Camp Ritchie is right by a lake, and surrounded by a majestic forest.

But its most defining features are the large granite boulders.

They are everywhere!

They serve as seats, steps, pathways, foundations, and places to repel down.

Each of my six years attending camp there, I could count on the granite boulders to be there.

They didn’t change.

I remember a leader of mine telling our group on a warm, starry night that she was grateful Christ was the immovable, unchanging foundation of her testimony, just like the rocks that were always waiting in the same place, year after year, at Camp Ritchie.

But I was never the same girl up at camp.

I think of 12-year-old Cali running into camp looking for a good time.

I think of 14-year-old Cali walking into camp with some big questions about whether God was real or not.

I think of 16-year old Cali hoping camp would give her some direction and peace, expecting answers with a sure testimony.

I changed so much at and between girls’ camps.

And the boulders stayed the same.

“A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart… and I will give you an heart of flesh.” (Ezekiel 36:26)

We don’t want stony, stagnant hearts.

Hearts that stay the same over the years.

Hearts that “are just the way that they are”.

We want moldable hearts of real flesh, that grow and change and feel and love and hurt and heal.

But all this change is only possible because of the steadfast, unchanging rock of our redeemer.

He is the rock we can depend on to remove the stony places from our heart.

Happy Studying!

-Cali Black

The post Camp Ritchie first appeared on Come Follow Me Study with Cali Black.