Embracing Fearless Pursuit

Yeah, the title might seem like it came straight from a horror movie, but honestly that's what this night felt like for me and the 2 others involved. Looking back, I can laugh (a lot) at it now, the 3 of us have a great memory and bond because of it, and most of all, God has used it to show me something about fear and trust. Fear, it's something none of us want to face. Ever. It doesn't make anybody comfortable. We want to run from it, or whatever is causing it. And that's exactly what I tried to do on this particular night. Now, hunker yourself down for a rollercoaster of a story. It was our second or third night in the village. You see, the village is in the middle of the African bush and there is no electricity. Put those two together and what you get at night (starting around 6pm) is a dark sky dotted and speckled with thousands of stars. The Milky Way is visible and if you look close enough, you can see the international space station circling the earth. C

There is a girl whose name I may never know, but whose face I will never forget.  It was a sunny day (as usual) in Zambia, and particularly hot. We started the morning off by running a kids camp at the local school. Don't be deceived by the term kids camp, it was not something that we trained for, we did not have materials ready, or t-shirts made. None of that. We had a parachute, some balls, a few frisbees, and a lot of smiles. When it is known that a group of muzungus (white people) are in the area and are coming to the school, all of the kids find out. Before we could even leave our property, we were surrounded by kids who had walked down the hill from the school to find us. So, we began walking towards the school. And that's exactly when everything changed. On this particular day, my energy was low and I was probably dehydrated. If I'm real with you, I was not very excited to do this kids camp. It was hotter outside than normal and there was no shade where

"When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. "Lord, have mercy on my son," he said. "He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him." "You unbelieving and perverse generation," Jesus replied, "how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me." Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment. Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, 'Why couldn't we drive it out?" He replied, "Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you."  Matthew 17:14-20  On a Friday night in Zambia, this passage was read over and over again by my te

As previously mentioned, we got to do "treasure hunts" while in the village which meant that we spent time in praying, asking God to speak to us, and show us who He wanted us to talk to that day. During our treasure hunt prayer time, Macie got a vision from God. She saw a woman walking with a yellow (yes, had to be yellow) oil bin on her head. She told the group that this woman carrying the oil bin is also carrying the burdens of her family. That afternoon, after lunch, as we drove through the village, we saw her. We saw the woman with the yellow oil bin. Macie said, "That's her. Dave, we need to stop." And so we did and that's the beginning to a story that God was orchestrating all along. As we all got out, we began to walk towards where the woman was walking to. We found her and introduced ourselves to her. This woman's name is Jennifer. Our team sat down and we began to talk to her and get to know her. We quickly found out that this woman is marri

6 days and 7 nights spent in a village. A place that now feels like home. Actually, it felt like home after only being there for a few hours. They told us it would and they were right. The name of this village is Ngangula (the "n" is silent, pronounced "gone-gu-la").  We were well taken care of by Uncle Hyrance and the village Aunties. Uncle Hyrance owns and lives on the property with his family where the mission station is built. He was our village dad, spending time with us as much as he could, doing ministry with us, making sure we had everything we needed. The village Aunties were Hyrances wife and a couple other women from the area who so graciously cooked for us, offered to wash some of our clothes, prepared our showers and insisted we use them, and did whatever they could to bless us.  In Ngangula, we lived in mud huts. Simplified homes that consist of brick walls, concrete floors, a steel roof, and 2 sets of bunk beds. We strung a little sol

Luke and Elise walking with Avery, I'm on the right. While in Zambia, we met, lived with, and worked with the Whitfield family. Immediately, I knew they were something special. Luke and Elise are the parents and they moved to Zambia 10 years ago with 3 young kids, to simply follow God's call even though they had no idea what it would look like. Five years ago, they moved from Lusaka to Mazabuka, where they currently live. They have 6 kids now and their mission is called the Eleeo Project ( eleeoproject.org/#anewthing ). Luke and Elise live life in Zambia and their family showed me what missions and ministry really is. I had this misconception that missionaries always move to a country with a "mission" in mind. Such as to build a hospital, start an orphanage, plant a church, etc. And that missionaries put everything they have into that and their ministry and God's workings come out of that. While I'm sure that's how it is in some situations, oh did