Lenhert Family

Dear Family and Friends,

What a joy it is to follow God through all the different seasons. Since our last update, we have finished our fall, winter, and spring here at Wolf Mountain, three seasons full of serving God and all our different campers God brought through our camp gates. Through it all, we have been following a good, perfect God. I hope this update is encouraging to you as we reflect on these last months and look to the future.

Our fall season began with the wonderful addition of three guys in our Life Institute program, a one-year program designed to provide those fresh out of high school with opportunities to grow spiritually and practically through classes and training. Serving alongside these guys not only allowed us to serve our campers better, but also provided the opportunity for many of us to act as mentors and serve them. Despite fall and winter being some of our slower seasons, they were still full of opportunities to reach people with the gospel and help people grow in their walk with God. We hosted church planning retreats, spiritual emphasis school camps, women’s retreats (including three of our sponsored ones in October), youth retreats, and our largest camp of the year – Youth Rally. As part of the registration team and in charge of running our camp’s social media, I was able to be intimately involved with many of these camps through different types of service. I loved being able to form connections and see firsthand how God is working in the hearts of those who attend camp in our “off-season”. On top of running activities through these camps, JD was also able to have one of the Life Institute guys as his full-time assistant, accomplishing multiple irrigation and fencing projects throughout the fall with his help. He was also able to add electricity to more parts of the horse area, prep the tack room for adding internet connection, and pave the way for the addition of four horses which we received this December. They have integrated well into our program and bring our total horse count to 14! It was incredible to watch the different ways God opened doors to allow ministry to increase here at Wolf Mountain.

Our spring season is certainly our busiest. We were able to end our winter by traveling to see both sides of our family over Christmas break, which was a wonderful time of relaxing and being with family. When we returned, it was like immediately jumping back into the saddle. We began our “spring” season with our Winter Work Week, where we were able to move most of our old auto shop up to the Studio, put in shelving, finish most of the mudding in our new camper cabin, repair our BBQ, deep clean cabins, work on program projects, and redrag the road leading into camp. This was only the start of all the projects we would accomplish in addition to the 23 camps we would host this spring! Our duplex cabin is almost ready for our summer season, and we hope to see it used for the first time during our Horsemanship camps in a few weeks. Our kitchen floors were also redone, our rifle range expanded and upgraded, our climbing barn storage redone, one side of our large Shodeo arena ripped out and replaced with permanent, welded pipe, and our spring mailout sent out. God is continuing to grow our facilities, grow our numbers, and grow our staff. The new horses we brought in over the winter were able to be immediately put into use for our program, and we had two different occasions this spring where we had different sets of campers on property consecutively for 21 days! In a season of extreme busyness, God provided us the strength and love to serve those He brought to our camp. He also provided us the grace to manage and act in other seasons of life that He had called us to.

In our personal life, God has also walked us through seasons of joy, connection, and trust. We have been blessed these past months to be able to spend time with family. JD’s parents and my mother and sister were able to come out in January and accomplish multiple projects around camp (including making a new mud-pit and clearing out a lot of bad trees from our yard!), and we were able to travel down to JD’s parents for Easter and Memorial Day. Despite popping a tire on the Jeep (the day we got new tires!), JD and I were also able to spend time together in Tahoe in February. We have also been able to grow closer to our newer church family through camp and church events. Who would have imagined that JD and I would face off against one another with nerf guns in front of the entire congregation? God has continued to show His goodness, and it is important to hold to that truth of His character even in the harder things. I had a successful surgery for my chronic wrist pain in March, where they found a hidden tear. My recovery has been slow but going well, but one thing that I ask for prayer for is my shoulder. Despite seeing multiple specialists and months of PT, there has barely been any improvement with pain since my accident last July. My next steps are trying acupuncture and seeing a neurologist to have a nerve conduction test done. It has been a waiting game. We also had an unexpected $3,500 expense with our Jeep a few weeks ago, where we had to replace our rear differential before leaving for our pre-summer break. Despite these things, we are trusting that God is working through these situations in His sovereignty and in His goodness, just as He has worked in all our good things.

Our next season of life is summer, and it is right around the corner. Actually, it began this week! After we spent our Memorial Day weekend with JD’s parents, Monday morning saw the first of our summer staff arrive for specialized training and help with projects. We have nine summer staff with us on property, with many more arriving next Monday for the rest of our training before campers officially arrive. Most of our summer camp weeks are already at capacity, and we are thrilled for all the returning and new campers we will get to serve. I will continue to work in the office for registration, and also take on some responsibilities as the health care assistant for Teen Camps. JD will continue to oversee and run his four Horsemanship camps, all of which are full or filling up fast! It is shaping up to be an incredible summer full of ministry. If you would like to support us during this next season, here are a few of our prayer requests:

• That God will bring exactly who needs to be here this summer
• That God will provide safety for our campers and staff through our summer season
• That the horse area and JD’s team will be ready for campers when they arrive
• That God will heal my shoulder and yet show me how to better glorify Him through it

While this update is chock-full of information about everything that has been happening these past months, I hope it is clear that every season is a season where we can completely trust in God, both in and outside of camp. Through every season He shows Himself faithful, equipping us with the tools we need to serve Him and the faith we need to simply rest in Him. As we look towards a full summer, exciting potential home renovations this upcoming Spring (our camp fundraising letter for the project just went out a few weeks ago!), and time with each other and with family, we are reminded daily how good it is to serve a good God. We are also reminded how important it is and what a blessing it is for all who support us in this endeavor here at Wolf Mountain Camps. We are so grateful for your outpouring of love towards us and we pray that this letter is an encouragement that it is worth it all. Thank you, and we look forward to sharing a summer update soon!

In Christ,

The Lenherts

P.S.: To see our latest family photos and our full list of praises and prayer requests, click these links (Gallery, Praises/Prayer Requests) or visit the pages above!