Muleshani! (That's hello in Bemba)
I'm in Zambia!
This is just a quick update for my prayer warriors and for Debbie Ginn to let you know we've made it halfway! God has been going CRAZY in providing for us, and we have been continuously surprised since arriving in Lusaka, Zambia with great food, amazing people, a wonderful hotel, a great night's rest, and lots of financial blessings. We are checking out now and getting ready to load up for 24 hours on a bus.
Please pray for safe travels. Several of us are having a gammet of health issues -which are much more difficult to manage on a bus. But we're in this for the long haul! The people of Zambia are beautiful and it's a beautiful day. We are welcomnig the adventure!
Thank you for your prayers. We feel them! Keep 'em coming!
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Monday, April 12, 2010
One Last South African Adventure!
12 hours till take-off...
But we just HAD to squeeze one last adventure in before we left for two months of the unknown, the uncomfortable, and walking with an unstoppable God.
This adventure's name was Mt Legagot. We got up early for a sunrise climb to take in one last deep of the beauty of South Africa. Check it out.
But we just HAD to squeeze one last adventure in before we left for two months of the unknown, the uncomfortable, and walking with an unstoppable God.
This adventure's name was Mt Legagot. We got up early for a sunrise climb to take in one last deep of the beauty of South Africa. Check it out.
At the tip-top... it was STRAIGHT up. Yes, we're sore.
But we did it!!
The View Was Amazing!
This is the beginning of my, "I'm dancing on the mountain" song...
I promise... We'll try to keep this PG.
Everybody likes dancing on mountains!
And Jumping!
And Cartwheeling!
Needless to say, we had fun.
We took lots of silly pictures, checked oursleves for ticks and saw more beauty than we could prepare ourselves for. But Mt Legagot was just a taste of what's ahead. So many times during that climb we couldn't see the path and had no idea where we came from or where we were going. But we had a leader who knew the way. And we sang songs. And we knew that the view from the top was worth it. It is an honor and a joy to go with these brothers and sisters to Zambia and Johannesburg because I know that we will climb this together... and have lots of great pictures along the way.
Please continue praying that the way we love each other will look like the way Christ loves us. That's the best way to do this missions thing. The best way to bring homes to orphans is to be Home.
"Jesus replied, 'If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." - John 14:23
Friday, April 9, 2010
The Blog You've All Been Waiting For...
I'M IN LOVE!
You all knew it was coming....
Head Over Heels...
Take My Breath Away...
I'm sure you want the whole story.
His name is Lifa. (Sounds like leaf-uh)
He's a great kisser.
We can't get enough of each other.
Whenever we see each other, we run with open arms and huge smiles.
We both love guavas.
Does anything else matter?
That's my man!
Talk about emotional! I hated to say goodbye, but can't help but feel hopeful for him to be taken into such a loving and providing family. They don't have much money, but there is plenty of love to share! And I know I'll see him again when we come back in June.
It also got me excited for Zambia and Johannesburg. I can't wait to meet more of God's precious children and to share with them and celebrate with them the love of a Father To The Orphans. The One who adopted us into His Home, His Kingdom and His Love that is more than we'll ever need.
It will be hard to leave knowing they will still have an abundance of physical needs, but that's where faith comes in. I hope and pray I can share stories with you as we go, but if there's no way to connect to you while we're away, you can count on tons of stories and pictures when I return!
I'm leaving Tuesday morning at 4am our time - that's 9pm Monday night if you're in Texas - for Zambia. We'll fly back from Zambia to Johannesburg, South Africa on May 13 and participate in an orphan ministry there until May 31.
And now...
Back to me and my man.
Mom, Can I Keep Him?
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Getting Ready for Outreach
Hello everyone!
I’m sure you have guessed by now that the Outreach Prayer Paper Chain is getting very short. (If you don’t know already, you should know that paper chains are a part of every major or minor event in my life. And I’ve been known to make them for other people’s life events too whether they want them or not.) We’re removing one link a day on which we’ve each written a prayer topic or Scripture to meditate on as we countdown for take-off!
Communication update: We still do not have internet on base. We are currently typing up blogs and emails and then copying and pasting when we are able to go somewhere with internet access. I’m hoping we will have connection on base before we leave so that I’ll be able to answer personal emails, Skype, and be able to connect with each of you before I go. I don’t know if we’ll access to internet while we are there, so if you don’t hear from me for four weeks: Don’t worry. Pray for me.
Our team is getting so excited. Pillow-talk this week in the girls room has been all about Zambia and about the ways that we all feel like we’re just “us” and not really changing, but can see God’s powerful and gracious movement in each other’s lives daily. Last night we got ourselves so excited, we couldn’t even handle the dark anymore. We had to turn the light back on!
We had a really big week this week talking about, walking through and entering new levels of relationships with one another. I’ve been learning so much about myself in encounters and reflections on relationships here. One of the most powerful lessons this week was a message that God has really been imprinting in my heart since I arrived: The power of language.
