Ta-da!

OK, here is a report on what happened from May 15-June 4. 3 countries, ministry, friendship, life on the edge, food, flying, wild animals, swimming in the Indian Ocean, crying, beautiful little children, evangelism, altar calls, photography, Star Wars, new spiritual awakenings, and a marriage.

I went on a mission trip with LSU Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship to South Africa, which lasted from May 16 til June 3. We were actually in the Republic of South Africa (RSA) for 2 weeks.

BEFORE ANYONE ASKS, PICTURES OF THE TRIP WILL FOLLOW TOWARDS THE END OF THIS WEEK.

The first week we were in a town called Grahamastown, 50 miles from the southeastern coast, working with a church called River of Life, evangelising the campus of Rhodes University, "Where Leaders Learn," named after Cecil Rhodes, after which the Rhodes Scholarship was named. Chi Alpha is a Christian outreach on LSU's campus that exists both to evangelise and to be a ministry to help Christians stay strong in their faith while at university. Rhodes University in South Africa lacks such a campus ministry. Our Chi Alpha team was in Grahamstown to train student leaders how to take Rhodes U. for Christ. We did some "2 by 2" evangelism, but the bulk of our work was bonding and forming relationships with students to mentor and encourage them to take Rhodes for Jesus.

The second week in the RSA was the team hooking up with the Goodriches, an American missionary family in the RSA. We did children's ministry for churches and schools in the villages and town outside of Pretoria. We also painted and did work at churches and AIDS orphanages. Therefore the second part of the trip was more hands-on mission work, working with and loving children, as well as hands-on activities like installing shelving and painting.

Also involved of course were several days' worth of travel to and from the RSA, a day trip to London, a safari, a trip to the RSA coast, and other nuances. This is a basic summary of the trip. If you want to know more, I will briefly highlight daily events below, summarizing my vast journal I took while on the trip:

