2009 Namibia Mission Trip

 

 Thank you for your interest in following our mission team as we travel to our sister church in Bethanien, Nambia, on October 26th. 

 

 

Wednesday, Oct. 14th - A five-member team consisting of Pastor Dean, Kirsten Laderach, Bob Foell, Steve Fritz and Tom Thul will start the trip on Monday night with a flight from Minneapolis to Amsterdam (8 to 9 hours) followed by another flight from Amsterdam to Cape Town, South Africa (11 or so hours).  It's really not as bad as it sounds.  We will drive from Cape Town to Bethanie, Namibia (10+ hour drive) hoping to arrive late Thursday night or Friday.  In addition to the time spent in Bethanie, the mission team will be in other parts of Namibia to visit projects and people sponsored by Zion Benevolence.  After about two weeks, the trip home begins with a flight from Windhoek to Johannesburg, South Africa, followed by the the direct but very long (16 to 17 hours) flight to Atlanta and a two hour flight into Minneapolis arriving on November 12th.

With this blog, I hope to keep you informed so you can share in the rich experience mission work provides and to see how Zion is fulfilling God's plan to share His word through reaching out to our neighbors in need.  

Tom 

Thursday Morning, October 28th - We arrived safely in Cape Town, South Africa, late on Tuesday night.  The flights were long but it gave us time to reflect on our mission trip (plus catch up on a few movies/books).  On Wednesday, we met with Rowan Haaroff the Executive Director of Lerato's Hope.  It is a Christian NGO (non-governmental organization) founded in 2002 and is based in the Crossroads township.  Lerato in the local language means "love" and is also the name of small child who serves as the inspiration behind the organization.  Lerato is living proof that with love, nurturing and antivirals, an HIV positve child can live a happy and fulfilled life.  Loreto's Hope builds meaningful relationships with existing grass roots organization who care, treat, support and empower poor families in the local townships.  Rowan explained their role as "walking beside" and "facilitating" these organizations to provide the support needed in their efforts.  One such organization is Beautiful Gate which we visted on Wednesday afternoon.  The complex is located in a very poor township of Cape Town where it provides support in a variety of ways.  It offers many youth development programs, including after-school homework support (think ZAP at Zion) for kids in the nearby townships.  Another program is a pediatric clinic providing medical treatment for over 350 HIV positive children.  A crisis-care program offers a safe place for up to 40 abused, abandoned or orphaned children which is housed in four on-site cottages.  There are many more programs which we will cover on our return.  Tino Tadokena, the resource team leader of Beautiful Gate, gave us a two-hour tour of the facility.  He has a strong passion for his work and the people they serve.  I could have spent many hours with Tino. 

Will try to download a few pictures and add more detail the next time I'm near a computer with Internet.  Right now it's time for the drive up to Bethanie!

Tom

Thursday, November 5th - As you can tell, this trip is a huge learning experience for me...especially when it comes to updating a blog.  I learned you need an Internet connection to provide any updates, which I have not had for the past week.  Will try to plan better next time, but let me update you about the trip.

On Sunday, Pastor Dean gave a great sermon at the Schmelen church up on the location.  Pastor Beukes (the Schmelen pastor) provided a live translation of the sermon in Nama for the congregation.  You will have to see a few of the video clips to appreciate this process as Pastor Beukes passionately provided the translation line by line.  Plus you will have a chance to hear the beautiful voices our Namibian brothers and sisters singing during the service.

One of our visits was to the Schmellen Preschool/Kindergarten which also serves as a hostel.  Here, Zion provides monthly support to feed the children living at the school.  With the proper nutrition, the children can concentrate on an education and learning about a God that loves them.  Zion provided extra support on this trip by paying for the water to the school.  Tough times had caused the school to fall behind on paying its bill.  Thanks to partners like you, we were able to help out.  I just wish you could have been there as the staff thanked us over and over.  They wanted us to make sure we passed along their thanks to all the people of Zion.

Another visit included a stop at D.C. Frederick Primary School which includes a pre-school and grades 1 to 4.  Each grade is broken up into two sections, one that is taught in Nama and one that is taught in African.  This is needed until the student's English is sufficient for learning.  Then the classes in upper grades are taught in English.  What I thought was impressive was the relief teacher we met at the school.  His job was to provide assistance to the other teachers due to the large class sizes.  The real story, however, was the funding for this teacher.  His salary is paid for by the other teachers.  Yes, you heard it right.  The other teachers pay for the relief teacher just so their students can get the education and attention they need!  Makes it tough for me to try and come up with an excuse for not helping. 

While at the school I also had the chance to interview a few of the students, via the ZAP program at Zion.  Stephanie Thul arranged it so the ZAP students at Zion could ask a question of the Bethanie students.  We took a picture of each ZAP student and wrote his/her question on the back of the photo.  The teachers at D.C. Frederick picked out six of their students to answer the ZAP students' questions.  Although we did not have much time, I look forward to sharing the video with the ZAP students and others at Zion.  I know the students from Bethanien enjoyed sharing their answers.

Our team met with the Schmelen Council and the Partnership Committee in order to learn how we might be of any assistance.  The key here is to ask how we might help, and not just assume we know what's best.  Out of this discussion surfaced plans for a garden project and a food program for the people living up on the location.  The one point that stood out during this discussion was the willingness and commitment of the Schmelen leaders to make these programs successful.  It is up to us to understand how we might provide some resources to help with this enthusiastic effort and will report on it upon our return.  Another helpful part of the meeting was to hear their opinions as to why some projects may have struggled in the past.  Again, the important piece is understanding their read on the situation, not just ours.  

