Urban lights and flashes of nature, though clouded, still persist in my weary mind. Countless thoughts slowly fade. Strange emotions still feuds for control. Yet new understanding makes home in me as i, make a new home, for my wings clipped, by His will, i am urged, for now, to stay. Names i will forget but the wisdom gained is partly forever and wholly mine. I want to thank all the people and all the places i will never recall. For you were and still are part of God's scheme, to ruin my once lost life. And now in the...
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Global Challenge Missions Blog Archive: These are real blogs, from real people, bringing real change...
In Jamaica I discovered why the word "challenge" is at the centre of ''Global Challenge Expeditions''. How ironic that the pastor's wife gave a sermon on the very first Sunday in which she repeated the phrase: ''Challenges, troubles, trials'' almost 50 times in a time frame of an hour. On the day we arrived in Kingston, half of our team was sick. Most had Chick-V fever, which is caused by some musquito (not very hard to believe since we lived in a musquito nest in Guyana). I on the other hand, had a VERY random pins-and-needles irritation on my arms...
Only two weeks of training have passed and I already feel like I have learnt a lifetime of lessons. The people I've met here are already like part of my family. And as for my relationship with God.. It has never been so strong and so intense. I feel like a better, stronger person. And God is my leader, using me as a messenger to tell His story to the world. And all I can say is, "I'm ready for the change, I'm ready for the world, I'm ready for the things that I've already learnt."- Coldplay. These are the...
So, I woke up in my own bed this morning after 7 weeks of sleeping in unfamiliar places with people I hardly know. Now I can say that I have 35 new homes built in my heart. On Thursday night we were commisioned, and man, what a long journey to FREEDOM!!!!!!!!!! Talking about homes. Time to be honest about the one I'm living in. The one you can't see with your eyes. The one you feel with your heart. For quite a long time, I was disobedient and didn't want to leave behind the familiar, to experience...
Wow! How do you even start to put the past two weeks in to words? Trainig started off with a bang! Well, no guns were included, but after a lot of heart warming stories from the Global community, and visiting all the awesome schools, we had our first challege!! From catching a chicken (we named her Sally, and no, she cannot dance), to surfing and eventually hiking down to a farm where we spent the next 4 days doing "Survivor Global". With nothing but he clothes on our backs and few "luxury items", we were bushing it out,we...
I love Ephesians 3:17-18: "And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord's holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ." Being ROOTED and ESTABLISHED in love. That is so cool to think about. I spent most of my life believing I was not worth being alive. Having felt so much rejection from a mother who chose addiction over her children, a lie was planted in my core. Even after I had been placed in a loving foster family, the devil...
We are in Kenya. We are in Kenya. We are in Kenya. A year ago I would have been at work doing some MS Excel programming and moving automotive parts in a warehouse to create space for more parts... I AM IN KENYA. We are walking through the streets of Kenya, we are teaching primary school kids that Jesus is the Winner Man, we are eating mangos, chapattis and beans. Karibu. We are in Kenya. No matter how many times I repeat it, it still feels weird and unreal. When we arrived here alot of us asked the question: What...
Three weeks ago we arrived in Jeffreys Bay, backpacks containing all the belongings that we will need for the year on our backs, mentally and physically ready to begin with training for our Global Challenge Expedition 2015:) During the first couple of days we were introduced to the Global community. By sharing amazing stories about what God has done in and through their lives all over the world they imparted to us their heart for the nations and a new excitement to see how God wants to love His children across the globe. On day five we received...
With a heart wild with expectancy, and eyes filled with wonder, I arrived at OR Tambo on the 4th of March. What to expect? I didn't know. All I knew is that I am about to embark on the journey of a lifetime, to live a life like no other. And all this, with Jesus as my compass and anchor. We boarded flight 202 headed to Dar es Salaam, and you could smell the excitement in the air. Our flight only jetted off at 23:20, and I soon found out that a dinner tray can also be used as a...
From Biblical times until today, the Middle East has been a region subject to near constant unrest and war. Throughout the generations, the kingdom of Jordan has been a safe harbour offering refuge to countless people fleeing from war torn countries on all sides. In an oasis like this, one finds many interesting people with inspiring stories. Stories of death, pain and destruction; stories of perseverance, courage and relief; stories of hope, love and a Saviour found. On top of that, one finds foreigners from every corner of the earth with the same heart who came to bring relief and...