MAY 15
Drove back to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, spent the night with Timothee and co., excited, watched movies and ate, hardly slept.
MAY 16
7-hour drive from Baton Rouge, LA to Dallas, Texas. Spent the night at Sari's house. Sari is a relative of Nick's, Nick being our campus pastor.
MAY 17
Prayer, preparation, fellowship, and fly out of Dallas at 4:30 p.m. Destination London. I slept about 2 hours that night.
MAY 18
Set our clocks forward 6 hours while still in flight over the Atlantic, arrived at Gatwick Airport, London, about 6 a.m. Customs, baggage reclaim. Had to lug aroudn our luggage as we would fly out of Heathrow about 12 hours later. Took a monorail and then a regular train through some semi-rural areas till we arrived at Victoria Station. Paid to stow our luggage for the day and began our tour of London. Oohs and aahs over architecture, beauty of the city, and double-decker busses. Changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace, St. James' Park, fish and chips at Wetherspoon's, pictures of exterior of Tower of London and London Bridge, pictures of Big Ben and Parliament, tour of Westminster Abbey, and of course much riding the Tube underground and hearing "Mind the Gap" quite often. Begged for money from strangers at Victoria Station so we could use the restroom. Flew out of Heathrow around 7:00 p.m. Slept about 4 hours on this flight, bound for Johannesburg, S.A. I was so tired after running around London on no sleep and the jet lag that I literally slept through takeoff. Got about 4 hours of sleep this night.
MAY 19
Weird experience spending 2 nights not in a hotel, but on a plane. Got in Jo-berg at 6 a.m., then took an in-country flight to Port Elizabeth. 2-hour shuttle serive ride to final destinaiton, Grahamstown. Checked into Oak Lodge Bed and Breakfast. Adam and Nick almost flooded and burned the place down in a half-hour due to extreme shower flooding the room and then dripping onto light fixtures below. All ended well. That night we went to a prayer meeting at River of Life, the church we were working with, got to know everyone, fellowshipped, shared a little of our mission and background.
MAY 20
Kudu sausage for breakfast. Information overload--quickly meeting dozens of new people. Making new friends. Toured the campus, prayer-walking (especially over stratetic areas), talked to students on campus and invited them to youth event that night. Had Altitude youth service at the church, which is 80% Rhodes students. Powerful worship. Broke assembly up into 6 smaller groups, one of which I led and asked prompts like "What does Jesus think of Rhodes?", "What has God called you to do at Rhodes?," facilitating discussion. Altar call and altar ministry..prayer.
MAY 21
Several-hour leadership mini-seminar for student leaders for the new campus ministry being formed there, as we speak. I participated in a question/answer panel pertaining to campus ministry. Fellowship lunch and saw Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith with friends that night...in South Africa. Whoa. What a movie.
MAY 22
Morning Sunday service. Lunch. Then me and Timo daringly went and played soccer with the "boys" locally on a field. Were extremely rookie in nature but tried our darndest. Evening church service, where once again our team was called on to do altar ministry. I was honored to pray for several guys and prophesy...guys with powerful callings on their lives. More fellowship afterwards
MAY 23
Church staff meeting, they asked us questions about what God was showing us about the church and Rhodes ministry, etc. Pastor John ("John the Baptist" as he'd done a baptism service the night before) took us on a tour of Grahamastown. Beautiful city, thoroughly hilly, 50,000 people, cool architecture, in a valley. I went with a couple girls to a hospital and prayed for a sick guy there. We talked to him and I asked him if he'd like to give his life to Christ. I got to lead him in a prayer of recommitment. Supper in Nelson Mandela dining hall with friends on campus. That's one thing I did on this trip...met more friends than ever before. I went halfway across the world and literally found my extended family...in Christ. Beautiful people.
MAY 24
Left at 7:00 a.m. to go with a high-school teacher to his school, Graeme College. Adam and I sat in on several classes and observed and the class asked us questions. We also got to judge an academic competition in a 6th grade class. "Fisher," as he is called, has started a Christian club at his school which is having far-reaching effects. At 10:00 I met Duane for our first 2 by 2 evangelism appt. We went to the campus at the main hangout. We would go up to a group of students at a table, initiate mundane conversation, eventually ask subtle questions like, "so what is the spiritual climate like at Rhodes?" then eventually make it personal by asking the students their religious beliefs, then stating our belief in Christ, sharing our testimony(ies) and working with it from there. There's always some resistance and sometimes acceptance. Everyone on the Chi Alpha team was having 2 by 2 appts. with students leaders to show them they can in fact do evangelism and to make this sort of a hands-on training thing. Went back to church and had a 1-on-1 (discipleship/prayer meeting) with a girl, Chiteu. We talked for a while about where she was, I prayed with her, then we went and did 40 more minutes of 2 by 2 evangelism. Played pool at a hall that evening.
MAY 25
