Important Summer 2020 Announcement and COVID-19 Update 

Valued Guests, 

As you know, we have been monitoring the COVID-19 situation very carefully. While planning for this summer, we have considered a multitude of factors, including government restrictions, the health and safety of our guests, students, and staff, and our ability to physically prepare for camp amongst all of the current restrictions. It is hard to imagine, we have gone from planning one of the best summers ever, to monitoring COVID-19 and what will this summer look like? As you know, our summer camping program is a major part of heritage and God uses camps to change lives, because the Gospel is our focus.  

With that in mind, Word of Life has made the difficult decision to consolidate our camping ministries this summer. We are still planning to offer both our youth and family camp programs! However, this will look very different from normal.  We will not be opening the Island property for camp this season.  Instead all youth camps, the Ranch, Wild and Island, will operate from the Bible Institute property.  In addition, our family camps programming will all be run from the Pines property, with limited lodging space only available at the Lodge property. This is not the decision any of us were wanting to make, but at this time we feel it is the safest and most responsible way to operate this summer.   

Unfortunately, these changes will result in the cancellation of our fall retreat season at The Lodge. Our Customer Service team will be reaching out to guests who had already registered to process refunds or transfers to another event.  We are still hoping to be able to offer our RISE Pastor’s conference in an alternative format; more details on that will be released as soon as possible. We are also in the process of creating a new women’s event and will communicate more details when they are finalized. 

For our guests at the Lodge who have already registered, customer service will be reaching out to you in the very near future to talk to you about your reservation and go over specific options with regards to room availability, meal plans, adjusted program fees, etc.  

Guests who are part of a program that is being significantly changed or cancelled at The Lodge or The Island will be eligible for a full refund. However, we would like to ask you to consider moving your reservation to another program or to the 2021 summer camping season. If you feel so led, you could also convert your deposit to a donation to assist Word of Life with ongoing operating costs during this challenging time. As you can imagine, this situation has significant stewardship challenges and any gift would be much appreciated; we need your support and contributions in order to sustain our current operations and to continue sharing the gospel with this generation and generations to come. Customer Service representatives will be available during regular office hours, but as you can imagine wait times may be significant over the next few days. We will begin calling all registered guests as soon as possible to confirm or make changes to your reservations, but as always you can communicate with customer service via email at customerservice@wol.org. Communicating via email will significantly speed up your process. No matter if you would like a refund or to cancel a reservation and donate your deposit, we can easily accommodate these requests via email. 

We want you to know that we are committed to offering an amazing summer camp experience for you! At this time, we are still hoping and planning to run our full camp schedule and have not cancelled any weeks of camp. We will continue to monitor the situation closely, and we will carefully follow all guidelines set by our governmental authorities. We have been and will be extremely diligent in our cleaning, health screening and health services protocol. Our priority is your safety and wellbeing.  

Thank you so much for your prayers, commitment, and patience as we work through this unprecedented situation. We will be available to answer questions as quickly as possible.  Please direct any questions about your current reservations to our Customer Service department at 518-494-6000 or email us at customerservice@wol.org. 

You also may have noticed that we have extended our Super Earlybird and Earlybird pricing discount deadlines to give more time for you to assess your personal situations and make a decision about attending this summer. For more information on that, go to our Camps Registration Page and click on the camp of your choice. 

We are praying for you during this difficult time, and we appreciate each and every one of you. Please feel free to reach out with prayer requests and let us know how we can help.   

We are committed to you our valued guest and we will be communicating regularly some of the excited elements we have planned for this summer!