Pressing On

This semester in NETS Community Devotions the lecturers preached through a series on the book of Revelation and are now finishing up the semester with a 3 week series on Haggai. This past Thursday I preached from Haggai 2:1-9, an encouragement for God's people to courageously continue God's work. You can download it here or listen below if you'd like.

NETS Fun Weekend

This past weekend, the Student Council at NETS planned a great community outreach weekend. On Friday night there was a Gospel Show. There were all kinds of acts like different dance groups and solos, church worship teams, spoken word performers, and some a cappella groups. I signed up for an act and recruited a friend from church to sing harmony with me. We performed "For The Moments I Feel Faint" by Relient K and "Your Hands" by JJ Heller. It was a great night with over 200 people in attendance!


Then on Saturday morning we were all back at NETS for a Volleyball fun day. The students had organized a volleyball tournament and we had food, and games, and water balloons. There were two teams from local churches, a team from Youth For Christ, a NETS student team, and I organized a NETS staff team. The NETS staff team had a very strong day and never lost a game, taking home the trophy in the end. The students already want a rematch. ;)

Intro to Missions

I put together this little video for a friend who's doing a missions emphasis with his youth group

this month. It's a brief introduction to mission strategy but also to my ministry in Namibia.

Blossoming Deserts

This is exactly why I call my blog "Blossoming Deserts." All it takes is a little bit of rain and the desert bursts into bloom. What was once dry, brown dirt becomes a fertile field of different shades of pink, yellow, purple and green.

That’s exactly how God’s Word works in the lives of dry souls. Jesus calls Himself the living water that becomes within us a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Just like the driest desert before the rain, Jesus can transform even the driest soul.

“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven

    and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
    giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall My Word be that goes out from My mouth;
    it shall not return to Me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
    and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”

                                                       ~ Isaiah 55:10-11

Spring Break 2015

This past week we had our "spring break" at NETS so I escaped from town for a few days for a little R&R. I joined 7 friends (some old, some new) staying at a little apartment right across from the beach in Cape Town, a city I'd heard so much about but never yet visited. I filled up a whole memory card worth of photos which will eventually make their way onto Flickr, but I'll give you the highlights here.

This was our beach in the small, homey suburb of Muizenberg. It's a popular surfer destination as the slow sloping beach offers many waves. The white sand, blue waters, and slightly warmer Indian Ocean current made it a great place to take a morning walk, toss a frisbee, or go for a swim.

   

The V&A Waterfront is a popular touristy shopping place. They have lots of shops, vendors, street performers, nice views of Table Mountain, and a little sense of pop culture humor. The food market here is an fantastic place to stop for lunch with a variety of authentic ethnic foods from all over the world!

   

Next, it was on to the World Heritage Site of Robben Island, the home for political prisoners during the apartheid era in South Africa's history. It was a sobering reminder of how power, fear, and hatred can bring out the worst in humanity. Nelson Mandela, a leader of the anti-apartheid movement, spent 18 years living in this small cell and doing hard labor at the lime quarries on the island. Namibian freedom-fighter Toivo ya Toivo was also imprisoned here.

Waiting in line for over an hour and a half to catch the cable car up Table Mountain was totally worth it. The views from the top over the Atlantic Ocean and the city are outstanding! The top is fairly flat, hence the name, so there are paved walking paths that lead you to viewpoints on both the north and south sides. We went up on an amazingly clear and warm day so we could see to the horizon in almost every direction.

   

If you plan your timing right, you can make it down from Table Mountain in time to drive over to Signal Hill to catch the sun setting over the Atlantic Ocean. As the one light disappears into the sea on west side of the hill, all the lights of the city start coming out on the other side of the hill.

   

The hills of Kirstenbosch are home to South Africa's National Botanical Gardens. There are thousands of varieties of flowers, herbs, trees, cacti and medicinal plants, even some species that are almost extinct. The many walking trails and vast lawns made it a relaxing setting for a nice picnic lunch and afternoon walk. They even had a raised walking bridge to take you through the upper canopy of the "Enchanted" Forest!

   

Boulder Beach is home to a colony of penguins. This is their breeding ground so you'll find them all up and down the coast sitting on their nests of eggs. They're quite used to humans lingering around so you can wander up right next to them and even swim alongside them. But don't get too close because they do have sharp beaks and claws.

   

The Cape of Good Hope is the most south-western point in Africa. Bartholomew Diaz was the first European to round the cape looking for a shipping route to India. Now tourists flock there to have their picture taken with this sign. But if you're a bit brave (some call it crazy) like me, then you can climb out on the rocks all the way to the edge of Africa. It's pretty cool looking out over the ocean knowing that the next land in that direction is Antartica. But before you start climbing out, make sure to give your car keys to your friends so they can still get home in case you fall off and die.

Then finally, we drove up the coastal road looking for a nice beach to relax on. Our criteria were simple, no seaweed covering the shore, no sand flies, and ideally no people. We came across the beach at Misty Cliffs (aptly named) with white sand, blue water, amazing waves and most importantly, no seaweed, flies, or people. :)

All in all it was a nice time to get away, enjoy friends, not think about work, and all that in a setting surrounded by God's beautiful creation. At 6am on Saturday morning I loaded up the car for the long 16 hour drive back to Windhoek. With all my friends going their separate ways I would be making this drive alone. But it was like the long slow sigh after a deep breath. Now, with a bit of renewed energy, it's back to work for the second half of our semester...and editing through a thousand photos to tell the tale!

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?