Confessions of a Junior.

Ahhh, junior year. The year that was least liked in high school (from the few opinions I've heard) and definitely has a peculiar vibe to it. The hype of freshman and sophomore years (yes, sophomore year included--at APU at least, the hype definitely does not wear off by that point) is gone. College has a sense of normalcy to it, a sense that I personally am not too fond of and have struggled to be okay with. Yet it's not quite the end of your college career; you have a little less than half of your undergrad ahead of you, so you can't fully prepare to move on yet.

As it goes with any relationship, friendship, or anything else for that matter--as you get to know someone or spend time somewhere the honeymoon phase eventually comes to an end. You begin to see the flaws and are left with a choice to make: you can bail because you don't want to deal with the imperfections or you can choose to stick it out.

When life reaches a sense of normalcy it is then that we need to be the most careful. Complacency is quick to follow normalcy if one is not aware of it. Normalcy is one thing--in and of itself it is not necessarily bad. Complacency, on the other hand, is a bad thing. It can make you content with where you are at, cause you to quit pursuing growth, and make you lazy.

This morning I went to Foothill Church and the lead pastor preached a message concluding "The Church is..." series that they have been doing. The title of the message was, "...on a mission." Preaching out of Matthew 28:18-20 where Jesus calls the disciples to "go forth and make disciples of all nations", the point was that we always have purpose wherever we go. My previous blog post touched on this topic, the idea that God's purpose for you is the reason you're alive. Pastor Chris's sermon, however, focused more on the fact that our lives are our ministry. It's funny how we're willing to go across the world to some third-world country and do "crazy things for God" yet when we come home to the culture and country that is familiar to us we all of a sudden become complacent or are afraid to do "crazy things for God". We even find a way to justify it: "I can't do those things here, Americans aren't the same...", "Americans aren't as accepting...", "I'll be judged...", "I'll lose what means most to me...", etc.

Let me be the first to say that I am completely guilty of this. I myself struggle to live differently in the States yet I know that I can go abroad and (it is much easier to) live simply, lovingly, and selflessly. I am not saying that going abroad isn't a good thing--it is definitely a good thing and many are in fact called to the nations. What we need to quit doing, however, is separating the two. God is as present in America as He is anywhere else. God's Kingdom can be here, there, and anywhere! There should be a fluid continuity between the two; the life I live in Africa shouldn't be any different from the life I live in America.

As a fellow struggler amongst the majority I give you permission to keep me accountable of this. Don't be afraid to ask how things are going. I want that kind of accountability and I think we all need it.

Live counter-culturally.

Live Kingdom-minded.


Live your life as your ministry, 'cause it is.

Month One.

It has now been one month since I left the United States. One month prior to this moment exactly I was enduring the longest plane ride I have ever been on. Now that's just crazy.

The last couple of weeks have been a wild ride. College in and of itself feels extremely long as there is so much going on, all the time. It's no different here in Africa. A day feels like several and a week feels like a month. Time is a confusing concept.

Last weekend we went on a battlefields tour, traveling for hours in two buses (one a charter bus and one a "baby bus") to see various battlefields here in the province of KwaZulu-Natal. I thoroughly enjoyed learning more about the history of this beautiful country. Not only was there tension (war, etc.) between whites and blacks (Anglos/Boers and Zulus) but also amongst the whites (the Dutch whom were called "Boers" and the British). The picture above is a memorial that was set up for several British soldiers who died in the particular war that happened at that battlefield. Underneath the stones are the bones of several soldiers as the British had fled the area and couldn't retrieve their dead until days later.

Overall the weekend was a great one. We learned a lot and stayed at an aged hotel characterized by the wars that have happened here. Flags, spears, and other items decorated the entire building filling it richly with history. On Saturday night, the night we stayed at the hotel, we had an amazingly delicious three-course, buffet-style dinner. It was one of the best meals I've had while I've been here, that's for sure! After dinner, sipping on tea and coffee, all 53 of us gathered around Reg Codrington, our director, to ask him any and every question we could think of. The amount of wisdom and grace in that one man is mind-blowing. He is certainly one of the greatest men of God I have ever met.

