Skiles Drama at its Greatest

So this evening I was innocently checking Facebook in my room in the basement. Rebekah was in the bathroom down here dying her t-shirt, Susannah was upstairs on the computer, and Abigail was out in the garden. The rest of the family was out harvesting. Well, I heard this crash and then these frantic tweets and the fluttering of wings.

*Let me take you back for a moment to last summer, when Rebekah and I came home from school to an empty house. I was going down to the basement room when I heard this shrieking sound coming from this little black mass of something on the floor. Rebekah and I, amidst lots of random screams and nervous steps down the basement stairs, discovered that it was a nest full of Chimney Swifts that had fallen down out of our chimney onto the floor. Our basement isn't quite finished yet, see. That was quite the experience.*

So this time, I knew it was the birds again. But...they were big this time, and they were flying.

*Let me take you back again to when I was little. My uncle had a parakeet named Buddy (that was supposed to be a boy but kept laying eggs...so apparently not) and sometimes it would fly around the house. I remember screaming and hiding under my aunt's bed because I was so scared. I like little birds chirping outside and I like shooting pheasants and dove and quail and eating them, but I do NOT like birds flying around in small places where they might hit me in the head.*

Okay, back to the story. So I took a few tentative steps toward the commotion and at the same moment I saw a bird flying into the porch door upstairs and one flying right toward me! I screamed pretty much at the top of my lungs and bolted for my bedroom slamming the door behind me. I could hear the bird flying into things outside. I yelled at the top of my lungs for help over and over again and finally my sisters came around. Rebekah, totally oblivious, came out of the bathroom to the washing machine, when suddenly the bird flew right toward her. SHE shrieked and dropped to the floor in a heap, then pulled the laundry basket over her head. By now the poor bird was behind the washing machine, apparently quite stuck. Abigail and Susannah climbed on top of the washing machines to try to dig it out. You should have heard our dialogue:

Me: Why don't you get a net? Do we have a net?
Abby: I have my fish net, but it's like "this" big.
Me: Oh well. Maybe if we got a hoe. Do you think? (I'm still peeking out from behind my door)
Abby gives up and climbs down, then Rebekah puts the laundry basket down and braves the task.
Rebekah: Here, birdy, birdy. Come on. Ah! (wings fluttering)
Me: Is it out?
Rebekah: No, it just moved. Stop moving!
Susannah: You WANT it to move, Rebekah, you're trying to get it out.

So Abigail leaves, I'm not sure why, because she was the bravest one there. I decide to go look for some sort of tool and bring in a rake. Suddenly the bird flies out of where it is hiding and slams right into the light, and dive bombs into a pile of cardboard boxes. Of course, we're all screaming while it's in flight, ducking and running. And then we were quoting Pete's Dragon:
"And then, he smiled at me."
"Well, did you smile back?"
"I didn't have TIME to smile back! I was too busy RUNNING!"

We all three tentatively start picking away at the boxes, calling for the bird and even whistling for it. I suggested we find some birdseed and lure it out, but you know, that wasn't really considered as a valid option.

Then, we found it, sitting askew on a board. We didn't know what to do, although we considered scooping it into a box, but we were afraid it would fly again. So we called Abigail and she came back downstairs and scooped it up in her hands and took it outside. She set it on the slide and it flew away. End of story. At least it was a happy one. We were afraid it broke itself when it hit the light.

Abigail: It's just a poor little bird scared to death.
Me: IT'S scared to death? What about me? It flew into my head!

So how many Skiles girls does it take to get a bird out of the basement? Abigail, apparently.

So, that was camp

For you are great and do wondrous things;
you alone are God.
Teach me your way, O LORD,
that I may walk in your truth.

The Lord truly did great and wondrous things at camp. And most of them revolved around revealing His truth to the girls I was with. It was really beautiful.

The week I counseled high school girls, one of the speakers shared about "toxic faith," or lies that we believe as truth. It fascinated me that this very thing is what the Lord has been trying to teach me this past year, and it was so good to see the Lord open my girls' eyes and show them the very things He has been proving to me - that they are beautiful, cherished, and loved. We had lots of good talks complete with tears and thank-you prayers. The Lord also gave me the opportunity to teach the girls afternoon Bible study for the week! I got to share on Thursday and Friday, and just shared about Hannah and Leah, two of my current favorite Bible women, and all that the Lord did for them and in them. It was really cool. I am always so thankful for any chance to teach, since it's kind of in my blood, but this time I was just really humbled by the fact that the Lord opened the door for me. It was so kind of Him. A girl in my cabin trusted Christ, too, after years of pretending to be a believer. And I got to spend time with one of my favorite boys in the world, who trusted Christ when he was 13, a few years ago, and is doing really well spiritually. He has the hardest life of almost anyone I know, but he is pressing on to know the Lord and it's so cool to see.

The second week was quite a stretching one. I was speaking at KBC for the girls grade school week. I had never been the only speaker at the week of camp, for morning and evening messages, and I must confess, that was pretty hard. Coming straight from school to working at the cemetery and then straight to camp two weeks after school, I definitely didn't feel as prepared as I would have like to have been, but that's okay, because the Lord had important things to teach me about dependence on Him and not on my own ability. Frankly, after I teach (anything, English, writing, Bible) I can generally feel like, "Yep, that went pretty well." But this week I didn't feel that way very much at all. One of my close friends who was counseling said that sometimes she did find it hard to follow the messages, even. That was pretty humbling. But the Lord used them - and even to teach the girls what I felt the Lord wanted as my objective. One girls said she learned more about Jesus' sacrifice for us, another about God's great love, another about the fact that she herself was special and loved, and one told me, after an especially difficult message, "Ms. Liz, that message was for me." So, the Lord was reminding me that it is His work and He only calls me to obey.

I was reminded one evening that it's actually kind of silly that when we have a hard week we talk about dependence on the Lord, when in reality we have to live every day depending on Him. It's true. But He does use those hard days to remind us, oh so vividly, that we have to trust Him for everything.

Thank you for praying. God did prove Himself strong and victorious through the two weeks of camp, and I'm thankful. It's back to work now. I'm not sure I'm ready to face the rest of the summer on a lawn mower, but it's again that daily dependence on my Lord. He will carry me through. :)