I’ve started to understand that to an even higher degree the impact language has on our attitudes and how it creates our realities. Lessons I’ve heard time and time again, but become so much more real in a time where I’m surrounded by so many languages and by people coming from so many different flavors of reality. I felt like we got endurance training this week for our 2-month outreach ahead when we add even more languages, realities and life as we know it gets flipped upside down once more.
I want you to know everything I know about our upcoming outreach and the details will follow. But first, I want to ask for your words. Please speak the Truth to one another every day for the next two months while I’m in Zambia and Johannesburg. Speak specifically about what the Bible says God’s plan for the nations is and about what you believe God wants for our team and for those we encounter on this outreach. Say it aloud around the dinner table, in small groups, in church, in the car on the way to school or work, in the line at the grocery store (I dare you!).
Sidenote: I just realized Jimmy Needham’s “Speak” is playing in my earbuds right now. Perfect song to listen to while you read.
Now for a few details so you can know some specific ways to pray.
Instead of a 45 hour bus ride, we’ve found out that it’s actually cheaper (and so much shorter) to fly to Zambia! Woohoo! Our African students will be going on their first plane ride… Pinkie’s going to get loud!
We’ll leave our base EARLY on Tuesday, April 13th for a 5 hour bus ride to Johannesburg where we’ll catch an 11:00am flight that, after one layover, will arrive in Lusaka, Zambia. From Lusaka, we’ll take another bus to Mpulungu where we’re staying on Lake Tanganyika. We’ll all stay in one house (SO EXCITED!) right on the dock of the lake, right next to the boat we’ll take to access communities around the lake.
The ministry is called the Good News Ministry and serves the communities around Lake Tanganyika, one of the Great Lakes of Africa, that cannot be accessed easily by car. The vision of Good News Ministry is to see people living around Lake Tanganyika brought into the Kingdom of God, worshipping Him in Spirit and in truth. Their approach is to impact the people living around Lake Tanganyika with the love of Christ through prayer, evangelism/church-planting, training, and meeting social needs to reach the goal of having a holistic ministry so that the spiritual and physical needs of the people are met.
Lake Tanganyika creates the border between Congo and Tanzania and is populated greatly by undeveloped communities making a living on fishing. ONE PERCENT (that’s 1%, .01, not a lot) are Christian, they have very low literacy levels and cannot live off agriculture as there is no fertile soil nearby.
We will be working with the Good News Ministry for four weeks. Their orphan school is on holiday for the month of April, but is hosting half-day programs so that the children will be able to eat 2 meals/day.
We will spend two weeks eating breakfast and lunch (pap, beans and more pap…MMmmmm) with the children and hosting their morning programs. We’ll work on literacy and homework with the students, paint signs and stencils for the new school building, and host games, crafts and dramas. We’ll be running the entire program from 7am – 12pm.
April 21-26th we will be a part of a youth camp and will be staying on-site with the youth. Other activities we’ll be a part of are teaching adult literacy, prison ministry, children’s and youth ministry, and participating in building a medical boat.
Every morning we’ll be starting our personal quiet time by 5:30am and our day will be action packed until after dinner. Kelly and I are in charge of planning our dinners and going to the market to buy supplies. Any verrry simple recipes that we might be able to cook in Zambia, send ‘em on!
After four weeks in Zambia, we are crossing our fingers and hoping to visit Victoria Falls on our way to outreach in Johannesburg. We could also use prayer for details to align for our 3-week outreach to Jo-burg. I don’t have any details to share because we don’t have them yet. Speak about God’s plans for us in Jo-burg, the capital city of South Africa. I am hoping to be able to update blogs and emails from there.
I hope you’ll be excited with me! Pray for us as we plan dramas, stories and sermons to share. Also, please pray for us to be open to creative ways to share God’s Truth to Bemba-speaking Zambians and multi-lingual South Africans.
I hope to update again before we leave, but if I am unable to, know you will be in my thoughts and prayers as well! We leave on April 13th!
And now for a bonus! My wonderful, wonderful friend Nicci mailed me a memory card on which my team and I loaded all the videos we could make. We sent it back to the States and she loaded up a YouTube account, so you can see a bit more of what our life has looked like here in South Africa. You can go to http://www.youtube.com/CompassionDTSKruger to see us!
I’m sure you have guessed by now that the Outreach Prayer Paper Chain is getting very short. (If you don’t know already, you should know that paper chains are a part of every major or minor event in my life. And I’ve been known to make them for other people’s life events too whether they want them or not.) We’re removing one link a day on which we’ve each written a prayer topic or Scripture to meditate on as we countdown for take-off!
Communication update: We still do not have internet on base. We are currently typing up blogs and emails and then copying and pasting when we are able to go somewhere with internet access. I’m hoping we will have connection on base before we leave so that I’ll be able to answer personal emails, Skype, and be able to connect with each of you before I go. I don’t know if we’ll access to internet while we are there, so if you don’t hear from me for four weeks: Don’t worry. Pray for me.
