How Camping Can Connect You to God

Hey what's up guys welcome to the GovVenture podcast. Today we're going to be talking about one of the more frequently asked questions that we're given which is mainly about why we are motivated to go out camping and what motivates us to go do something that's really rough and sometimes not always fun you know because camping doesn't always go smoothly it can be cold it can be rainy and it can be not always just glamorous but we enjoy it. And for our verse today I'm going to share a story from First Kings. First Kings 17 there's a little passage there I'm going to read from but the specific one I'm going to read is four. So you shall drink from the brook and I have commanded the Ravens to feed you there. And this specific thing is God telling Elijah to go out and basically go camping and he's going to provide for him there. And I was reading and doing some research on camping in the Bible when it shows up and when I did that I actually saw that there was a lot of times especially in Old Testament where God sends people out and he does this they call it camping but they have tents and it's basically that. And so he does it so that they can he can show them that he is enough that you don't need all these things to have life to sustain life and that a lot of times he's trying to teach you something. In this specific story here he's about to tell Elijah about and prepare Elijah that there's going to be a drought coming up and so he needs to prepare his nation and the people that listen to him as a prophet for that. And then in the next little section here he actually raises someone from the dead by pleading with God and asking God to do that. And so I mean he prepared him for that as well. I'm not saying that God's about to because you go camping that you come back and you raise someone from the dead but he could definitely teach you something out there if you go out and you listen to the whispers that he gives you. And so that's one big reason why we really like camping is that we can get out away from everything and I'm a firm believer in the worship so coverages the better your prayer service is. So really lean into that when you guys go outside and we're going to talk a little bit about today about why we like camping and why you should go camping as well. And then we'll talk about a few different easy ways to get into it and some different types as well. Yeah I really want to pick you back off that bro that's good. Yeah and part of the reason why me personally I enjoy camping is just because you don't realize how much in a day that you're on your phone and you're connected to the world. And I think when your focus is not primarily on God or if you're distracted mainly you're not going to be able to hear God's voice and that's why you know when you like what you say when people are out in the wilderness trying to discern what God's saying and let him lead them and be their provider when you're literally out in the wilderness for me it's like I get more in touch with who I am as a person and I get to enjoy you know good company and not have to be interrupted by anything else or like what I have to do about work when I get back and my other priorities. So it really kind of grounds you in a weird way and it's not even just because of where you're going it's just because you're away from everything and being out in nature just really gives you a spiritual refresh. Yeah Robert do you have anything to add to that? Yeah I think that was really really solid Nathan when you were my name this quote I actually just write it today from the book The Reefless Elimination of Hurry. It's a little bit of a twist. It does a tongue twist right there. Yeah. So the quote says because what you give your attention to is the person you become to put another way that mine is the portal to the soul and what you fill your mind with will shape the trajectory of your character and the end your life is no more than the sum of what you give your attention to. I think that quote is really convicting because it all we're giving our if 98% of our day is spent on social media or on our phones or calling or doing work or emails or texting and that's just screen time alone and then you have other things drawing your attention away. We have a million different things in our culture pooling for our attention all the time but there's really only one thing that matters within the day and we seldom make time for it. And that's why I like camping in the wilderness because you get outside and all those distractions disappear like when you're looking at when you're on top of a mountain you're staring off into the sunset or at sunrise or when you're standing beside a tall stream with like a little brook babbling on fire when you're standing in the ocean and you see the waves crashing and all that just disappears the whole world just disappeared and then that moment is just your soul and God. I mean that's why I think the wilderness is something you really just try to get into. Yeah and it's not really hard when you actually get out there it's not really hard to immerse yourself in that environment because I think us as humans were really good at kind of shrinking the world down to what we see on a daily basis and that includes God too like God so big and he can do things in so many different places in so many different ways. And when we kind of when we pray sometimes we we be praying about the things that are going on in our life in our town but that being said when we get out to the wilderness and that world kind of disappears you know nothing else is able to influence you on who you are because I know I've had different influences from my work from my church from my other friends and they they have sayings where you're the sum of the of the five people that you're closest to and you know that's why they say you got to be close to God and like yeah like I said being out there really gives you a connection to who you are and almost like a grounding that you really can't get from geographically being anywhere else in my opinion so that's awesome. Yeah and some of you set off of community is like the the the the sum of your your five closest friends like that's the other thing you get to build when you go out on a camping trip with some friends or family or whoever you're going to be really close to those people physically actually and and just kind of have good conversations with them and being out of a decision around a campfire and talk to people and not have any other distractions or anything on your mind if like this is what I have to go do next or whatever you get to have some really good conversation and working through stuff together is another big thing like eat some stuff doesn't go well all the time like we talked about earlier sometimes it rains sometimes it's hard to build a fire sometimes you have to build something to be able to have some shelter or something like that but being able to kind of work through stuff as well is another big thing that why you get to build community so communities another big thing that I think is really good about camping