Last Day in Schools and Family Memories

When looking back on time it often feels like a paradox.  In some ways it seems like so long ago when we first left home to come on this short term trip to Africa.  But on the other hand, it is hard to believe that today was already our last day to serve in the schools with the Centershot team.  We will have opportunity to serve more over the next two day in different capacities but the main purpose to reach out with Christ and archery to local schools is already over.  It has been a busy four days serving at the schools and each one had its own challenges and rewards.  I would definitely say that we feel tired.

Todays school’s unique challenge was that we were far more limited on what we could share directly with the kids than at any of the other schools we were at.  Although we were told that this school might have as many as 70% christian kids it is known to be a very multi-cultural, multi-faith school.  It is actually owned by Muslims and you can easily see the muslim influence as soon as you enter the school.  Because of this Muslim influence/ownership we were told that we needed to be sure not to present Christ directly while front of the whole school. Leon, who works for RaG, has been working with teachers in this school to gain their trust and confidence so that as time goes on they will have more opportunity here.  We were directed by one of the female christian teachers at this school to be very careful how we approached this situation so as to not ruin future opportunities that they are hopeful will come their way to minister in this school. Our main goal for the day became to love the kids as Christ would, and to show them in such a way His love that they would wonder what is inside of us to make us want to come from the other side of the world to share archery with them.  I think we were successful in this goal and also remained true to our own convictions to still speak with them in our study time about sin and get them thinking about how they need to deal with that in their own lives.  

This school was so different than our rural school from yesterday.  This was a school where more affluent kids attend.  Although the majority were black kids, there were multiple races of kids represented here and that gave it a different dynamic than all the other schools we attended.  Discipline was also more apparent here and you could see the kids showed a lot of respect to the teachers and were diligent about following the rules laid out for them.  This element of discipling as well as the set up of where we were able to shoot made this a nice location to be at for our final day.  It was also a lot of fun to have kids from every grade at the school come and shoot with us.  I believe the school had 500 students from grade 1-12.  It was a blast to help the little kids and then on the next group have 16 and 17 year olds who we could interact with in a totally different way.  Despite the differences in ages they all loved being able to shoot and spend time with us.  The excitement showed and once again archery was the great common denominator.

RaG hopes to be able to start a Centershot program in this school soon with the gospel message being part of that.  They already have 10 kids from this school signed up to begin their Leadership Academy where Christian values are taught to the kids while training to lead in their schools and communities.  We hope that our ability to “play within their rules” will help to open  doors for future more bold ministries.

After we packed up all our gear and headed back to the lodge for a slightly late lunch it was an afternoon for some to relax or if they wished head out for a hunt.  We decide to go as a family to hunt today.  Our main goal was for Jaelyn to have a bit of time to practice with the crossbow and then head to the blinds in search of an impala.  I also took my bow along to hunt but really was not expecting to shoot anything…it was an impala hunt for Jaelyn as the main priority!

Today we also had the privilege of having Kevin Vogt join us to film all the action and just hang out with our family.  He has become a great friend and I love being able to spend time with him and his family on this trip. It was special to have him spend time in a hunting blind with us, as a family, helping to preserve our memories of this hunt on video.  It was exciting to see kudu in the general area as we drove in along with some impala that were right at the blind.  

In this blog entry I will not go into all the details of our hunt, as I realize some of you may not be interested in that.  I will make a separate entry with more details and fun stories from this hunt.  It is a day I will remember for a long time and was happy to share it with all “my girls”.  I will say it was amazing to take in God’s creation together as a family, except during Terrace’s one hour nap where she missed seeing all the impala.  We were able to see Kudu, Impala, Guinea Fowl, and Zebras all from this one location.  The best part is the memories together and the bonus is that we will have it all on video thanks to Kevin!  If your interested to know more watch for the next blog entry that I hope to get done on Saturday sometime.

We would appreciate prayer again for Brennan as he was sick today for a good part of the day.  Seems he got what his wife, Anna, and so many other had.  Everyone else was feeling well today so we are thankful for how prayers have been answered.  

We would also appreciate prayer for our team and the kids we will be ministering to tomorrow afternoon and evening.  Shikwaru Lodge is having a youth event called ‘Unite’ and we should have 150-200 youth coming for games, skits, archery, special music, speakers, supper and a camp fire.  They have asked our team to participate in the event by helping with games and activities in the afternoon and then hosting the whole service in the evening.  As a team we have a few nerves about this as we have not really prepared for this kind of thing and fee a little rushed with our preparations for it.  Please pray that God would use us to make it a success.  Pray specifically for John Wheeler who will speak and Danielle who plans to share a testimony for the youth.  Also pray for Ryan who will be the emcee and has details to work out to make the evening flow. We had a brief planning meeting for this event tonight but many more details will have to be worked out before it starts.

On a final note at the end of our meeting Jannie, who leads Centershot for RaG and has done so much to lead our group this week, brought out a birthday cake for Jaelyn.  It was nice for Jaelyn as she kinda missed out on a cake because of our travel on her special day.  What a kind thought to remember it was her birthday when we arrived and to make it special for her later in the week.  Jannie has been a source of comedy for us most of the week with his dry humor and ability to keep you guessing if he is serious or not.  He had mentioned several times during the week about having to celebrate her birthday.  So all the girls had a small party in one of their rooms to end the night by eating cake!  Thanks everyone!