Mountaintop Moments Can Fuel Real Growth At Home

Camp highs are real, but they are meant to fuel everyday faith once our kids come back down into normal life. We share four simple practices that help lasting spiritual growth take root, plus what to expect when the post-camp dip hits. 
• the mountaintop as fuel for the valley 
• why emotional momentum fades without deep roots 
• drawing out your child’s story while it is fresh 
• journaling or recording decisions to help them remember 
• setting an “Ebenezer” style physical reminder 
• shrinking big commitments into a daily rhythm 
• plugging into the local church for community and follow-up 

If this episode encouraged you, please share it with another parent who could use it. And like we said, if you’ve got questions or you want some connections to good Christian camps, send us an email, podcast at waynechristian.org. And be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss our next episode. 

Send any questions you want answered to podcast@waynechristian.org

This podcast is presented by Wayne Christian School- A Christ-centered community school whose mission is to assist parents and churches in the education of their children from a biblical worldview to impact their world for Christ. You can learn more at waynechristian.org 

Transcript

The Post-Camp Problem

Luis 0:00

So, Nate, we just got back from camp.

Nate 0:03

You know, there's a special smell of teenagers getting off the church van after a week of camp. Yep.

Luis 0:11

Their hands on a duffel bag full of dirty laundry that has somehow started breathing. Or maybe that's just the the mildew inside the bag that's growing. Possibly, right? Uh it tells you that they've had a fun week of camp, but then they also say they're gonna read their Bible every single day for the rest of their life.

Nate 0:37

And you're really excited because that sounds like an amazing thing, but then Monday comes.

Luis 0:43

Monday always comes, right? Yep, that's exactly right. Then by Thursday, that fire is already flickering.

Nate 0:50

And so here's where we're going today. We're not just going to explain why these mountaintop moments fade away. We're handing four specific things you can actually do after your kid comes back from a mountaintop experience so that they can keep living it out long after.

Luis 1:11

And these are going to be easy to remember, easy to start.

Nate 1:21

Welcome to Equipped for Impact, the podcast designed to assist Christian parents, leaders, and educators to raise up the next generation, to stand firm in their faith, and influence the world for Christ. We're your hosts. I'm Nate and I'm Lewis. And it is summer, which means it's camp season, it's mission trip season. And like we were just saying in that cold open, you've got all of these vans rolling back into the church parking lot full of sunburned, fired up kids ready to go. And every parent has one of those kids asking the same question. How do I help this last? So, Lewis, we're gonna hand them these four practices today about what's actually happening when that fire starts and

The Mountain Fuels The Valley

Nate 2:10

as it starts to fade. So, so what actually is going on in the heart of these kids at this like post-mountaintop moment?

Luis 2:18

Well, let's let's be clear, right? The mountaintop is is real. Like that actually happened. They they're not. Especially if your camp is literally on top of a mountain.

Nate 2:31

You can't just throw teen slang at me like that.

Luis 2:34

I just spent a week at camp with teens, right? Oh, okay, there we go. And so when Jesus took Peter, James, and John up the mountain, and he was transfigured in Luke 9, right? Like that was the realest thing that those guys had ever seen. And Peter wanted to build shelters and stay up there.

Nate 2:52

Yeah, he wanted to literally set up camp on top of the mountain just because it was such an awesome experience seeing Jesus, seeing Moses and Elijah, and it was it was great for him.

Luis 3:04

And Jesus brought them back down though, right? Yep. Because the herding people, the ministry, the work, all of that was all in the valley. And so the mountaintop was never the destination, it was the fuel for the valley. And so, parents, the one thing to know is that we don't try to keep our kids up on the mountain.

Nate 3:25

Yeah, that's exactly right. Because you can't stay there forever. I mean, that was the whole point of Jesus talking to Peter there in Luke 9 was you can't stay up here forever. There's work to do. And so then there's there's another kind of picture that really helps us in the scriptures understand that. And it's it's the parable of the sower and the seed, right? And and there's that time where you know the sower goes out and he's

Why The Fire Fades

Nate 3:50

spreading the seed, and some of it springs up fast. But then in that, it says that the cares of the world really choked it out. And when the sun came, it withered because there was no fruit. And really, that's a good picture of some things that happen at camp, right? It's just an emotional experience, but there's no deep root that helps keep things going in your child's life.

Luis 4:15

Jesus is describing the post-camp crash before camp ever existed. Look at that.

Nate 4:21

What if Jesus ran a summer camp? What would it be like? Have you ever been to Word of Life the Coast? I have. In fact, I think it would be like that. Would it be like that? Except all they ate was like bread and fish. Bread and fish. And it would just be the five loaves and the two fish that was perpetually multiple.

