About Camp

I'm very mindful of the fact that I'll be a counselor at a Bible Camp in a week. How terrifying. Let's review my dossier.

- I don't know what I believe about the Bible, nor do I read it very often.
- I'm confused and frustrated by prayer. I rarely pray.
- I tend to be angry with God.
- I tend to be depressed.
- I'm disillusioned with a broad spectrum of Christian catchphrases, buzzwords and doctrines.
- I think a lot of our theology is illogical.
- I can't come up with a good reason why I'm a Christian.

So would you put me in charge of the spiritual wellbeing of ten kids for a week?
Seriously, if this isn't bothering you, it's bothering me. I signed up for camp months ago, trusting that I'd have a few things worked out by then. Now I've got about a week, and I'm worse of now then I was then. I don't even know if I could fake it.
I picture myself sitting in a circle of boys on the first night giving them "the gospel". I'd have to do it in the dark. I'll cringe at every cliche. Every promise and assertion will leave a bad taste in my mouth. Any profession of faith will plunge me into a secret, cynical gloom. I'll go to the staff meeting in the morning and tell them that little Billy accepted Jesus and they'll say that's wonderful and join with the rejoicing of the angels in heaven, and I'll feel sick. I'll have sold out. I'll have become a salesman for Jesus - Charles Finney, but without any passion or conviction behind my smooth methods. I'll have become one of those who preach out of "selfish ambition", only seeking the easy way, only wishing to drift through life with a fish on my bumper and a void in my soul. Paul says "at least the gospel is being preached", and I suppose the Holy Spirit can work despite my insincerity, but where does that leave me?
I've built my life on honesty. I want to present an honest picture of myself. I want people to say of me "He doesn't have it all together, he's not perfect, but you can trust him. You can put your life in his hands. He's dependable, he's transparent, he's real." I'm trying to become a bad liar. I don't like playing games that involve deception because I don't want to get good at it, and I don't want people to remember that time when I fooled them all, weaving a masterful deception that won and abused their trust. Even in a game.
You can imagine my distress, then, at being faced with such a great pressure to fake it. I tried to be upfront with the camp people about who I am and what my struggles are, but a lot has changed (for the worse) since then, and maybe I didn't make myself clear to begin with.
A lot can change in a week - this gives me faint hope that things will work themselves out before I go off to camp, and I won't have to lie. But I don't really think it will happen. God apparently disagrees with me about when would be a good time to make himself known to me, but I think any time in the next seven days would be great.
I'm thinking about what my evangelism will look like. The traditional approach would look something like this:
"God loves you and sent his son to die for you and pay the penalty for your sins. If you accept his salvation you will be cleansed and redeemed and freed from slavery to sin. The Holy Spirit will live inside you and support and convict and guide you. As a Christian, you need to pray without ceasing and listen for God's voice and read the Bible, because it is the inerrant, inspired word of God. And if you have doubts about Christianity, don't worry! We live in the age of apologetics, where God has seen fit to supplement his scriptures with a lot of good books by Biologists and Reporters who will show you that all the evidence is clearly on our side." (Sorry about that last bit. Terribly cynical and probably a bit immature. I couldn't resist.)
It's crazy the things that make me squirm these days. I recently heard a camp guy tell me about a time where he found a boy crying outside the dining hall because all the campers didn't like him and his counselor didn't care about him, and I forget what else. So he told him that he could have a friend who'll always be there for him, and I think the kid became a Christian. This is just so exasperating to me. What are you really promising this kid? Or, since this is such a common sales pitch, perhaps I should say what are we promising the world? What's the meaning behind all these metaphors? Try making a list of everything that you can guarantee - categorically and without qualification - to anyone who chooses to become a Christian. Here's what I came up with:

-You will go to heaven, not hell

Ok, that's not much of a list, but it is one pretty good reason to be a Christian (assuming it's all true and so forth). So based on this list, here's what my evangelism would look like:
"Some day you will die, and if you're not a Christian, you'll go to hell. If you are a Christian, you will go to heaven. That's it. Which would you prefer?"
The snag is that this sounds a lot like "turn or burn", which is not considered a very fair or ethical method of evangelism. I have mixed feelings - part of me says "well, that's all you've got. If you're selling fire insurance, I guess you've got to talk about fire." But the other part says "man, can you sink any lower than this - to scare little kids into converting?"
My favorite radio commercial for a while was for a home security system. The guy says "we don't use scare tactics - that's just not the way we do business", then proceeds to describe the horror of returning home to a smashed window and a looted house. Hey alarm guy, you can't have it both ways! You can't say "Buy our stuff because we don't use scary advertising, and because if you don't the bad guys will get you." So that's the dilemma - how do you tell kids "Jesus will save you from hell" without being a manipulative jerk? Maybe it can't be done. But what does that leave?
"Ok kids, I'm a Christian. I think it's a good thing to be. Some Christians say that God lives inside them and talks to them and comforts them, but I've never experienced that. My favorite part is that it gives me a lot of great people to talk to, but I think I just got lucky there, because a lot of people feel rejected and ignored by other Christians. If your wondering if the whole thing is true, I can't really help you. You can convince yourself it is if all you read is CS Lewis and Lee Strobel, but what's the point of that? All I can say is that This is not a particularly stupid thing to believe, and I don't know of anything better. If you're wondering about the Bible, parts of it are quite good. Just stay away from the boring stuff, and don't put too much weight on the Old Testament, and be careful about interpretation, because after all, it's a translation of a 2000 year old book and you really don't understand the cultural context. And yes, there may be errors in there, but on the whole, it's quite good. Honestly, there are better books out there. I know Mere Christianity has done more for me than Leviticus ever did. But you probably shouldn't tell the director I said that. All in all, I think being a Christian is a good thing. I recommend it to all of you."
Ouch. If I was being really open and honest with these kids, that's about what I'd be saying. I suppose the only other method is avoidance:
"Hi, I'm your counselor. I'm here to be a good role model and hang out with you. If you have questions about ethics or want to know the fine points of orthodox theology, I'm your man. I also have a reasonable knowledge of Biblical events and Church history. If you have any questions regarding salvation they should be directed to the speaker or, well, anyone other than me, because, um... Evangelism isn't my spiritual gift. Or something."
Ouch again.
So I really don't know what to do. I guess God knows what to do, and I guess he'll do it, but in the mean time, it's kind of stressful for me.