signposts

The following is the summary letter about my trip to Namibia this summer that I wrote to my support partners. I thought I'd also share it here for anyone interested. If you'd like to see pics from the trip you can check out either Mike's Photo Gallery or G.O. Team Namibia 2005 Photo Gallery.

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Dear Friends and Family,

Well the weather's starting to cool and the leaves are starting to turn and the summer life of this traveling vagabond is finally settling back into some semblance of routine. This finally gives me opportunity to try and put into words the incredible opportunities that God's allowed me to be involved with this summer, in large part due to your prayers and support.

I've been to Namibia four times now, but have never quite had the trouble trying to describe our trip as I now have. As many of you know, we partnered with Melissa Hoffman Dance Center to form this year's Global Outreach team to Namibia, that included 1 dance teacher, 14 dancers, 2 family relatives, and 12 Christ's Church members. The majority of the team from MHDC had very little experience with God or church, so I quickly found myself in a position of challenging many of their preconceived ideas about church, pastors, and God with simply the way I lived my life.

While our "mission" in Namibia was to bring hope and the message of abstinence to Namibian secondary school students, the majority of my ministry took place back at camp amongst our own team. Sitting around the campfire at night and long car rides to our next performances offered the perfect forum for open, honest conversation about how God desires relationship with people. They asked phenomenal questions like what is "born again", what does it mean to dance for God, and how come I've never heard this before. These were conversations we could've had here at home, but probably never would have. It wasn't until we had shared such intense experiences that these questions even came up.

Now we expected to have some of those conversations in Africa, but what we didn't expect was for them to follow us back here. Through team reunion socials, families visiting Christ's Church, and the ever popular instant messaging technology we've been able to continue those conversations that started around the campfire. God's story that was seeded in their hearts long ago and watered in the plains of Africa, will continue to grow up in them long after our influence has come and gone.

During a few afternoons, after our school performances in the mornings, we were able to go to Vyf Rand, the squatters' camp community where our missionary friends, Dieter and Joan Morsbach, minister regularly. We would drive into town and kids would chase our vans all the way to the soccer field where we would pile out into the crowds of their eager, young faces just to play and dance with them. It didn't take long before each team member had their own little attatchment. For me it was Jonas. And every time we would pile out of the vans he would find me and come running up to jump into my arms. It was these kids that we had grown to love that were the hardest to leave. And it strikes me that God went a lot farther than 25,000 miles over 5 flights to show me how much He loved me.

There are so many stories to tell that a letter like this cannot begin to explain. But my hope is that you are encouraged in God's relentless love for you, that He would go through such extravagant means to show you how much He loves you. Thank you for joining me in this adventure by your continued prayers and financial support. I'm excited to see how God will continue to use the experiences and relationships of our trip for His glory in each of our lives.

In His Grip...