Thursday, August 03, 2006

News from T in Cameroon!

Here are a couple updates. I'm copying them, pasting them so some of the info will be duplicate. The girls and I are heading home tomorrow. I'm dreading the ride. I'd much rather stay here, but we need to get home for a good-bye party. Then we sit around all weekend waiting for T to come home!

Update 1:
Hi parents,

Sorry for the lack of updates. The team is doing great – there are some slight stomach issues and Lauren got a small dog bite by the Naines dog. Lauren did talk to her mom, and we are treating accordingly. Good thing they both got all their shots.
The team has done a great job with the youth camp, which finished on Wednesday. Lot of friendships were made, 4 students made decisions and the indigenous youth worker team here got some great momentum. Tomorrow is a visit to a tech school in the morning, followed by visiting some first time ever student small groups – as a follow up from camp – and then a Nav gathering to say goodbye to us. We depart from Yaounde on Sat evening and land in Paris Sunday morning.
Thanks for praying, please pray for:
- that our stomach issues would go away
- for Lauren’s ankle
- that our flights would be on time
- that our time in Paris would be a great time of encouraging our team as they come back to the states and what they will do with the experience

Thanks again, your kids are pretty awesome!

Tony for the team
Prayer Update:

Dear SPACE friends,

I’m writing this from Yaounde, Cameroon, Africa, where we are in day 7 of a 10 day mission experience. The sights, sounds and smells of Cameroon are mostly what you expect of Africa – dusty roads, lots of people, roadside stands and a lot of taxis in this city of 1.5 million people. The relationships here though are far deeper than those images relate to. Cameroonians love people and their warm smiles and handshakes only scratch the surface.

Our team just finished helping run a four day youth camp - assisted by an indigenous team of Cameroonian youthworkers - for around 35 high school students. The overall effort is part of a long term strategy to start a high school ministry and our tasks included being a part of small group discussions centered around faith and spiritual things, running fun high school style games and sharing our stories as well as our lives. Most Cameroonians don’t swim, so the combined experience of a youth camp and the location of the beach was a real treat for them. It was also great for us to have a few lifeguards on our team. This strategy is an ideal situation for a team such as ours, as 4 Cameroonians made first time decisions for Jesus and as the Cameroonian youth team already has planned immediate small groups to follow up.

As if being in Africa wasn’t enough of a real time lab about culture and context, our team also took a 2 hour ride – via dugout canoe – into the jungle to see a village of Cameroonian pygmies. I never imagined I would have the privilege of talking about God to a village chief via two translators. It was a wild experience.

Thank you again for praying and supporting this team – we know God is hearing your requests for us. Please continue to pray for:
- our relative safety for the rest of our time here
most everyone has been healthy except for minor stomach issues.
Also please pray for LFoley, who got a minor bite from one of our hosts’ dog. Fortunately, both have had all their shots.
- Our timely and safe travel – we fly to Paris on Sat night and back home on Monday evening.
- A quality time of debriefing and processing the experience while in Paris
- Our new Cameroonian friends, their spiritual growth and that decades from now, Yaounde and all of Cameroon would be a much different place because of Jesus
- That life back home would be lived with the same passion and intensity for what Jesus longs to do with our lives and the communities we live in.

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