here is an overview of the three months we spent in africa. we visited three different countries, which were: kenya, tanzania, and uganda. it is really hard to pick just a few pictures and stories of what has happened in these months, but here is the best pictures and descriptions of the three months!! please enjoy!! also, i want to thank you so much for supporting me thus far on my journey!! it has meant a lot, not only to me, but to all these people who i have come in contact with over this year. just as a reminder, i still have about $2700 more dollars to raise, until i am fully supported!! thank you so much!!
june: we started africa in kenya. we were located in a small village that was about 8 hours outside of nairobi. we did so much in such a small village. it was amazing! first i want to say that most people knew english, which was a surprise to me, but at the same time a blessing! we went to various schools where we taught the students. we would do some songs and bible lesson. we usually did our most famous skit, which is the good samaritan! so much fun! we also did home visits. that usually looked like this: we would go to various neighborhoods and most people would invite us in to talk with them. we would ask them about their life and we would tell them about our trip. then we would share the gospel with them. it was amazing how open the people would be to hear the good news and how many people wanted to accept that! so cool! we would also give them bibles and invite them to the church that we worked with. we also went to the hospital and visited with the patients in the mornings. it wasn’t like a hospital in the states, oh no. this was, see how many people we could fit in one huge room and how many babies can we fit in one bed. it was very different from anything i have ever seen. so hard. we would go in to the hospital and pray and encourage the people that were sick. i remember the first time i ever prayed for someone, he was a prisoner who killed his brother a few month earlier. i just remember thinking to myself, how much he needs help and needs to know that god still loves him and that he needs to hear about jesus. i remember praying for him to be open in his mind and heart to hear god, and each time we went back someone would go pray for him. i hope the people we went with continue to show him love and support. and of course we also preached at different churches in surrounding villages. this was the first time i actually official preached! it was nerve-racking, but not actually that bad! it really helped me practice for what was to come the next month. one of the last days we got to work with some street kids. they range in age from 5 years old to 18 years old. what we did was we fed them bread, milk and cookies. i have never seen so many kids so hungry. we also did a bible lesson with them and prayed for them. they were just hungry for more than food. they were hungry for an answer of how to get out of the streets. that was probably one of my teams favorite times. it gave me such a perspective on what really happens in not just kenya but africa. there is so much more to tell you, but i would end up writing a 100 pages!! but i will say, because of your support we were able to give out bibles, feed lots of kids, get medicine for a few sick people and bless the church and everyone we worked with!
july: the next stop in africa was tanzania. this was my favorite month in africa. we were in the most beautiful place called morogoro. my cousin actually had been here on a mission trip a few years ago! we worked with a small church and basically lived in the neighborhood that the church worked with. which worked out so well, because we got a chance to really build relationships with the people. so during the morning we would do home visits. it looked very similar to kenya, in that the people were very friendly and welcomed us into their homes with open arms. again, we would ask them about their lives and tell them what we were doing. we would then share the gospel with them and most of the time the people would be more than open to it. and many people did accept it! praise god! during these home visits, most of the people were already christian, so we would encourage them to continue in their walk and to go to church. we also handed out bibles to these people. during the evenings, we would go to the church a do different ministry. each night was something different at the church. like mondays were youth, tuesdays were women, wednesday was all church members, thursdays were choir, and fridays were all church. so we took turns preaching to these different groups. i usually did the womens group on tuesday and took this time to tell about my past and then give them encouragement about the future. i also did youth one time with my teammate jake. we did a skit that involved giving my heart to him and he would crush it. but by the end of the skit, i learned to give my heart to god and that i didn’t need jake anymore. it was really a great skit! again i related the skit to my past and then gave them encouragement about the future. it was a great time! there are so many more stories to tell but again like kenya i would end up writing 100 pages!!! but with your support we were able to hand out bibles, hand out food to different families, bless two different orphanages and of course bless the church and everyone we worked with!
august: our last stop in africa was uganda. i want to be honest with you, since you are my supporters. uganda was my least favorite month in africa and probably my least favorite on the race. we lived out in the bush, as you would say, and we moved villages every 2-3 days. it was extremely rough on our whole team. we never really had a chance to rest, because we were always moving. i was also extremely sick during all of uganda. i believe we did 20 days of ministry and i did about 8 actual days of ministry, because i was sick or we had days off. it was not good times. i had malaria twice and ulcers, which really caused me a lot of pain. so i missed out on seeing most of my team, because i was in a smaller city and they were out in the bush. but one thing that was amazing being in the small city, is that we met an american missionary, who helped us out so much! she has been in uganda for about 2 years and worked with a local church, to do medical ministry to the local village. so i call her the saver of uganda, because i was fortunate enough to stay with her both times, instead of having to stay in a hospital. she even cooked american food for me! god is blessing her in so many different ways! so when i was doing ministry this is what we did. in the mornings we would do door-to-door evangelism. which consisted of gathering people from different neighborhoods to tell them about jesus. most of the time we would just stand or sit under a tree and basically preach to them. we had to have 2 different translators, because each village we visited had a different dialect. so it was hard to make sure our words were really transferring to the people as we said them. but at the same time i am thankful, we even had translators! and then in the evenings, we would do crusades. what these look like, is that everyone in the village comes out to hear us preach. one of us would preach for about an hour or so and then our contacts that came with us, preached the rest of the time. we would first worship for about 2-3 hours, then we would hear the preachers, and then we would pray for all the people. people would come forward who needed prayer for various things or if they wanted to accept christ. some nights they would get over around 10 or 11, but a couple of nights we did all night crusades, which lasted until about 2 or 3 in the morning! i missed those, because i was sick, of course. and that is what we did everyday for the entire length of uganda. and because of your support we were able to bless all the different churches we visited in the different villages, we were able to bless our contacts that worked so hard with us and of course the american missionary who took care of me and my team!
me with street kids in kenya
me walking with kids in uganda
with a family in tanzania
me with a kid in tanzania
so this is just africa! stick around for the last part of my journey because i talk about eastern europe!! and of course just a reminder that i need just $2700 more dollars before i am fully supported!!! thanks!!