This last week was a rough one. Everyone was exhausted after being gone all weekend and having been pretty busy in general. On Wednesday for my biology class we went to Treasure Beach: a rocky beach with an abundance of wildlife and "treasures" to be found. We got to swim in some of the rock pools and had a total blast. The Indian Ocean is so warm! (In case I haven't mentioned it before. :P)

On Thursday we visited a sangoma--a witch doctor. In the case of the one we visited he was more of an herbalist but a witch doctor nonetheless. He uses traditional medicine to heal those who come to him; he calls upon the ancestors for healing as well. Ancestral worship is a prominent part of many African religions; even within African Christian circles many of the practices surrounding the ancestors are still continued. Needless to say visiting the sangoma was an interesting experience; my mind continues to be opened every day.

On Friday we went to a Bible Institute and shared the entire day with them. Their chapel service was filled with plenty of worship and song; every transition had a song to fill its place. The worship "leaders" sat in the crowd and sang from their seats; how cool this was! They did a dance and sang some songs for us and we did the same for them; we taught them the Cupid Shuffle (dance) and sang "Bless the Lord (Son of Man)" for them. They certainly loved it!

The rest of our time was spent playing games and getting to know the students there. I met a man named Luzuko, a former pastor and current professor at the Institute. He had taught there from 1998 to 2005 and then left to do pastoral work for a number of years. He then returned to UBI (Union Bible Institute) in 2009 and has been teaching there ever since. He loves what he does, and as it turns out, has family in Washington State--small world! The games we played were plenty: relay races, bobbing for apples, tug-of-war, and soccer. Their soccer team had uniforms and cleats that they wore which was a lot more professional than any of us expected. Unfortunately we lost the soccer game but had a lot of fun playing with them! It was raining the whole time too so we were soaked by the end of it.

God has been doing so much in and around me over the last month that it's difficult to put it all into words. Feelings of loneliness were common during the first several weeks. I noticed within this last week that something shifted, however; I haven't felt lonely anymore and I feel that I've finally reached that point where I'm comfortable with everyone here. I've been able to be myself and not worry about holding back or being concerned about what others think; it's been so freeing! What I've had to remember about myself is that I take time to open up to people; I tend to be more observant and quiet at the beginning but open up as time goes on.

I've also had to remind myself to give myself a break. While I've been here the things I have been struggling with seem to be things that I haven't dealt with in years. The other day a friend and I had a great conversation and she made a really good point: "just because you're dealing with something here that you haven't dealt with in a long time doesn't mean your regressing. It's a completely new environment with a new group of people and the challenges are going to be different from what you deal with back home." There is a abundance of truth to that statement and it has relieved me of a great burden. I know more than anything that I want to keep moving forward and seek God in all things--my prayer is that my life reflects that pursuit. Not for me, but for Him. For His Kingdom.

Speaking of His Kingdom, the spiritual manifested in a profound way last night. We watched a documentary called "Furious Love"--a documentary where a guy went around the world in search of seeing God's love overcome the powers of darkness. It wasn't where he intentionally provoked demons or anything of that sort; he simply went to places where God was working. For example, the documentary starts off at a revival meeting in Tanzania. Several people (in the documentary) ended up getting possessed by demons and delivered by God through much prayer and His power. The documentary moved us in a prominent way; we ended up spending a lot of time in prayer, rebuking the powers of darkness and declaring God's victory over ourselves and this campus. We know that He has a lot of good things in store for us and we are ready to fight as soldiers of His army. I am so incredibly blessed to be a part of all of this and I cannot wait to see what is to come. It may not be easy, but God is on our side and that is all we need. He is all we need.

This is Africa. Month One.