Preparing - Think Beforehand

One of the things I advise that you do before going on a mission trip is to THINK about your daily life... and what would be the corresponding life in the country your going to.

For example, I thought about this, and realised that I will probably not be able to shower daily. Result: I bought wipes so that I can keep as clean as I like.

Another thought, I probably won't be able to wash my hair as often. So I have spent the past three months stretching the time between washes - I now am fine with a week and a half. And I've bought dry shampoo.

Now, these things are not life or death matters, but they will make you more (or less) comfortable. And if you are worried about these simple things, you won't be as effective at ministering to the people you are serving.

So think about it!

Day 3 (10 Dec 2011) movies

Here are more videos from the Saturday morning service in San Jose:

Wow! Those mums sure can dance. I'm sure our mums can do better...right?

And if our own Sunday School teachers thought our children were a handful...

Contemporary Christmas songs? These girls are hip.

Review: The Price of Stones

The Price of Stones, by Twesigye Jackson Kaguri.

This was a wonderful book by a Ugandan man who emigrated to America, but who realised how much the AIDS crisis was effecting Uganda, especially after his own brother died. He realised that there was a lot of poverty and other issues in his home area, and that the AIDS orphans were most strongly affected by these issues.

Knowing that education had been his own route out of the poverty of his home, he decided to build a school for the AIDS orphans – one that would be completely free, including providing the school uniform and books. This is rare in Uganda, and while the fees are very small for us, to many Ugandans, finding $20 a year is well beyond what they can afford.

Soon he realised that the school would have a bigger effect if there was clean water for those in the village, if there was a medical centre, and if the children were fed two meals as part of their day. He also found foster families for many of the children.

It was a wonderful story, full of inspiring tales of the children, Kaguri’s personal life story, and rich details that brought the area of Uganda that Kaguri works in to life.

You can visit the school’s website: www.nyakaschool.org

The book’s site: www.thepriceofstones.com

You can become a friend of Nyaka AIDS Foundation or of Twesigye Jackson Kaguri on Facebook, and Twesigye Jackson Kaguri has a twitter account at twitter.com/twejaka

Day 3 (10 Dec 2011)

Do you believe you can be used by God today?
What are the things that may be hindering you from serving God today?
These are the questions we discussed together during our morning quiet time.

Today, we did something separate from Hope Manila. We went all the way to San Jose to visit Alvin and Jace, the independent missionaries, at International Christian College of Manila. We were supposed to sing carols and hand out gifts to children and their families. One of the main preparations for this mission trip was singing our carols, which I did not have the privilege to practice with the others until I arrived in Manila. On top of songs like Angels We Have Heard On High and Oh Come All Ye Faithful, we also sang a Filipino Christmas song: Star Ng Pasko or the Star of Christmas. This was only the first of many days of caroling. Joy!

To get there, we went on a long journey. We walked down an alley, climbed a flight of stairs, took the train all the way to the end, got out, walked along a flyover, took another train, got out, climbed down some stairs, took a jeepney, got out, took a tricycle, and we reached our destination, in one and a half hours.

This is us in a Jeepney.

The college has a big iron gate and high walls with broken glass set in concrete. Hmm...was it to prevent people from going in, or coming out? As soon as I set foot inside, we were greeted by all these children and mums in the courtyard.

Paul looked puzzled.

  

Come to think of it, where are all the dads?

Then they started hogging the camera.

Those 'V' symbols have to mean something.

Paul: "Hmm...what shall I do with all these children?"

Paul "I know! I'll tell them a story!"

Paul seemed to connect really well with the kids. The mums and children will all join us together for a Saturday Christmas morning service. Before that, we met Alvin and Jace (hugs and kisses) and a couple of familiar faces as well (not to me tho'). We helped with some of their gift packing before we finally headed for the service, adorned with Santa hats and star props, guys in red and girls in green. (Obviously, Paul forgot!)

The service was mostly in English, and there were a few performances other than our caroling. We had mums singing, mums dancing, and kids singing. They were all awesome. 

My dream is to see our Christmas service have performances from every single age group in our church, mums, kids, students. Weeks later, I would attend a baptist Christmas morning service and I was just as inspired as the youths and mums gave us wonderful performances. Surely our church can take this up...

After that, the kids received their toys.

The mums are the next ones to receive gifts.

We had to leave early because we needed to reach Hope Manila in time to give our worship workshop. So, adios, San Jose!

Have I told you that Hope Manila has a 24-hour intercessory prayer going on every day? We had the workshop in one of the small side rooms, had praise and worship, and each of us shared what true worship is. Me? I shared about dancing and serving, and how that is the way I worship, the way God has created me to be. I had no idea how hungry these people are to hear our sharings and teachings, that they took time off to come to church and meet us. We feel so privileged. :) Let's not forget to mention that since this is a worship workshop, these people are also hungry for the presence of God. We as a team led everyone into  one of the most intense worship sessions I have ever been in, where people were just soaking in the presence of God and not wanting to leave, ever. 