Pink dolphins in the amazon, wild horses on the Guyana plains, red parrots in the Iwokrama forest in Guyana, coconuts of varies kinds just falling from trees around you, small wild mangoes, cake for breakfast, free condensed milk coffee on the amazon, acai, brigadeiro and more acai... Sao Paulo Brazil. The first thought that popped into my mind about the people here was: ''Wow these people are really entering my personal space with all these hug-and-kiss-on-the-cheek greetings!'' Lets just say physical touch did not score very high on my love languages test. But nonetheless I felt loved. I felt at...
In C.S. Lewis' Prince Caspian, Aslan says to Lucy, "Every year that you grow, you will find me bigger." We just completed our third country, and I find Jesus bigger than ever before. It took us about 2 weeks of travelling to get from Brazil to Suriname. During this time I realised that another way travelling adventures can enrich our faith is simply by showing us new facets of God’s exotic world, confronting us with its gloriously peculiar variety and terrifying power. When we encounter Him on the road, in a foreign land, in cultures and landscapes utterly alien to...
To you, the school of the nations This is a thank you. Or an attempt at acknowledgement. To the countless faces and people that I have crossed paths with in the past few years. I once heard a sermon of the way that we are rocks on a river bed, being tossed and turned and swept downstream. And as we bump shoulders with one another, a forming takes place. God determines the length and the depth but still - we are formed in different ways by the people around us. Words cannot describe the forming that has...
Movement, travel, journeying: these are central motifs in the Bible, as they are in Christian life. One reason is that these things jolt us out of what is comfortable, requiring us to step out in faith into the unknown and uncomfortable. And OH WOW have I been jolted these past 7 weeks. I came to Global Challenge with ALOT of preconceived ideas. About myself, about my walk with Jesus, about my future etc etc. I had Marié in a nice little box and all figured out. I thought I was taking a journey to Africa. This changed to South America....
In the late afternoon dusk the city is settling down under a cloud of dust. A few blocks away the image of dreary stone coloured houses is broken by a blue and green kite that sweeps over and through the buildings. Yells of delight are carried on the early evening breeze toward where I am sitting. Sarah sits on the steps outside her house, crying. Her brother has passed away today. The image of a broken girl is a far cry from the one I met this morning before school. Laughing when she introduced herself, screeching as she ran after...
Israel, the promised land, the country where Jesus walked, the place where God revealed so much of His character to us through the Israeli nation. Visiting this special place is an experience that can hardly be captured or described in mere words or pictures. It is seeing a piece of living history, a walk through the gospels. From Bethlehem where Jesus was born to Capernaum next to the sea of Galilea where Jesus ministered to Jerusalem, the city that Jesus loved. How strange and heartbreaking to see the same historic events being viewed so differently through the glasses of different...
It is our first morning in Yogyakarta in Indonesia. I wake up at around 4:30am to the now forgotten but still familiar sound of the call to prayer being boomed into the neighbourhood from the rooftop of ten plus mosques. Not long after as the dawn starts breaking another strange sound claws its way through my sub-conscience. It's a clanging empty noise accompanied by the shouts of a man... Later the day I see that the centre where we are staying at is surrounded by rice paddies. And it is a ritual for the workers that sleep around the...
Hello everyone!! So this is officially the first blog post of the year- hopefully the first of many!! So I will be writing a little unconventionally- I feel like there is a lot of explaining going on about what we have been doing for the last 3 weeks. I don't really feel like explaining today, so instead I will give a few word description of what we did and and how I felt about it or what I learned. I hope you enjoy! Training started January 9th: After 2 days of traveling, I am...
Guyana: land of many waters (especially in rainy season), many many musquitos (also known as the national bird of Guyana), ALOT of jungle and ALOT of sand... Overall Guyana was one of my favorite countries so far. Guyana is like a little India in Africa but situated in South America. The beauty of the jungle is something you only dream about or see in movies. The people: le-gen-da-ry. Just to give some insight into this statement. One day our faithful mode of transportation, an old school bus, failed to start and we needed to be at the pastor's village in...
From the north to the south, the beaches of the Galilee to the stone-cobbled streets in Jerusalem, the country shouts the name of our Emmanuel - God with us. But the echoes in the religion and the hate and the noisy youth murmur the depravity of our human souls. This is my second time in Jerusalem, and again the wailing wall is exactly that, a cause for despair. Against the wall an old woman is rocking back and forth. Pilgrims come from afar to leave their prayers rolled up in wads of prayer, stuck in between two rocks. On the...