specifically that you're working through stuff and you're building shelter cooking dinner stuff like that that you weren't necessarily do if you were hiking like yes you can get out in nature and see awesome stuff and be able to connect to God through nature but when you go and go camping and spend time with close friends and that kind of thing that that's kind of a whole other level I think. Yeah and there's not many opportunities I mean like you say where stuff's going to go down like real you know problems that actually make you worried and like maybe even a lap of death since and you're with like your friends there's very rare instances well you'll be in that situation you know in like a safe environment and your neighborhood or in your community and I don't know if this is only a guy thing I feel like it might be I could be wrong but whenever for me when we go out and do these adventures and crap goes wrong I it's still like I you look back on those memories and like even it's such a kind of like it's a fond memory and I remember when I was reading this book by John Eldridge called Wild at Heart he was describing people it's a book about Christian masculinity the book was talking about how some people were recalling some of their most dangerous life moments one of them was like some guy was out at sea with his buddies sailing and a huge storm rolled in and it was like an actual situation where the boat could have tipped and they could have died easily and he he looked back talking about that saying that was one of the best memories of my life so not saying that you go out and try to go in danger but it definitely you know it shows your character and it definitely shows you know what kind of your friends when you're with them like what kind of bond you guys have and it's crazy yeah it builds it makes you build trust real fast with someone I these guys like to go rock climbing a lot I'm not too experienced with that but I have gone repelling a few times and I remember my buddy will will bread this is shout out to will bread by the way dude you rock we went repelling in De Launega into like so De Launega was where the first gold rush was in the United States ever and so there's a bunch of old abandoned mind shafts and we went repelling into one of these mind shafts and it was terrifying like there's a lot of trust in him and that his work was good quality yeah it was so cool like it was such a great like you like you said a very very fond memory despite how dangerous it was but it took a lot of trust and like I remember lean over the edge and I said a few words I can't repeat it on here I was like I'm going forward you go for it and I just went down but it was a lot of fun but it builds a lot of trust when you rely on someone a situation like that you know you can rely on them in real life as well was it worth it when you did it oh so worth it it was so I do it again I want to take these guys actually one day that sounds sick that actually sounds the same I really do like repelling and most of the time I do it it's like just out of next it easier to like because when we go outside like outdoors climbing like we go up to Yona or the kind of easiest place to get into outdoor climbing is Indian seats that's in the area and whenever I'll set up the quick draws and all the the rigging up the top it's easier to just repel down instead of walking around so and it's just more fun and too so I definitely enjoy repelling and something off of what Nathan said earlier with wild at heart there's also a girl version of the book that's actually co-written with John Eldridge and his wife Stacey Eldridge and that's called captivating so if you are a girl that's listening to this definitely recommend that book as well and even if you're a guy I recommend reading both of the books no matter if you're a guy or a girl just because it helps you understand the opposite sex better yeah which is important when you're 20 or 22 and everybody trying to get married yeah yeah yeah what an understanding the desires of the other person's heart like and understanding what your role is and but more importantly what God's role is in that is I think why it's helped pull to read both of the books especially as a guy you don't necessarily think about the girl's perspective I don't know about girls I'm not a girl so I don't know if girls really kind of think I kind of understand that but I'm guessing not I'm guessing girls don't understand as well either as what guys are doing so I definitely recommend both of those books there so let's talk about a little bit of the different types of camping to get into Robert's kind of our expert on backpacking some mess Robert to kind of explain backpacking and kind of what that's like backpacking is really cool and I wouldn't let it intimidate you because I know it is kind of like the first time I did it I was a little intimidating because your packing everything you need into a backpack and you're going out to the woods for sometimes a few days at a time you're like really really like well prepared you've been doing this for a while and you've got a lot of experience you can go out for even longer than that I would recommend for if you're doing it for the very first time just going for an overnight backpacking trip backpacking is cool because you're really relying on like one your ingenuity two your preparedness and three like you're just throwing everything that you have in the backpack that you're going to need and then you rely on that and if you don't have what you need or if you forgot something you guys got to be really resourceful in making making ends meet like per se let's say you get out there and a really big thing with backpacking is almost anywhere in the United States you're going to run into bears they've learned the backpackers and people are camping is really easy to get free food off these people because they just have a ton of trash and so you got to do a bear bag and you had to tie it up and let's say that you forget your bear bag all of a sudden you've got to find out what to do with these goods that you have with this trash and this leftover food or else you can have a bear showing up in your camp in the middle of the night and so it wakes you can't be kind of resourceful you eat it all yeah you burn in the fire you got to make something do with like let's say you got a trash bag with you and some rope or if you got like a t-shirt you can tie it up and sort of way and tie it up something like that I don't really know it's I've been running that issue before now we don't want you to get intimidated by a bad thing it's not super crazy I mean yes you can go on these lawn trips like if people do the Appalachian trail that's how they do it is they have everything in the backpack but you can also just get your normal school backpack and put all your stuff in there with some friends and kind of share the load that you're carrying and go do something fun that's something else you can do and I really like backpacking specifically because you're able to like go on a mountain and go camping where you wouldn't be able to do that normally