First off, let me just say that Adventures in Missions (AIM)–the agency I am going on the trip with–has done an amazing job preparing us to go into our ministry setting. I do admit that I was a little unsure what training camp was going to entail, but now that I have been through it I see that it was an essential part of the experience. I have been on several other missions trips in my life thus far and I have never in my life been either informally or formally trained to go. So advice to start with: Please please please. If you are being sent out to serve, somehow prepare and have people help you prepare. I have a feeling that once our team hits the ground–and honestly, even before that–we will make an impact on the nations!
Every team that is going on a trip this summer similar to the one I will be going on receives training. At my particular camp, there are roughly two hundred or so of us participants plus some for sure God sent leaders. We have learned about listening to the voice of God, proclaiming the truths of God over ourselves, our trip, and the people we will be ministering to, surrendering our expectations and burdens, and encouraging and cooperating with our teammates. In order to check out more of what went on during training camp, be sure to log on and go to www.facebook.com/thepassport for photos and other various information!
In addition to these things, we learned more about our particular ministry area and what in general to expect of the culture. Our team has been blessed to be provided with a place to stay and the opportunity to prepare most of our own meals. Granted, our budget will not be extravagant but I know that this provision is of the Lord. Not only do we have those provisions, but we have amazing people who are waiting for us there. There are already missionaries there that will be assisting us with finding translators and helping us see where the needs are, amongst other things. We will be living indoors which is also a blessing, considering I expected just the opposite. We will have opportunities to experience the culture, and hopefully meet the king! A few people on our team have connections with locals that live near where we will be, so it will definitely be an awesome experience.
I am super SUPER excited to be going back to Swaziland. I cannot even imagine what emotions I will be feeling tomorrow as our team boards a plane to fly into Joburg, South Africa and board a bus the next day to get into Swaziland, but let’s just say that I am expectant of God to move and do ridiculously crazy things both in our lives and in the lives of the Swazi people. Please pray for Swaziland as a whole, but particularly two places that we will be working in or around: Timbutini and Manzini. Pray that we will recognize the power we have inside of us to proclaim the straight up truth to these people and anyone else we meet along the way. Pray for divine appointments, open homes, and open minds for all involved. I cannot thank ya’ll enough for prayers because our team has really been seeing prayers answered already!
