Summer is finally calming down!

Well I have finally finished my epic summer. Togo, 5 days, WYnet Camp, 6 days then soul Survivor. Many, many highlights to share but I will restrict myself to a couple from each place

Togo: Getting 205 Ntcham New Testaments into the hands of people who need them ,also the epic journey to the top of the mountain :) A whole lot of stuff already posted about Togo... go read it!

WYnet camp: Definitely Thursday evening, getting all the leaders releasing stuff in prayer over all the peeps who were at camp. It was an amazing privilege to stand there with a bunch of wonderful amazing young people all desperate to see God move in them an through them. Also amazing to see Young people desperate to see God working in their lives and that they were prepared to be open to God using us. Okay i say us, i am really thinking wow God wants to use ME. I somehow lost sight out that the last couple years. All the routine of summer camp, easy to organise and put everything in place, but being open to God using you, that never fits into a plan! It sort of revived my desperation to see God move in my life and to use me at every given opportunity. Thanks gang for being open to that, thanks campers for being open to God!!!

Soul Survivor: Going into 10 days of Camping and exhibiting already tired is NEVER a good plan. Thank you Steve for putting up with me and helping me get through! This was the first time I have thought, maybe i am actually getting to old for this job! I hate camping at the best of times let alone in Gale force wind and flood producing down pours. We made a lot of good contacts, had a LOT of great fun with our Neighbours from Ellel Ministries in the Tool shed exhibition. A lot of the time was blurred with the news that Christophe one of the translators in Togo had died. I knew it would happen, he had stomach Cancer, but trying to deal with that, a colleague of 10 years, and 20 people to call and inform was not easy in the middle of exhibiting.

Spring Harvest week 1

Springy week 1

Well, four hours of driving, a very large tent that was not there 15 years ago, and a whole lot of rain. Being newbies to the spring harvest exhibition proved obvious as soon as we tried to get into a closed door. Not knowing anyone or really having any expectations of what the place was going to be like we were extremely surprised to find out the ‘exhibition’ is basically a bunch of stands dotted around the skyline which normally has bar restaurants and entertainment stuff. We found our spot, we pop off to the car to get our stuff on getting back to lovely chaps from ‘inyourfatith’ had dumped all their stuff where we were trying to get set up. A hunt was on the exhibition manager. Steve was a great chap. Sorted us out, explained all the ins and outs and got us a space to set up. Things got messy when the computer screen we had for the Wii didn’t work.
We headed off ot the team lounge ot get our info pack and room key, only to discover that they didn’t have us on their list! A couple of phone calls and a conversation with thebandwihtnoname boys and another hour later we finally got room keys to our unexpected apartment with kitchen and lounge. EXCELLENT. A brief trip to Tesco to get some lunch supplies and a TV for the Wii, we got set up and ready to rock. Inclusive dinner in the restaurant was a new experience, buffet roast lamb or about 3 other things, and salad, and desert, we were pretty pleased, then off to open the stand. We had an amazing first night 47 people, we only have a target of 140 for the week, so we actually left at 2300 shattered but very pleased.
The rest of the week, we found a nice grove, of chilling and working hard full English breakfast and meeting loads of new friends, 283 to be exact. I KNOW literally twice our target. I have no idea how the other weeks are going to pan out, but frankly I am excited. By the end of April we may have doubled our WYnet Database, and made loads of new contacts with connect and fro Wycliffe.
High light has to be meeting a guy who started by asking my where he could get a copy of a bible printed especially for dyslexics.( why is that word so hard to spell?) he explained single column, large print and on yellow paper. I said I had no idea, but would do some research for him. We got talking to discover he is based not far from us and is involved in some very high powered computing technology called I2. I can’t go into what he does for a living, but it is WAY cool, and he is working on an idea to 3-D map the bible for people who don’t think linearly and don’t engage with read straight text. Dead herd to explain without sounding like the complete geek that I am!
The winning Wii high score was 55, stevo’s best was 54, pretty awesome, but the wee (no pun intended!) guy was 13 and amazing haha!
Most embarrassing moment was Stevo asking 2 girls if there were over 13 to fill out their own forms, only to get the forms back to discover they were 19 year old twins! A lot of fun, a LOT of hard work, but awesome.

Here’s a wee video of the puppet guy, our stand was opposite them.