June 2 & June 3

Day 2: June 2- Morogoro, Tanzania Africa

Jambo!!

We just completed our second day here in the village! The weather has been wonderful, hot but with a cool breeze and lots of sunshine! As a team we had a very productive day with women from all over.

Today is known as the day where the people celebrate the ascending of Christ into Heaven. We hung out with many different women from all different tribes and villages and went into their gardens and picked peas with them! We also taught ourselves, along with the women, how to make fabric, beaded necklaces so that they can make more and sell them. We encouraged them and connected with them in many ways.

After making beads we ate lunch (lots of rice and beans) and had a 2 hour worship service with the women. They taught us songs in Swahili as we sang to them and taught them songs in English! They showed us a lot of hospitality and were glad we came to be with them.

The women taught us a few phrases in Swahili as well, such as “Shikamoo” which is a type of greeting you would say to an older woman and in response they say Marahaba. Also, “Habari gani” asks the question ‘how are you?’ and in response you say, “Nzuri” which means fine or well.

We had a lot of fun being with the women and learned so much about their caring hearts. As a team we are looking forward to the rest of week!!

Thank you all for keeping us in your prayers!! We are all having so much fun and doing well!

With much love,

Shelby Boaz

Day 3: June 3- Tanzania, Africa

Habari gani!?! Nzuri!

Today we visited the village of Lukangaza. We cooked, hung out with a lot of kids, sang lots of songs, and some of the children even knew English!

At the beginning of our day we picked some crops to cook for the lunch that the women were serving us. The different types included a Kasaba leaf, which is a leaf of sweet milk from a tree, corn that we shucked, cow-peas that we de-skinned, and another leaf from a little bush. After picking Abby, Megan, & Avery got to de-shell a coconut, which was super hard!! The women loved it that we were so willing to learn and help even though we couldn’t understand a word they were saying!

Next we headed to the church where the kids were learning English for some domestic and wild animals! We sang some English songs and they sang some Swahili songs AND English! Crazy, huh? They tried teaching us a song, but that didn’t go to smoothly. We also did a skit for them, Noah’s Ark, which Robert translated for us. They seemed to like it, or maybe they were just laughing because we used animal plates for the animals or that a girl was playing a boy’s part!

As the day went on, we ate lunch in Pastor Nuru’s house, played some outdoor games with the children, sang some more songs, watched a Swahili skit played out by young boys, and colored some coloring sheets. At the end it was sad leaving the kids, and they just kept saying bye to us and once we drove off they chased after the van.

Today was an amazing day just as the rest of them have been!! Thank you for the prayers, and we are all well and having a great time!

Lots of love,

Avery Hufft

Day 1- Morogoro, Tanzania, Africa

After a long couple of days of little sleep, long flights, being stuck in an elevator, running through the Chicago airport to catch our flight, a newbie flight attendant, crying babies on multiple flights, raining inside the airplane, a stripping man on the London tram, greenbus tour that made great nap time, getting our own rows on the final flight to Dar es Salaam, and waking up to a beautiful sunrise over Mount Kilimanjaro…WE MADE IT!!!

We went through customs, exchanged some money and hopped on a car and a van and began the three-hour journey to our home for the week! Our ride was filled with beautiful views and a lot of waving to the local people!

After lunch and getting settled into our rooms, Kristen took us for a walk to a local catholic orphanage. We saw two monkeys on the way! At the orphanage we played with kids from newborn age through 15! Some of the kids do not have parents, but most are waiting for their parents to come back and get them when they are able to support them. We all had such a fun time loving on the kids!

Thanks for praying! We are having a great time!!

Love,

Megan Crum

Today is the day!

We leave today at 2pm and get to Tanzania Wednesday morning at 7:45am their time (Tues. at 11:45pm your time)

I think we are beyond excited and ready for God to use us in huge ways. We are going to be visiting orphanages, playing with children, and helping women make beaded bracelets for them to sell.

We are thankful for this opportunity and ready to go!

Leaving in 14 days

It has been a year since I asked the missions coordinator if we could go on a mission trip to Tanzania with Asbury. It has been a year full of prayer, fund-raising, excitement, anxiety, shots, medicine, expectations, senior business, and anticipation for this trip! God is good.

We leave in 14 days.