Several meetings were held with Pastor Beukes, the pastor at Schelen church.  What can I say except that he is a very determined individual who has the gifts from God necessary to make our partnership a great success for all of us.  We certainly look forward to working and communicating with Pastor Beukes.  By the way, the pastor's truck (called a backie in Namibia) was not working upon our arrival.  Again due to your generous support and sacrifices the truck now has a new starter and a pair of sorely needed tires.  The pastor wanted us to pass along his appreciation for your generousity and help.  

Let's call this next one - Bob the Internet Guy!  Throughout many of our meetings one of the challenges raised often was the difficulty in communicating with both sides of the partnership.  Too many missed phone calls and letters make it hard to stay in touch.  As a result, projects struggle and people get frustrated.  As a solution, an Internet connection was installed (thanks to all of Bob Foell's efforts) at the Pastor's house allowing email for the first time with our friends in Bethanien.  Zion partners provided the modem, Internet connection and email service so now we can communicate often and very easily.  This will have a significant impact on our partnership with Schmelen.  Thank you Zion partners!!

A great outcome of our trip was the effort Kirsten made to get to know the women of Bethanien.  She scheduled a meeting to better understand their celebrations and their struggles.  I will not even attempt to report on the success of Kirsten's efforts, but just let me say it was very clear as to why God included her on the trip.  Please make sure you speak to Kirsten about this touching story. 

I could not close this blog without sharing with you one very special event.  The good people of Schmelen had a Steve Fritz farewell and Tom Thul welcome party which included a prayer service, a program and a goat.  Yes, yours truely bought a goat for the barbeque following the program.  Please do me a favor and grab any one of our team members to get details on this wonderful evening.  Trust me, it will be worth your time.

There is not enough time to share all the love, respect and warmth the people of Bethanie have for Steve Fritz.  He will be sorely missed by them!  And I know it will be impossible to fill his shoes.  I can only pray that God will make clear my role and how I might continue his good works.

I must close for now.  Please excuse all the typos and misspellings as I do not have the time to edit.    Just know that we are safe and are priviledged to have the opporutnity to serve all you back at Zion.

Till the next time I see an Internet connection, please pray for us and the people of Bethanie.

Tom

Final Thoughts - Thursday, November 12th

The mission team returned home to Clear Lake safe and sound today.  We would like to thank everyone for their support and prayers during the trip and a big thanks goes out to Mark Holck for the van rides to the airport in Minneapolis. 

While jumping on the site to update this blog, I was pleasantly surprised to see it had over 260+ hits since its inception in mid October.  Okay, 200 were probably from my mother but I'm still pleased with the level of interest.  Thanks for checking in!

It's hard to summarize a mission experience to Bethanie and in some ways it's probably unfair to do so at this time since the effect of it all does not really set in fully until long after your return.  What can be said is that it does change you.  Actually you have no choice in this regard.  You simply cannot walk away without at least a different perspective on life and the importance of helping others. 

The big question is how can I help?  We have to be a little careful here as it is easy to become frustrated in the mission efforts in Bethanie.  As we learn more about the issues, which can run deep and be rather complicated, the more difficult it becomes to find a potential answer or solution.  But this is exactly where we need to exercise caution.  Frustration is a common travel companion on the road to believing we know how best to help others.  We need to avoid words like "solutions" and "answers" and to avoid thinking in terms of "I" or "me".  It's not about I or me and it's not just about Zion.  It's about a partnership.  A partnership between Zion and the good people of Schmelen church in Bethanie where our role is not necessarily to provide solutions or answers.  Our role is to help facilitate a relationship.  One that is based on mutual respect for what each partner brings to the table.  Respect for how each partner can help to understand the issues and how best to approach them.  And, more importantly, how together we might understand God's plan regarding each person's respective role/purpose.  So back to the question about what can we do.  We can start by taking on the Biblical role of a true servant of God and work in partnership with people in need.  This means admitting we won't always know all the answers.  But if it starts with love and respect for our neighbor, especially in times of need, and it continues with a heavy dose of listening, understanding, loving and even sacrificing in partnership with our friends in need, then we will be well on our way to addressing this question.   

There is one more point to be made about this trip.  It's called surrendering.  My good friend Steve Fritz tried to get me to understand this concept many times in the past.  But it was only a few days into this last trip that the concept suddenly started to take on a new meaning.  The details are not important but essentially it involved failing to stay on schedule and accomplishing the "to do" list each day.  At one point when we were about three hours behind schedule Steve looked at me and simply said, "Africa makes you surrender".  I'm sure Steve had no idea of the signicance and impact of these words, but they struck rather hard and they struck deep.  I had to learn a lesson.  You must surrender to Africa before you can even begin to understand how you might help her people.  It's just like we must surrender to God before we can expect to understand His will and His ways.  But when you do, the path becomes clearer and the rewards greater.  Yes, yours truly finally surrendered to Africa that day.  Just like we must do with God so we can follow His guidance to know how we might help our friends in Bethanie.  And as importantly, how they might help us.  Like I said, it's about a partnership.

Thanks again for your interest in this mission trip!

God Bless,

Tom