Luis 4:38

They would just go to the tables and there'd be the five loaves of fish, and then the kids just go up and get it.

Nate 4:42

But what if he took those loaves and made French toast? I hope he never would.

unknown 4:47

I hope he never would.

Nate 4:49

But here's the thing, right?

Luis 4:50

The goal is it Jewish toast? Instead of French toast? We need that sound effect that like wah wah. Boots. There you go. But the goal isn't just another high, right? The goal is to develop roots. And here's the good news, parents. Roots don't grow from intensity. They grow from a few simple, repeatable moves that any parent can make. And the good news is that you don't need to be a pastor, a theologian, a Christian school educator, a youth leader, a Sunday school teacher. These are things that you can do as a parent in your home the moment that your kid gets back from camp.

Nate 5:32

Yep, that's exactly right. And so, number one, I think we need to say like these are awesome opportunities. Like if you can send your kid to a camp, we were talking before we hit record about how awesome camp experiences are. If you take your kid on a missions trip, like I tell people all the time, like every teenager, every high schooler should at least go on one mission strip before they graduate just because of the way it opens their eyes to the global church and the work God's doing around the world, right? But like we said, you've

Practice One Tell The Story

Nate 6:00

got to come back. Yeah. And so here are these four things. Number one, it's a good idea to draw out the story from your child of what that mountain trop was like. Yeah.

Luis 6:11

And I think the way that you can do that is within the first few days that they're back, right? So maybe the first two or three days, they those days are gonna matter, right? And those days are important. And almost all of us blow it up with one question immediately, right? We say, Did you have fun? And when we say that, we've just turned this spiritual experience that they've had at camp, and now it just becomes another summer activity. It's somewhere right between the pool and the family vacation. But instead, ask for the story. Say, tell me about a moment that you won't forget. What did you experience? What did God show you? What did God call you to? What what decisions did you make while you were at camp? And you help them to begin to draw it out. You you aren't prying it, you're inviting them to tell you that story.

Nate 7:11

Yeah, that's great. And you can lock down that memory before it fades. And really, I mean, you can even have them write it down. This is a good time to journal, or on that drive home, you're just really having those conversations, asking them those questions. What did God say? What did you decide? Like, what were you convicted about? Because your memory is a terrible filing cabinet. And so you need to do something. One of one of my favorite, you mentioned Word of Life Camp. When you were down there, did they do the cardboard testimonies? They did, yes. Okay, so you're like, you have on the the, it's literally for those of you that have not seen them, it's like a a piece of cardboard and they have kids write your before on one side of the cardboard and then your after on the other side. And they get up and it's this big, it one, it streamlines a testimony service so you don't get those people that hog the mic. It also helps the shy kid express themselves, they don't actually have to say anything. So it's like you show your before, then you flip it and show your after. And so doing something like that, and you can even record it on your phone with your kid and have that as a reference point before it all starts to fade away.

Luis 8:14

Yeah. And you can't live out a dis uh a decision, you can't live out a choice if you don't remember making it.

Nate 8:23

Yep. So that's that's your first one

Practice Two Set A Reminder

Nate 8:25

is draw out that story. So the second thing you can do is to set up something that's gonna help you remember. You can set up a stone, so to speak. Yeah. And this really comes from an old testament story where like, Lewis, have you ever what is the name of that hymn now? But it the line in the the original was like, Here I raise my Ebenezer. If you remember it, okay. And then like old, you know, younger people today hear that and they're like, Ebenezer, like Ebenezer Scrooge? Like, who That's who I think about. Is that who you think about because you're young? Are you young? I'm young, okay. But I just got back from camp. Are you if you're feeling young? I'm young. Straight facts. So it that actually comes from an old testament story. It it's an old term for just a pile of stones or like a monument. And that's from when the Israelites crossed the Jordan River to go conquer the land. This is in the book of Joshua, and they they crossed that the you know, God had stopped the river from flowing so that they could all march across. And what God had them do was go get 12 stones and set it up on the you know, the other side of the river so that it would be a physical reminder for what God had done for them. So later they would be walking past after they'd conquered the land and they've got their kids with them, the next generation, and they they ask, you know, what are these stones? And they'd have the opportunity to stop and tell them the story about that physical reminder and what God had done for them.

Luis 9:57

And I think that's a genius idea because our days are very visual, right? Like we run on autopilot looking at the same things. Like, have you ever been driving and you're not distracted by your phone or anything, but then all of a sudden you're like, wait, how did I get to Berkeley Boulevard? Like your mind was just on something else, and you were driving and you were seeing it.