My prayer for this trip is that our eyes are opened wider, our skin becomes tougher, our hearts become softer, our minds are filled with knowledge from the Lord, our lives are changed for the better, and that God is glorified in all that we do.

Last night in the sermon, 1 Thessalonians 4:3 was mentioned, "It is God's will that you should be sanctified." That's my ultimate prayer for this trip. That we will die to ourselves and become sanctified. That God will be lifted high in the lives of the leaders and the college girls. That we will "Seek first His kingdom" like Jesus says to do in Matthew 6:33.

We leave in 14 days.

I am excited =]

He provides

In 2008 I was approached by a few moms at church and they asked if I would lead their soon to be 10th grade girl's small group. I hesitantly thought about it because I was already committed to another small group and I was not sure how I could do 2. But, after some thought I thankfully said yes and began a relationship with girls who have blessed my life.

Shortly after meeting for a couple months I decided to go on a mission trip to Kenya, Africa for 5 weeks. Although I missed the girls, I had an incredible time and knew those 5 weeks were not the last of me going to Africa. But, little did I know it would affect our small group in such a big way...

When I got back the girls asked if we could go to Africa as a small group. I told them it would be awesome if we could get to do that someday (thinking, "yeah right, how will we pull that off? It would cost 20 grand to do that!") and then said, "Maybe when you graduate we can look into it."

Anyways, a year and half went by and we started thinking and talking about it again. We realized how much money it would take for us to go and how much we would have to rely on the Lord to provide. So, the girls, their parents, my co-leader, and I, fearfully said, "we trust you Lord, send us to Tanzania so we can be your hands and feet."

We knew we were committed, but we also knew we had a lot of work to do. We had to put our thinking caps on- we thought of multiple ways we could raise money... We sold t-shirts, hosted a "Wild Game Dinner", raked hundreds of bags of leaves, cleaned an office, wrote letters to ones that we felt would support us, and we prayed. We waited and prayed and trusted.

As this process of raising money to go to Tanzania went along there were times of fear, joy, hard work, untrusting hearts, trusting hearts, and stretched lives. There were times when we weren't sure if we were going to get full support and there were times when we were so blessed by all the generous hearts around us- And then, it happened. More than enough money was given to this team to go love on the people of Tanzania, Africa!

God is good. He is faithful. God deserves all glory and honor for this trip and the process to get there. He is and will be working in the lives of our team, the lives of the people who gave to this trip, and the lives of the Tanzanians. He is Jehovah Jireh and will always provide.

Thank you to all who gave and thank you Jesus for allowing us to be your hands and feet in Tanzania.

The girls going to Tanzania are: Megan Crum, Abby King, Avery Hufft, Shelby Boaz, Mollie Stansbury, Katie Wise, Frances Brower, Ruthie Brower, and myself. We are beyond excited and pray that the Lord will open our eyes, help us listen, and use us to His desire.

*P.S. Another incredible aspect of God's provision is that He has also provided more generous people who gave money for the first 5 girls on that list above, plus Kristin Fitzgerald, Ruthie & myself to go to Guatemala on the youth group mission trip over Spring Break. He is good.

Cheque Leque

We are having such a wonderful time! It has been so fun seeing Jon and Emily and getting to see how incredible they are with the people of Mogote. The Lord is doing huge things in this ministry, in Honduras, and in our hearts.
As a team, we have laughed, prayed, cried, built a house, loved on kids, made a lot of crafts in kindergarten, fed a village, sorted clothing to give, and seen Jesus in many many ways. We are blessed to be here and are so exctied for the next few days! Thanks for praying... You would be very impressed with this team team, I definitely am.

Honduras here we come!

January 11-18 I will be leading a team of 8 from the "Casual Twenties" community at Asbury to go see/help Jon and Emily Odom with Hope for Honduras Ministries.

We will be building a house, teaching in the school, leading a women's class, helping with the food and clothes program around the village and doing some prayer walks around the communities.

The team members are: Robert Neely, Emily Sharp, Rustin Heflin, Cavett Binion, Lyndsey Campbell, Krissa Cummins, Melissa Martin, and myself.

Please be in prayer that we will grow closer as a team, give encouragement to the Odoms and the Joneses (other missionaries at Hope for Honduras), and be a light to all around us. Thanks for your prayers and support!

Click on "Jon & Emily Odom" on the side of my blog to read more about what God is doing through them in Honduras.