  Steve? Hemmings - a local boy.

Middle row l-r

1. Ray Smith, a local boy, 

2. Pete Langdon, a Brethren boy.  His dad owned the Furniture Removal Firm's Van which was our transportation.  Pete was in quiet and subversive rebellion against the Brethren strictures, His mother was a sweet woman, his father a religious tyrant.

Front Row l-r

1. "Miffer"  about who I remember nothing, except that his surname  was probably Smith..  

2. Yours truly, with horrible incisors,  I had ghastly dental health, (and a lot of hair on my pate!)  

3. John Joseph, from a Brethren family. He was not a popular guy, and to our shame,  the committed Brethren young men shunned his company.  

4. "Cooker", a local non Brethren boy. His last name must have been Cook.

The names are inscribed on the back of the photo' in my spindly handwriting.

So there we were in 1960, at a one week camp sponsored by the Bristol and District Brethren Assemblies. 

Good for the Brethren.  It was the one holiday which working class boys might have.

Bad for the Brethren.    The underlying purpose of Camp was so that the unsaved boys might commit their lives to Jesus; and that the saved boys would to recommit themselves to Jesus.  Oh how coercive/manipulative this could be 

So it was that each day ended with a religious service in a permanent building.

 The hall was lit with "Tilly Lamps"  giving a warm and heating light. (If you have never heard of Tilly Lamps, look them up.  They  are paraffin//kerosene lamps, inherently dangerous. The modus operandi is the same as the old fashioned blow torches used by plumbers (such as my dad)

We sang a lot - gospel choruses - mostly scriptures in paraphrase, and all with the theme of getting saved, or remaining "sound in the faith"

There was a sermon, calling for the unsaved to confess Jesus; and for the saved to reeducate their lives.

I was one of the saved (lah-de-dah),  so the  Friday night service was the one last night on which to repent again of my sins, and recommit my life to the Lord.

Saturday mornings came and we traveled back home.  Mum and Dad knew that I would be a spiritual zombie for a few days, until  I came down from an unrealistic spiritual high.  

Mum and Dad  also knew that my twin sister would also  return from her week at girls camp on a similar high.

I suspect that children who went to all manner of summer camps, secular or religious, came home and were wistful for camp, at least for a few days.

As for the "Brethren".  For a long time I was angry about them; their pettiness, judgmental words and attitude, arrogance about being "the true Church" &c, &c

Then I came to understand that my anger was fruitless. 

"Cease from anger, and forsake wrath; Fret not thyself, it tendeth only to evil-doing", Psalm 37:8