To end off this wonderful but tiring day, we ate pizza! Why am I not in the picture? Because we previously were sitting at a separate basement food court and I went to order my meal. By the time I came back, everyone had shifted upstairs. Sniff...they must have forgotten about me. So...no pizza for me.

So, that's it for Day 3. 5 more days left and still got lots more to do. What's in store for me and the gang? Stay tuned to find out!

Review: Another Hand on Mine

This is a really interesting book on Dr Carl K Becker. Dr Becker was a missionary with the Africa Inland Mission, living in the Congo, and is most noted for his work in founding the Oicha Hospital.

This book was interesting in the ways that it described a lot of the details of being a medical worker in a third world country, and how it described the different political situations that occurred in the Congo over the years Becker served there, and why they chose the course of action that they did. It’s easy to think that missionaries should automatically stay at their posts regardless of what is happening, but we need to access whether we are dying for Jesus or for something else (such as ethnicity). In cases where the conflict was ethnically based, they left the area when necessary.

Another aspect of this book that I really enjoyed was how it demonstrated that the medical work had a big impact on the community, not just in terms of physical health, but in terms of salvations and building up believers. While we must never be preachers of a social gospel, we are to demonstrate the reality of our faith by what we do, and that means taking care of people’s physical needs where possible.

Things that weren’t so great – sometimes it seemed like Becker was making all of his decisions based on his own reasoning, and not on prayer and careful study of the Bible. A few passages in the book clearly contradict this, but the general feeling is of Becker relying on himself. However, this does not spoil the general readability of this book.

So this is a great book to read if you have an interest in medical missions or the Congo.

Thabiti Anyabwile

Christian, throw safety and security and ease and comfort and convenience to the dogs! Give yourself to something greater – the glory of God and the joy of God. Jesus is our reward. Lose your life for Jesus and the gospel so that you will find your life. Give that cup of water – in other words, do even small acts of mercy in the name of Jesus and the gospel – and you will have a reward you cannot lose. Count it all loss so that you might gain Christ. Stop fearing man – and go get your reward, which is loving fellowship with God in heaven. God is your portion, your inheritance. And to everyone who goes out with the gospel of the kingdom, God gives himself as the fulfilment of all their hopes and joys. Go get him.

From his chapter in Thinking.Loving.Doing. (Edited by John Piper & David Mathis)

Day 2 (9 Dec 2011)

We kick start all our mornings in Manila, Philippines with quiet time. It helps get our objectives right with God. What are we here in Manila for? Are we prepared to face trials and persecution? Are we believing in salvations today? Do I have a burning desire for the lost? As we read Romans 10:1 and meditate on Paul's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved, we wanted to capture the same desire for the folk of Manila. Once our hearts are ready, we left for the district of Laguna that's far away from the city centre. Well, even if our hearts were still not ready, we had a 1.5 hour-long bus trip to prepare...

Day 2 Mission objective: Run two consecutive lifegroups for highschoolers (15-16 years old)

We had to run two lifegroups for two groups of kids: One group in the afternoon, and one after lunch. The first one was a short one-hour long session with praise and worship and shared testimonies. Why only one hour, you ask? Because these kids came after their school ended and had to leave before their extra-curricular activities started. That's a tight schedule, and still they were willing to use up their lunchtime to meet us strangers from Australia (who technically aren't Australians).

Well, what did I do? I led praise of course (because I cannot sing very well, logical really), and Florence led worship. Myrna was our guitarist. Paul was chairperson. One thing that I got out from this experience was singing the song 'I Walk by Faith'. We sing it all the time, but I had to explain to the kids what it meant, and what I said surprised even me. Do I walk by faith every day? Trust in God all the time? Or only sometimes? Only when I pray? That really challenged me right on the spot.

Paul shared a personal testimony about his past that I think really spoke out to the kids. In the end, he became a socialite amongst the guys. I'm pretty sure he got of their Facebooks (Yes, they have Facebooks). Among these guys was one single 15-year-old boy whom God had challenged to see his friends' behvaiours and motives change and bring them to church and life group. The product of that commission was that, almost every boy we saw there was there because of him. Praise God!

I forgot to mention that the venue was a rented shoplot in a three-storey apartment filled with shoplots. The story of how the shoplot was obtained itself was a story filled with miracles. We took a break after the first group left and had lunch prepared by Hani. Pansit, Philippines' version of fried bee hoon. I don't know how to describe it, but it TASTES of AWESOMENESS!!!

We basically repeated the same thing for the second group, which was much larger. This, we had more time, so we played games. Everyone should recognise the game in the picture.