The Global Challenge Expeditions Team of 2015 has created an initiative to increase financial support, called the Break an Egg, Build a School Challenge . This challenge is to create a video of you breaking an egg in a creative way and donate at www.gcex.org or at your local bank. Post your video on a social media website and nominate 5 friends to do the same! You are welcome to donate without participating in the challenge. Three classrooms. Seven days. Thirty-six students. One inspired vision. Our team has the privilege to advance classrooms which will prepare leaders who will reach...
Ci-dessous, le texte de notre leader Chris. J'ai pris la liberté de traduire le texte... Nous sommes toujours à Antofagasta, nous repartons mercredi... Bonne lecture ! "Voila comment ont commence une aventure... Après notre aventure à Machu Piccu, nous sommes montés dans un bus au départ de Cusco à 22h30 et à destination de la frontière bolivienne. Nous sommes arrivés à la frontière bolivienne le lendemain matin avec l'espoir de pouvoir revoir la jungle amazonienne dans ce pays, mais... Dieu avait un plan différent. Environ 1 heure plus tard, nous nous sommes retrouver sur le trottoir du côté Péruvien, car...
So this is the account of our Luke10 faith journey. This story starts with two guys setting out on an adventure. Jesus sent out his disciples two by two into towns to prepare the way for the kingdom. We prayed and felt God said we should travel through Argentina to the city of Asuncion in Paraguay. I asked God to show me His love on this Luke 10...He did. Day 1 - Wednesday 14 Oct On a bus from Chile to Argentina at 05:00 We traveled over the Andes mountains at 4200m above sea level Andes mountains are amazing...snow capped...
Leadership gets defined when you are thrown into the back of an airplane wondering if all the team members are on board. Or when, a supposedly agreed upon, 5 minute per person shower, turns into a self proclaimed 10 minute spa treatment with 6 other people waiting for their turn with a "what are you going to do about this" expressions on their faces. Or even that moment when someone tries to convince the guys that lentils have the same amount of protein as a steak. And all this before breakfast. Our team is neatly divided into 5 smaller teams....
"Someone asked will the heathen who have never heard the Gospel be saved?" "Its more a question with me whether we -- who have the Gospel and fail to give it to those who have not -- can be saved." Charles Spurgeon If there is something I can take out of our Africa journey, it would be Gods heart regarding the great commission. The whole of heavens army and all the witnesses are eagerly awaiting on the completion of our mission. The whole time here it felt as if we were being cheered on to complete the race,walking in...
The following story is based on true events. During our time in Panama I was inspired to earnestly seek child like faith. This is to Ann, Emma and Pastor Bill. "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children"- Matthew 11:25The Travelzoonz were in a land much like a prison. The land had walls around it. The clock was tickady-tock-ticking, so they took a truck and a machine bird to travel to new lands. O, it was a big truck they travelled with. A...
So this is the last country of our journey. In a sense the last stretch home. We have experienced a lot up until now and it is with mixed emotions we approach the finish line. Some of us are sad that our travels are coming to an end mixed with excitement of seeing our homeland again. Some of us are excited at the prospect of wearing new outfits. And then there are those who are excited about the full farmhouse breakfast awaiting us in Johannesburg...eggs sunny side up, no toast, lots of bacon, and a good cup of coffee. Paraguay...
Im busy reading this book on vulnerability and shame. Apparently shame does not like it when we talk about it and this is where vulnerability comes in. Its to open up a part of yourself that may be assaulted or hurt by others. So its about the courage to open up. To step into the arena and fight the fight with others who are courages enough. And people who are not in the arena don't have a say or should not influence the way you think about yourself. Your worthiness is in your courage to step out in faith...
Tomorrow evening, we will land in South Africa. As I reflect on this last month in India, I realise Work Your Way 2015 is ready to go home. Ready for the next journey that awaits us. Its been a great year. A journey full of lessons learned, adventures, fun and difficult times? Our expectations have been met in more ways than one could imagine. The first week in India we spent in New Delhi, while we waited for another Global team (Nortbound) to arrive. Together we went to an Orphanage in Kota, South of New Delhi. It...
Hello everyone ! This couple of weeks, I could experiment deeply what was the meaning of the verse 8 from the chapter 55 in the book of Isaiah: "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD. Everything started at the border of Suriname. Pastor Deo brought us al the way from Timehri to the Surinamese border with a Bus. So we all went out of the bus and had to hurry to embark in the ferry. We went for the check of our passport, everything was fine for everyone EXCEPT for me...