like you can drive up to the top of the mountain usually so that can be something that is kind of a unique thing about backpacking do you have anything else ed robber yeah I would just I want to take a real quick second to recommend a few items if it's your first time going out there like Matt said don't be intimidated there's really not a lot you have to bring if you got like a chance for a backpack or something like that you can go backpacking just as well as a guy with like a 40 liter R.I backpack and so you just first of all you need a backpack yeah and I mean we also talked a lot about this gear on the one of the previous podcast so if you want to go back and listen to the gear episode you can learn a lot more about it but basically you're just thinking about everything you need for camping putting it in a backpack so you want to think about weight and you want to think about size and that kind of thing yeah so you'll think need for sure water need a little bit of food supplies like granola bars are really good some that's easy to pack you'll want to sleep in bag you won't attend or an ENO and you want to fresh clip pair of clothes and then you can pack a little like survival kit which is just a Catholic and emergency big blanket matches things like that that'll help you start a fire and that's really all you need to go back back here for the first time what's crazy is it's like when Matt was talking about managing your weight too there's different ways to actually approach that packing and some people like to carry like a ton of stuff like extra things but and then there's other people out there who I've heard because I was at a REI one time and the people who work at REI are absolutely like they work there because they're outdoorsy so I've met people there who have literally they go camping with like no tent but no like mattress to sleep on and they just take a tarp and they go super lightweight and they just try like speed run the Appalachian Trail and they're like 50 years old too yeah that's what's really cool about hiking is that you can actually do it with even if you're older like hiking is one of those activities that you know longevity doesn't really matter with it you can still like go out and participate in hiking and going out in nature yeah and maybe that counts for camping is too yeah yeah those I mean that's definitely kind of the brief on on backpacking but something that's a little bit easier to get out of and we might have should have talked about this first but the easiest way to really get into this and it's super super easy to go camping is just go rent a campsite nearby you can go over to Lake Lanier that's probably the closest place to go and you can rent a campsite for like 20 30 bucks for a night and then that's just gonna have flat little area you have a little campfire spot you I think they also showers and that kind of thing included in your in your nightly fee and so that's probably the easiest way to get into it and you can go buy a tent for really cheap you can even if you don't have a tent you don't want to go spend money on tent and you just want to spend a little bit more money on like a campsite thing it's not necessarily camping I guess but you can go over a lot of state parks that actually have like yurts and things like that they're like little circular buildings that people will stay in as well and so those are cool things to do just go check out a state park near you and you can check out that that's an easy way to get into camping yes so like another thing off of that where I was talking about those where you just pull into the parking lot and then you camp right there that's essentially car camping you can go over and I just camp right there next to your vehicle a lot of times people will do where they just they have an air mattress grant Gilbert used to do this a lot where he would lay down his seats in his forerunner and just put an air mattress in there and just camp in there that's a cool way to do things as well as far as camping you can do over landing like we've talked about as well where you go and you have off road cable vehicle and then you can go out and camp unlike up in up in the mountains and places that you can't get a normal vehicle to and so that's an option you can get tents for that and all that kind of stuff as well and that's a lot of fun so really just any way that you want to get into camping that's definitely something we would recommend you should definitely try to check out do you guys have any stories I've like just one or two stories you guys want to share of just kind of cool camping stories where you've kind of seen God in nature for us to close with yeah I got one man there's this really cool place in the north Georgia and the Launaga area called Preacher's Rock and it's along the Appalachian Trail and one time I went I went camping for the actually I think it was the very first time I went camping there was in November freezing cold I tried to do it in the you know it was a terrible idea brace the suck though and I woke up in the morning and I caught the most beautiful sunrise it was red my very rarely see red sunrise like that like it was it was absolutely beautiful I had to go to work immediately afterwards up before everyone else just looking to sunrise by myself I mean I think I still have a picture of it I might send it to Matt and put it on the Instagram show it to you guys it was just a beautiful sunrise and a great way to start the day yeah this that's really cool I mean I have a kind of pretty story to add to that one of the first times I went like backpacking was I went camping on Yona mountain and it was miserably cold I also did the e-no thing and I was like oh this new sleeping bag is going to be great and it was horribly it was so cold and I woke up and I like couldn't feel my toes and it was just like I can't wake up there the night like begging God for the sunrise early and when the sun finally rose it was one of my favorite sunrise ever seen and so this it's a constant daily reminder of how God is faithful and awesome sunrise comes up and you're like wow and if you just wake up early you'd be like yeah and God's God's still there for us and he is almighty let's have a little verse about joy coming in the morning you experience that in my friends yes yes that's definitely a good yeah that's it thanks guys for listening to the GovVenture Podcast today we hope you enjoyed and we hope you learned a little bit about camping and that we encouraged you to go out and go camping and feel free to let us know if you have any questions on our Instagram account about good campsites to check out and there's definitely lots of good things and just look for state parks and different things like that around you but we hope that you enjoyed it and we hope that you learned something if you did We would love you to leave a review and just let us know what you learned in that review and give us a follow on Instagram so you can see some of the stuff that we're talking about in this podcast as well. Thanks again for listening to GovVenture Podcast, see you out on the trail.