Thank you for inquiring to lead on Lee Abbey Camp 2019! Lee Abbey Camp has been running since 1948. It was originally set up as a camp to get inner city kids who had never seen fields or the sea to experience a week in Devon. Camp has continued to grow since then and now we welcome up to 220 13-18 year olds over 2 weeks.
Camp has its own vision statement and values which allow Camp to be uniquely camp whilst also reflecting the Lee Abbey Movement.
"Our vision is to gather and inspire young people to discover their true identity in Christ, enabling them to live out the generous love of God in their community and the world."
Below are our values, we want to create a camp community that centres around these values and are present in everything we do.
LOVING - SIMPLICITY - HONESTY - FUN - ENCOUNTERING GOD
Loving
We want to reflect Jesus in the way that we love the campers and each other.
Simplicity
Camp life is simple: sleeping in tents, cooking on fires, no internet or phone signal and we like it that way. We want to create space, free from life's normal distractions and complexities so that campers can experience God in His beautiful creation.
Honest
We want a community that is honest, authentic and real.
Fun
We want camp to be ridiculously fun. Laughter is obligatory.
Encountering God
We want every camper (and leader) to encounter God at camp. It might be for the very first time, or the hundredth, but we pray that these encounters would transform the campers' lives and bring them closer to Jesus.
The camp is run at Lee Abbey Devon – although we are only there for 2 weeks in the summer, over 100 other people live there all year round in Christian community. When we come to camp we join the community for the duration of our stay. We do this by making 'Green Badge Promises' which all community members say upon arrival.
They are:
- Do you affirm before the Community your personal faith in Christ and your desire through prayer, study and service to seek a deep and mature faith?
- Do you understand by this that your mind, your time, your talents, your possessions and all your relationships are to be increasingly surrendered to Christ as Lord?
- Do you promise to be loyal to the Community in its aims, its work, its standards of behaviour, and its disciplines?
We know that we will all be struggling with different sins and issues and so recognise we come as imperfect leaders, but hold onto our perfect Saviour as our Lord, and as our example who we strive to follow. We would want leaders to be regularly turning away from sin and coming to meet with our God of grace in His Word and by prayer.
This means that we agree to live as Christians who sit under the Word of God and obey His commands.
The Lee Abbey Movement believes in Jesus Christ as the only way of salvation through grace and by faith. It upholds the orthodox Christian position on many issues including sexuality and marriage. We know that within the church there are different views on some issues, and at camp we want to expose the teenagers that come to God’s Word and teach them to read and understand it and to allow God to convict them. This means that whilst Lee Abbey holds the orthodox position we want campers to be given space to come to their own conclusions through personal study and corporate teaching.
Being a leader is more than just a summer pastime, it is a real opportunity to serve God and get alongside young people. If you're successful in your application to be a leader, here are some expectations of what you will practically be required to do:
- Be part of a team involved in running one area of camp life, first-time leaders will normally spend at least one week on site or cooks team. Other teams include arts and crafts, sports and activities, teaching team etc. We take into consideration your preferences, gifts and also team availability.
- You will also most likely be a tent leader with 1 or 2 other leaders, responsible for a group of approximately 8 campers. You will sleep in a tent with your fellow leaders and co-lead a group time together (tent prayers) with your campers each morning.
- Attend a whole team meeting at 8.00 am every morning for a devotion, prayer and to go over the day.
- Each day you will spend your time doing 4 main things:
- doing the job your team requires (i.e. cooks – preparations before each meal time)
- doing a practical orderly job (bins, toilet cleaning, washing up water etc.);
- rest time which you can use as needed (to nap, go for a walk off the camp field or do something that is unrelated to your team)
- and finally, 'around time' where you will be expected to join in with an activity or just hang out on the field with campers.
- If you lead for 2 weeks you will have an afternoon or morning off at some point where you are expected to go off site and rest. If you are only coming for one week you can request extra rest time if you are using your daily rest breaks well and need more time.
- Leaders are REQUIRED to attend the preparation day which will be held in London on 11 May 2019.
- Leaders are also required to have an enhanced DBS certificate, if you are registered on the update service you should be able to use that or if you do not have one we can guide you through how to get one.
- Upon provisional acceptance, all leaders are required to carry out a Level One Safeguarding online course.
- We expect leaders to want to, and to be able to engage with young people. We strongly encourage leaders to get involved with the youth in their home churches. We want camp to be a place where leaders can find love and support but our priority is to serve the campers.
Leaders are welcome to do one or two weeks of camp. Please indicate which dates you wish to apply for on the form. If you know you want to come to camp but aren't sure which week or could be flexible on which week please indicate this on the form.
If you are coming for the first week – leaders should arrive on the Friday evening (Friday 9th August 2018), although if this isn’t possible you should arrive on the Saturday 10th August 2019 at 10:30 am. Leaders are expected to stay for the duration of the week and can leave after the campers have left on the Friday. Friday afternoon and evening will be free for the leaders to enjoy as they please- the beach, the pub, games! Time to relax before the second week begins. If you are coming for the second week leaders are welcome to arrive on Friday 16th August but you should arrive by 11:30 am on Saturday 17th August 2019. The final Friday of camp (23rd August 2019) is set down, where we take all the tents down and transform camp back into a sheep's field. Leaders again should stay and help until afternoon of this Friday.
Each team will have a team leader who will manage and pastorally support you. The team leaders each have a delegated 'senior leader link' to manage and support them. The senior leaders of camp this year are: Tom and Katie Rogers, Juliet Goss, Tim Broadbent, Millie Clark and Paul Eaton who will be overseeing camp and are there for any pastoral issues too. Juliet heads up leader applications so please get in touch with her if you have any questions about being a leader.
Don’t worry about absorbing all of the above information, but we wanted to be clear about the expectations we have of our leaders. If you have any questions about anything that has been mentioned (or not mentioned!) please do get in touch with Juliet or one of other senior leaders.
We look forward to reading your application!
