By Jordan Beach
As a seasoned Glisson counselor, Alex Lee, a Reinhardt University digital storytelling major, greeted Glisson employees with a cheerful “cho boi,” their signature greeting adopted from an African chant meaning “welcome home.”
While completing projects on the Campus Ministries Spring Break mission trip on what was many of the Reinhardt team’s first time at Glisson Camp & Retreat Center, the Glisson staff made Reinhardt students feel as if they were being welcomed to a new home.
Campus Ministries traveled to the Dahlonega-based camp with nine Reinhardt students to spend the week providing hundreds of incoming campers with a summer that includes exploration of their faith and discoveries in nature.
The first two days included the creation of a hiking trail and destruction of wooden pallets. The end of the week utilized the wood to construct a bridge and extend the outdoor chapel at Outpost, Glisson’s outdoor summer program. Other projects included painting benches and spreading mulch and gravel.
Lee has spent the past two summers as an Outpost counselor and knows firsthand how much the Reinhardt team’s work will make an impact this summer.
“The work we did truly transformed much of the camp and will allow Glisson counselors to more easily affect the lives of the many campers joining us over the whole year,” Lee said. “While to some the effect may seem small, there is no overstating the impact those small changes can have.”
The group bonded throughout the week with devotionals and worship sessions in their cabins and joined the University of North Georgia Wesley Foundation for worship on Ash Wednesday.
Student body president Levi Cochran ’19 described the break away from campus as “both fulfilling and emptying.”
“The week was fulfilling in the sense that we were able to see the fruits of our work directly and emptying in the sense that we allowed God to use all the energy we gave Him in pursuit of serving others,” said Cochran. “It was a perfect way to spend a break away from the world of academia.”
Campus Ministries plans to travel again in Fall 2019 for a Fall Retreat at Camp Gideon.