Our team is getting so excited. Pillow-talk this week in the girls room has been all about Zambia and about the ways that we all feel like we’re just “us” and not really changing, but can see God’s powerful and gracious movement in each other’s lives daily. Last night we got ourselves so excited, we couldn’t even handle the dark anymore. We had to turn the light back on!
We had a really big week this week talking about, walking through and entering new levels of relationships with one another. I’ve been learning so much about myself in encounters and reflections on relationships here. One of the most powerful lessons this week was a message that God has really been imprinting in my heart since I arrived: The power of language.
I’ve started to understand that to an even higher degree the impact language has on our attitudes and how it creates our realities. Lessons I’ve heard time and time again, but become so much more real in a time where I’m surrounded by so many languages and by people coming from so many different flavors of reality. I felt like we got endurance training this week for our 2-month outreach ahead when we add even more languages, realities and life as we know it gets flipped upside down once more.
I want you to know everything I know about our upcoming outreach and the details will follow. But first, I want to ask for your words. Please speak the Truth to one another every day for the next two months while I’m in Zambia and Johannesburg. Speak specifically about what the Bible says God’s plan for the nations is and about what you believe God wants for our team and for those we encounter on this outreach. Say it aloud around the dinner table, in small groups, in church, in the car on the way to school or work, in the line at the grocery store (I dare you!).
Sidenote: I just realized Jimmy Needham’s “Speak” is playing in my earbuds right now. Perfect song to listen to while you read.
Now for a few details so you can know some specific ways to pray.
Instead of a 45 hour bus ride, we’ve found out that it’s actually cheaper (and so much shorter) to fly to Zambia! Woohoo! Our African students will be going on their first plane ride… Pinkie’s going to get loud!
We’ll leave our base EARLY on Tuesday, April 13th for a 5 hour bus ride to Johannesburg where we’ll catch an 11:00am flight that, after one layover, will arrive in Lusaka, Zambia. From Lusaka, we’ll take another bus to Mpulungu where we’re staying on Lake Tanganyika. We’ll all stay in one house (SO EXCITED!) right on the dock of the lake, right next to the boat we’ll take to access communities around the lake.
The ministry is called the Good News Ministry and serves the communities around Lake Tanganyika, one of the Great Lakes of Africa, that cannot be accessed easily by car. The vision of Good News Ministry is to see people living around Lake Tanganyika brought into the Kingdom of God, worshipping Him in Spirit and in truth. Their approach is to impact the people living around Lake Tanganyika with the love of Christ through prayer, evangelism/church-planting, training, and meeting social needs to reach the goal of having a holistic ministry so that the spiritual and physical needs of the people are met.
Lake Tanganyika creates the border between Congo and Tanzania and is populated greatly by undeveloped communities making a living on fishing. ONE PERCENT (that’s 1%, .01, not a lot) are Christian, they have very low literacy levels and cannot live off agriculture as there is no fertile soil nearby.
We will be working with the Good News Ministry for four weeks. Their orphan school is on holiday for the month of April, but is hosting half-day programs so that the children will be able to eat 2 meals/day.
We will spend two weeks eating breakfast and lunch (pap, beans and more pap…MMmmmm) with the children and hosting their morning programs. We’ll work on literacy and homework with the students, paint signs and stencils for the new school building, and host games, crafts and dramas. We’ll be running the entire program from 7am – 12pm.
April 21-26th we will be a part of a youth camp and will be staying on-site with the youth. Other activities we’ll be a part of are teaching adult literacy, prison ministry, children’s and youth ministry, and participating in building a medical boat.
Every morning we’ll be starting our personal quiet time by 5:30am and our day will be action packed until after dinner. Kelly and I are in charge of planning our dinners and going to the market to buy supplies. Any verrry simple recipes that we might be able to cook in Zambia, send ‘em on!
After four weeks in Zambia, we are crossing our fingers and hoping to visit Victoria Falls on our way to outreach in Johannesburg. We could also use prayer for details to align for our 3-week outreach to Jo-burg. I don’t have any details to share because we don’t have them yet. Speak about God’s plans for us in Jo-burg, the capital city of South Africa. I am hoping to be able to update blogs and emails from there.
I hope you’ll be excited with me! Pray for us as we plan dramas, stories and sermons to share. Also, please pray for us to be open to creative ways to share God’s Truth to Bemba-speaking Zambians and multi-lingual South Africans.
I hope to update again before we leave, but if I am unable to, know you will be in my thoughts and prayers as well! We leave on April 13th!
And now for a bonus! My wonderful, wonderful friend Nicci mailed me a memory card on which my team and I loaded all the videos we could make. We sent it back to the States and she loaded up a YouTube account, so you can see a bit more of what our life has looked like here in South Africa. You can go to http://www.youtube.com/CompassionDTSKruger to see us!
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