Commencement

Schools in the States call their graduation "Commencement" because it's not suppose to symbolize an end, but a beginning. The students' education has been preparation for sending them out into the world. After 16 years of schooling, life beyond school is scary for some, or exciting for others. But it's the fulfillment of what you've been educated for. The goal is not simply hoarding head-knowledge or useless facts. The goal is using what you know to make an impact on the world. And that's exactly what we hope our graduates will do.

This past Saturday, we celebrated Graduation at NETS. The graduates were those who had finished back in December 2014. There were many different levels of students graduating. We had 5 distance education students graduating with a Certificate in Christian Ministry. There were 4 of our first-year residential students who had completed their Certificate in Theology and were graduating into second year. There was 1 student who was graduating with a three-year Diploma in Theology, and 3 students who had made it all the way through our four-year program and were graduating with a Bachelor's Degree in Theology. Congrats to them all!

Frans receiving his graduation hood

2014 Graduates and Faculty

This hood cost me thousands of dollars.
I'm gonna wear it every chance I get!

Familiar Faces

It's always nice to have friends come visit when you're on the mission field. It's a good reminder that people from back home still remember you and are interested in what's going on your side of the world. Plus it's always fun to share with others things that you're passionate about.

View of Windhoek from the koppe

My friend Julia has spent the last few months serving with Mercy Ships in Madagascar. "On her way home" she stopped by Namibia to visit me for the past week, then she'll visit another missionary friend in Zambia before heading back across the Atlantic. Another fun thing about having visitors is that you get to do all the touristy stuff you never do when you just live someplace. So I showed her all the tourist sites around Windhoek, we went hiking up the small koppe (peak) out behind my place, we went to the market for kapana (today's meat), ate some oryx, kudu, zebra, springbok, and ostrich at Joe's Beerhouse, and saw some of Africa's wild cats. (See more photos on my Flickr page)

        

Stained-glass Jesus inside Christuskirche

   

The National History Museum

Leopard feeding at Dusternbrook

The Cheetahs were much more friendly

In addition to the fun stuff, we also visited Family of Hope Services, a ministry which helps underprivileged children get educated to the point where they can rejoin the government schools. We were invited to come be the Bible teachers for the day. The lesson was on Cain & Abel. We started by telling the story with as simple English as possible, then had some kids come up and act it out with us (minus the murder, of course!). We visited Community Hope School where I was leading their morning chapel with a lesson on forgiveness from the Parable of the Unmerciful Servant. I also showed her around NETS and we sat in on The Living Church class which I will be teaching some lessons for later in the semester.

Acting out the Cain & Abel story

Speaking for chapel at Community Hope School

This morning I dropped Julia off at the airport to catch a flight to Lusaka. I'm again reminded of the value of short-term visitors to encourage and support long-termers. As somebody once said, our joy is made complete by sharing it with others. So what better way to help encourage someone then by letting them share their passion and joy with you! That's what I got to experience this past week. Who can you do that for this week?