Nate 10:19

Especially if you don't live in our town, because then if you're on Berkeley, then you're really lost. You're really lost, right?

Luis 10:24

And so then it's like, how did I like like how how did I get here? But it's because we look at the same things every day, and then your brain just kind of forgets that they're there, right? And so we interrupt the routine by giving them by giving them something that they're going to see every single day. Anything physical that they're actually gonna notice. And so maybe it's a token on the desk, maybe it's the verse that defined the week on a card and they tape it inside their Bible. Maybe if they had a commitment and they and and they brought home a commitment card, one of the things that the Word of Life Camp did is they gave them a birth certificate for anybody that made a profession of faith in Christ, and it was their it was their new birth certificate. It was like a little index card that had the date that they gave their life to Jesus, right? So maybe something like that that they bring home and they put it on the mirror. Maybe it's even the f lock screen on their phone, right? Because we know they're going to picture a camp or whatever. Absolutely. And so it doesn't have to be something that is grandiose, right? And maybe it's even a way to redeem the lock screen. We just finished up a few episodes ago about technology, right? Yeah. Find a way to redeem it. And then parents build one of your own, like right next to theirs. So when they ask what yours is, you can tell your story too. And that's what Josh was talking about in Joshua 4. That when somebody asks what does that mean, they can tell the story.

Nate 11:56

Yeah. I've actually got one in my office from it was a mission strip I took to Ecuador. I led my youth group when I was a youth pastor. And as we left, one of the locals from the the church in the village there that we'd been working with, he actually had hand-carved this miniature yoke, you know, like you would put two animals in to plow. And he wrote something in their native language, the the Qichua language. But he he presented that to us and said, like, this is us, right? We're we're laboring together two animals in the yoke, even though I'm in Ecuador, you're back in the United States. And so I have that little thing. And so anytime I do that, I think of him. He passed away, he's with the Lord now. But but you know, that missions trip, it's a physical reminder that sits on my shelf in my office that reminds me of the work we got to do in in Ecuador. And so good. Anything like that would really help for for for your child. And it can be, there's lots of different options, but something physical

Practice Three Build A Rhythm

Nate 12:55

to set a reminder.

Luis 12:56

And then the next thing that we need to do is we need to shrink it into a rhythm. Like it needs to become a part of their daily life, right? And I think this may be the most important part, right? Because inspiration, it gets you started, but habit is what keeps you going. And so if the daily schedule doesn't change, then life doesn't change, right? And so you take that big mountaintop commitment and you shrink it down to one small thing that they can actually keep doing. It doesn't have to be big.

Nate 13:27

Yeah, it's it's something small, right? And we've talked about how to take a daily pause and just, you know, read, review to pray, you know, go through a couple of verses. Maybe it's a a a Bible verse that really stuck out to you from that time, and you just ri recite it over to yourself. And it's something like that, that it it doesn't have to take long, right? Just a couple of minutes. Maybe you've got a reminder on your phone that'll just, you know, ping at you and tell you to go. And you know, it's it's something that you can go to th you know throughout the day, and it's a rhythm built into what you're doing.

Luis 14:07

And a few episodes ago, actually it was the episode before this one, we talked about putting your phone in a specific spot where you don't reach for it, right? Right. It's not the first thing you do in the morning. And so maybe you'd train your children, you help your children have this become the first thing they do, right? Maybe they redeem the first 10 minutes of their day, right? These minutes where they can spend just reflecting back on these Bible verses where they can reflect on what God did. And and you can do it with them, right? Don't don't do it at them. We we we talked about this in uh several episodes about family devotions, right? You don't need a production, it doesn't need to be fancy, it doesn't need to be huge. Don't go out and buy a fancy journal. Maybe it's just an index card, right? Right.

Nate 14:59

Yep, that's really important. And and so the routine helps protect that time so that you can keep moving forward and in these, you know,

Practice Four Plug Into Church

Nate 15:10

decisions that your child has made. Which then this kind of leads us into number four, which is to really plant them in the body of Christ, put them in the local church.

Luis 15:23

Yep. Camp is like a parachute drop, right? Yep. It's awesome, it's intense, but it's temporary. The local church, and this is one thing that I loved hearing at the camp that we were at last week, they kept going back to this that you need to go back to where you actually live and you need to serve and be a part of a church where you are located. And we've done several episodes on the importance of the role of the church. And so when your child comes home and they're on to borrow a cliche, fire for the Lord, uh, get them connected before that fire dies down. Make a commitment to put them in a youth group, make a commitment to have them serve in their church so that people who still know them will be able to see what they're doing, not in the summer, but October, November, December.

