MASH

I believe Ministers’ Adolescent Support Happenings (MASH) is one of the best things the Alabama Baptist Convention does. For those who don’t know, MASH is a camp for ministers’ kids held yearly at Shocco Springs Convention Center in Talladega.

I would like to thank my church, Glynwood Baptist, Prattville, for sending my brother and me to MASH. If it weren’t for them paying the fee, I never would have had such an awesome experience.

This year MASH was incredible. It’s the best so far. The main thing I learned is to put all my trust in God.

On the last night of MASH we always take the Lord’s Supper. This year when it came time for the communion service, we were ushered outside where the camp director, Terry Brown, was sitting by a fire pretending to be Peter. He described how he had denied Jesus three times and then led us down to an open field where a cross lay on the ground. He described the Last Supper they had with Christ. After we had taken the bread and the cup, he left. I heard everyone falling to the ground, some on their knees, some even lower.

Somehow, I doubt I was the only one there who was eating grass. I must have been there for an hour — just sitting there and praying.

When I ran out of things to say to God, I asked Him to speak to me. I could already feel the Holy Spirit moving, and now it was overwhelming. I didn’t hear a voice speaking to me, but I began to remember Scriptures, some I had learned in Bible drill, some I thought I had forgotten. All of them in some way related to my life lately and told me what I needed to do to straighten things out.

I went to MASH this year with the thought that it would be the worst week yet because the man who had led MASH since the beginning was no longer running it. The main thing I learned this week is that you must always be willing to face change and just trust God.

Russell G. Platt
Prattville, Ala.