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Sunset at Camp Gideon

Camp Gideon   July 2012
Report by Ann and Andrew Dunsire


Manchester Airport for 3.30 am, signalled the start for our trip to Estonia and Camp Gideon. For Andrew and I this year was the most incredible, spiritually powerful experience of our lives and a two week period that we wish we could hold onto forever!

It was pouring with rain on the day of our arrival but as soon as the children arrived, the sun came out and it was gloriously hot, beautiful sunshine for the whole of the rest of the time at camp, wonderful answer to prayers.

73 children, 33 of us on Team, 15 or so interpreters, approximately 10 foster parents and a few other visitors made up our camp, which was on the most beautiful spread out site right beside the Baltic sea with a lovely beach just a two minute walk away from the camp, on which we spent lots of fun times having sandcastle competitions, playing games on the sand and splashing around in the sea.

The children absolutely loved the beach and would happily have stayed there all day if they could, as would we! Such a different experience to our previous camps at Kostino Orphanage, in that all the children here at Gideon are fostered by the Christian foster parents here and to see the love they showed to them constantly was such a beautiful thing, which was clearly making the children flourish.

Our days began around 5/6 am due to not being able to sleep! However, never once felt remotely tired! Andrew was usually organising worship/slide presentations in the church at 5.30 am (his favourite time of day anyway!!) then 8 am team Bible reading/teaching/worship time when we all gathered to give the day over to the Lord. This, in the beautiful setting of the church sanctuary which overlooked the sea (very inspiring, especially in the evenings as we worshipped and watched the awesome sunsets), then breakfast at 8.45 am (a military operation to get everyone fed and the dishes washed!).

We gathered as a whole group at 10 am each morning and had the main worship and teaching time with all of the children, then would divide into younger children and older for separate teaching times. I was blown away when doing the group time with the 5-9 year olds, we asked them questions such as ‘How does reading the Bible, praying and meeting with other Christians help us to grow?’ and they would immediately start to discuss the Bible reading they had been doing themselves that day. ‘How can you sow seeds of faith for others?’ – two 7 year old boys told us how they had lists written up of all their classmates who did not yet know the Lord and were systematically praying
for every one of them every day.

‘What do you think God will want you to be doing in 10 years’ time?’ Nearly all answered they wanted to be pastors, sharing the Word of God with as many people as possible in their lifetimes. All this from the 5-9 year olds – wow!! On one of these sessions they all had a paper flower and were to write the names of people they wanted to pray for on this, fold over the petals and then float them in a basin of water, slowly opening up the petals to reveal the prayer. An incredibly moving moment as many of them wrote prayers for alcoholic parents, parents in prison etc that they would come to faith in God. One small girl saw that the ink had been washed away from her flower, so knew that God had already taken her prayer to heaven and was answering it at that moment.

The rest of each morning was usually spent doing various crafts such as making windmills, painting seascapes, making crowns, pop-up puppets, jewellery boxes and bracelets, crazy glasses, tapestry,felt crosses, painting pebbles and many other things. Also for the whole week we all worked on making a memory book, recording each daily memory verse, including photos of our colour groups and recording events of the week. After this, there would be a time of outside games most days,which the children all loved.

Lunchtime was followed by siesta! From 4 pm onwards we would have other outside activities going on, such as guitar and drumming lessons, lego & construction building, hair braiding, beauty parlour for the girls, hand massage,time at the beach, and there would also be a little tea party with the carers to which a few team members would go each day, a wonderful opportunity to share tea together and to hear much more from the parents about how they came to foster the children they had. Such moving accounts from each one. They have very specifically asked us all to pray that more and more Christian parents would foster orphaned and abandoned children to give them opportunities that just couldn’t be possible for them any other way.

After dinner each evening we would have computers with Photoshop, video clips and music making software for the older children and a ‘quiet games time’ which would consist of lots of different board games and this was such a lovely time as the children began to wind down a little for the evening. There would then be acted out bedtime stories for the younger children and a separate meeting for the teenagers which almost always included them hearing various peoples’ testimonies of how they came to faith. Extremely powerful meetings in which the Lord moved in dramatic ways on many evenings, especially the last Tuesday, the day on which the power of the Holy Spirit
was poured out in a way we’ve never experienced before in our lives.

This was also the day that three of the teenage girls and many of the younger children gave their hearts to the Lord. Many young people came forward for healing prayer that evening and other teenagers would lay hands on them praying over them and giving them words from the Lord. As this began to happen, the floor started to shake and it felt as though a thousand voices from heaven were praying, the most incredible time, which way overran its scheduled time slot! Much more of the Holy Spirit’s power then happened to different team members in the meeting that followed also. On that day, many of us had prayed that the Holy Spirit would come in such power and the text I had sent to church on the Saturday had also asked for prayer re this, so the Lord certainly answered!

On the last evening, a special concert was held, at which there were many talents displayed, as the children sang, danced, played recorder, performed a very moving mime, and then towards the end, one of the mums spoke so movingly of the amazing time everyone had experienced at camp and, having given the gift from the Messy Church children here in Penicuik earlier in the week to the parents, they had all had their children make special gifts for the children back here.

One of the ladies was a sculptress and taught the children how to make models, so all of these had then been lovingly wrapped in a box and presented to us at the concert to bring back to the children here. They were so moved that children from across the world could be united together in such a way as this.

So, having thought that this was perhaps our last Love Russia camp, now we’re not so sure! Who’s coming with us next year?

Ann and Andrews' full story with pictures will feature in the September issue of the Mungo Messenger, the St. Mungo's monthly newsletter.  Sign up for a copy on the home page of the website if you would like to receive a copy, or ask anyone in the Church.

Penicuik: St. Mungo's Parish Church (Church of Scotland). Scottish Charity No SC005838