Nate 16:22

Yep. Yep. And they've got a specific person, right? Probably a youth leader, maybe a youth leader who went with them to camp who can continue that in their life, right? And and have them share that commitment with somebody. Uh, maybe it's a Sunday school teacher, a small group leader, somebody at church, because then it's not just you as the parent who's holding them accountable, but there's these other people in the body of Christ who are going to follow up and say, hey, you know, how are you doing on that decision you made? Like how are things going? Maybe you decide to cut something out of your life, or maybe you're trying to start some type of spiritual habit, whatever it is, they can keep following up. And it's not just a private thing, it's not just a family thing, it's a community thing where your child's connected within the body of Christ.

Luis 17:10

And then it becomes a community, not just a memory, right? Yep. Because they were never meant to charge their battery once a year.

Nate 17:20

Yep, that's exactly right. So these are four really practices, great practices you can do to help, you know, solidify these decisions in your child's life and continue them throughout the year as they come down into the valley of everyday life. But there's a couple of things really that you can expect

Brace For The Dip

Nate 17:40

as we keep moving forward in this, as you help your child walk through this. So, what what are those things, Liz?

Luis 17:46

So the first one, parents, is is brace for the dip, right? Because here's the thing the glow is going to fade two or three weeks out, and then you're gonna panic. You're gonna be like, oh no, it it wasn't real. My kid really didn't get saved, my kid really didn't experience that. It was just all emotion. Uh I failed. No, just just breathe, right? I love how Paul puts it in First Corinthians. He says, I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. Parents, you're not the Holy Spirit, right? You can do the planting, you can do the watering, you can keep the soil soft, but ultimately it's God's role, it's God's responsibility. He is the one that produces the growth. And that's the best news, right? Yeah. And then that leads us into the second thing.

Nate 18:33

Yep. The second thing, and that is watch out for the seven-day old prophet. Yeah. Like that it it's it's kind of a funny way to point it, but the idea is your kid had this mountaintop experience, and then they come home and they're looking down on everyone else who didn't go with them, right? Maybe their siblings are doing something that they were convicted of and have stopped, and now they're looking down on them like they're the horrible, sinful people, or you know, you even as the parent aren't spiritual enough and and nobody gets them. And you can just coach

Beware The Seven-Day Prophet

Nate 19:05

them through that gently, recognizing that, you know, people didn't have the same experience you did, right? But you don't have to lecture them and expect them to have the same experience you had just because you shared what God did in your life. It's it's an attitude change, and you know, it can be something that you can walk your child through so that they don't get that spiritual arrogance from you know just a great experience that they had that then just ruins everything.

Luis 19:37

Yep. I love that. That's that's a really good thing, Nate. And you know, remember, parents, the dip is not the death, right? Uh the God who lit that fire is not finished just because the summer camp ended.

Nate 19:47

That's exactly right. So, Lewis, you know, what what encouragement would you give to parents as they are helping walk their children through this post-camp, post-mission strip, mountaintop high?

Luis 19:59

Well, number one, parents, I'd say if if you don't have a place to send your child this summer, um, it's not too late, right? Hopefully you can get plugged in to a camp. Unless you're listening to this in uh November. Winter, yeah. Yeah, then it's too late. Although there are winter camps. There are, there are. Anyway. But if maybe you're looking for a camp, maybe you're like, okay, like our church doesn't do a camp, or is you know, what's a good camp that you might recommend, email us, right? Yep, podcast at waynechristian.org. And we'd be happy to share some resources with you on some really good camps that that we know about. I think every teenager should go to camp and experience it. There's just something about that. So that's the first encouragement that I would give you. Here's the second encouragement that I would give you. Pick one of these things, right? It's it's

Next Steps And How To Reach Us

Luis 20:45

not too late. Whether your kid got back from camp this week, last week, three weeks ago, four weeks ago, whenever that was, find somewhere that you can implement what we've talked about. And then the third thing is when the dip comes, trust the gardener, right? The mountaintop was for the vision, but the valley is where the fruit grows. And God is the one who is gardening their soul, right? Your job is faithfulness, but God is going to produce the growth.

Nate 21:15

That's exactly right. So thank you all for listening today to Equipped for Impact. And if this episode encouraged you, please share it with another parent who could use it. And like we said, if you've got questions or you uh want some connections to good Christian camps, send us an email, podcast at WayneChristian.org. And be sure to subscribe so you don't miss our next episode. But until then, keep leading the next generation to stand firm in their faith and influence the world for Christ.