Then, we had praise and worship, followed by a discussion group session. Half of the time, we spent getting to know each other better; half the time, we spent asking about their faith and sharing the gospel. High school students are different from university students, we were told, because high school students are very eager to accept Jesus. There's no need to go too much in depth, sure they might have interesting questions here and there. And friendship plays a big part in this ministry too. That's why it's so much more effective for these kids to invite their own friends to come to life group or church.

Overall, it was an eye-opening experience to hear some of these kid's stories. There was a girl who struggled between life group and extra-curricular activites. She was threatened to be pulled out of her activity if she missed practice. Yet here she was, she made her choice and came for our session, but she was crying because she made a hard decision. I think for some of us, we always seem to pick the easy choice, and thus we lack the same courage a 15-year-old who is mature beyond her years has.

We headed back to Manila as day turned to night. From that day alone, we had 5 salvations, and my thoughts came back to my own life group. How different it is! 

Well, here's a picture to sum it all up:

All the best, Hope Laguna and Cabuyao! May God bless you!

Saturday26.11.11 and Sunday 27.11.11 Day I Go Home and Flight Back

I got up, finished packing, had my quiet time, and spent some time with Amaya and Abby, and gave them each a bike toy, and took a few photos. I settled down to read my book while I waited for my driver… who didn’t show. So we all went in the van – Britt, Andrew, Abby, Amaya, Lisa, Speciosa, and Vicky as well as me. I had had visions of me having to go by boda, with my suitcase tied to the end, going as fast as its wheels would go. I was very, very worried… we were running very close to the wire. I ended up being about 10 minutes late, but far from the last person. I forgot how Africa doesn’t run to the same schedule as the rest of the world. All the same, next time I’m going to leave more time for the trip.

At the airport I was worried about my bag weight. When I put the bag on the scale it said 32 kg! I was horrified – it was only 12.1 kg when I left Australia. But it turned out that another person’s bag was still on the scale. My bag was only 17.5 kg.

I got Mum the gin she wanted in customs, and changed my money into UD$.

The flight went well. I even had GF/CF food, which was fantastic. I didn’t get a bag, and was slightly sad about that. I’m planning to dye and decorate the bags I get.

Doha airport was OK. I didn’t see it on the way to Uganda. I had some food, read for a bit, and found a place with free internet. I entered a competition for Vision Forum gift certificates, then placed and order. I’ve read a lot of my books, and so I need some more.

The terribly sad thing was customs. They wouldn’t let me take Mum’s duty-free gin. They were going to confiscate it, but I talked them into letting me give it away. It took about 5 strangers until someone took it. I suppose it does look a bit dodgy. I will need to buy her a gin in Melbourne.

To avoid jet lag, I’m planning to sleep as little as possible on the flights, so I am tired when I arrive. It will be 10:30PM Australian time, but only 2:30PM Ugandan time. And I’m working the next day!

The funny thing was, I got on the plane and though, who are all these WHITE people, and what are they doing on my plane? That was the extent of my reverse culture shock. What can I say? I’m uncultured like that. No real jet lag – I worked every day the first week back. I was tired but that’s more from going to bed ridiculously late because I can’t stand not having all my luggage still packed.

Customs took my baskets, but I should get them back in 10 weeks. Fortunately they were the only things that they took. This means I had issues with 3 out of 4 customs.

I was healthier in Uganda than I usually am in Australia, which means… I can go back! Yay!

All in all, my trip went smoothly, and I have been exceedingly blessed by God as a result of it. To Him alone be the glory!

Now to plan my next trip!

Katie Davis

The truth is that the 143 million orphaned children and the 11 million who starve to death or die from preventable diseases and the 8.5 million who work as child slaves, prostitutes, or under other horrific conditions and the 2.3 million who live with HIV add up to 164.8 million needy children. And though at first glance that looks like a big number, 2.1 BILLION people on this earth proclaim to be Christians.
The truth is that if only 8 percent of the Christians would care for one more child, there would not be any statistics left.
From her book, Kisses From Katie

One World Missions Conference

Just to let you all know, there is a One World Missions confernce on from the 8th May to the 10th of May.

Speakers include Ps Wayne Alcorn and Ps Alun Davies.

You can find out more at:

http://www.accim.org.au/im/oneworldconference

or phone 1300 997 502

The even takes place at Faith! Christian Church, 307 Gladestone Road, Dandenong North, 3175

Cost is $80.

Why Go?

When I have heard people say, "Wouldn't it be better to give the money I would spend on airfare to the poor/widow/orphan?"

I'll be real honest...

I have a really difficult time swallowing their words.

I have to wonder, how many really have taken their thousands and given it
to a Third World country need?

Probably not many.


If I read about the need, the words are empty and meaningless.
But if I see the need, I cannot forget.
I cannot erase the faces.
I can no longer neglect the reality.


Seeing the need changes your life forever.

From this post at A Place Called Simplicity