Car tour of the region. Africa is beautiful, rolling valleys filled with mist, etc., can't put into words. Trip to the coast, several locations. Timo and I swam in the Indian Ocean and were freezing cold. Saw a shipwreck, caves on the beach, all kind of fascinating stuff. Cell groups in the evening. Nick and I went to Lucy and Hilda's and it was a powerful time in the Word. The song they sung in one of the African languages was powerful...everyone sang every note in unison.
MAY 26
We cooked a Louisiana-style meal for our River of Life friends. Jambalaya, butternut soup, garlic bread and banana pudding with iced tea. An all-day affair. Bought a Rhodes sweater for myself and hand-crafted jewelry for mom. Coffee, other random stuff, prayer meeting, and like 3 hours worth of goodbyes. I haven't felt so loved by so many people ever before. Nor have I loved so many people at once as in that final service amidst tearful hugs.
MAY 27
Up at 4:30 a.m. to drive back to P.E. and fly back to Jo-berg, be met by the Goodriches missionary family and then travel to a village. Went to the straw-floor church there and put on a kids service replete with puppets, team members in animal costumes, Bible drills, object lessons, and a powerful altar call for the baptism in the HOly Spirit, to which 150 kids responded. We spent about a half-hour praying over them. At a certain point I remember just praying mainly for protection for these kids who were daily in danger and claiming them for the kingdom of God. I cried when I hugged and talked to one kid who I could tell didn't want to leave the church because he would have to walk home alone through the township. Checked into a hostel. Timo and I slept in a shack and were c-c-cold.
MAY 28
Laid-back day. Team learned puppet songs and blew up balloons for kids service tomorrow. Saw Star Wars III again, this time of course with different people. 2 times and the movie is still great.
MAY 29
Church service in Mamelodi. 3 hours long! We did puppets for the kids and re-enacted the story of Joshua and the Battle of Jericho with balloon swords, a balloon wall of Jericho we'd made, and using kids from the audience. A lot of fun and most rewarding was of course again praying and laying hands on kids at the end. The team had to regroup that evening and repent to / pray with each other. When you spend this much time day in and day out with folks, you begin to know each other and love each other enough that you have the capacity to be aggravated witht them.
MAY 30
Busiest day of the whole trip. Awoke at 5:30 a.m. Drove to a government school in Mamelodi that allowed us to do a gospel presentation for the kids! Timo Rachel and I did a skit, along with puppets, a bible story, prayers, etc. Then drove to a church to renovate and paint a room to be used as some sort of AIDS help center. Then another long drive out into "the bush" to an orphanage for kids where there is 70% unemployment and 75% have AIDS, including the kids. We painted the floor of the place and spent time holding, playing with, and loving kids. We went back to the hostel and played pool and I let the girls style my hair...what a disaster. We were a tired group getting in bed that night.
MAY 31
Went back to the church from the day before, and did more renovation. I got to use a power drill, yay. We did a 2-hour kids program for a school that evening.
JUNE 1
Awoke at 5:30 a.m., 2 hour drive to a wildlife santuary at Pilanesburg. You guessed it: African safari, baby! We drove around the park for over 8 hours and saw among other things: elephants, zebra, wildebeest, vervet monkeys, rhinos, hippos, giraffes, impalas, hyenas, kudu, water buffalo, warthogs, various deer, no lions though. did you know the hippo is responsible for more deaths in AFrica than any other creature? Highlights of the trip were seeing an elephant walk right in front of the car and me paying 130 Rand (25 USD) for a camera.
JUNE 2
Our last day in the RSA. First stop an open air market where we had to haggle sellers to get bargains. I got a stone bracelete and necklace for myself, banana leaf art and african fabric wall hanging for Mom. Next was lunch at Carnivore, South Africa's best eating experience. They bring out around knives with huge pieces of meat they carve onto your plate. You leave the flag up on the center of the table while you want them to keep bringing more meat to eat. You put the flag down as a sign of surrender. Nick Adam and I survived the whole gauntlet of every type of meat they had available (and would suffer Montezuma's revenge later on). It's great to eat stuff you'd seen running around on a safari the day before. Among the foods were sable, ostrich, wildebeest, crocodile, beef, lamb, kudu, chicken, venison. Then to another shop, where I bought a spring buck skin for dad (and one for myself) as well as stuff for my siblings. Goodbyes to our hospitable lovely friends the Goodriches and then boarded a 9:30 p.m. flight from Jo-berg to London. I got about 4 hours of sleep.
JUNE 3
Arrived London at 7:30 a.m. and had to scramble like mad from Heathrow to Gatwick and barely made it with about 5 minutes to spare. I watched Hitch, Million Dollar Baby and Constantine on the way home. I recommend the first 2 and recommend you avoid the lattermost. Of course, we were flying British Airways, as at the first part of the trip and it's a very nice airline. Set our clocks back, arrived Dallas, 2:30. Slept from 5 p.m. til 2 a.m.
JUNE 4
At 2 a.m. we left to drive back to Baton Rouge, as several of us had to attend a wedding. It was my good friend Patrick's wedding to Mica Spence. Lovely ceremony and reception. I crashed at a friend's house, slept 14 hours and drove back home the following day.

Now I get to make money cashiering at a supermarket this summer.

This was the trip of a lifetime. God didn't just use us, the team, but he did a work in us, and I believe this may be the first of a lifetime of missions work. Hmm. To be continued...