Update

I know I haven't posted in a long time on this blog, but I was waiting to get a little time under my belt and let the mission I'm working towards really sink in. I will say, that as of today, I'm half way to reaching my goal regarding my financial part of the mission. People have been incredibly generous, and I thank all of you who have contributed. Without out you, this dream wouldn't be possible. I now know that a long flight on a plane does not bode well for my knees. On our flight to Kauai, my knees were pretty sore by the time we landed. I know I will recover after the flight to South Africa and it would never stop me from going, but I now know I need to work on some solutions. Thanks again for your support, and spread the word.

The letter

Dear Friends,
As some of you may know, I began to do mission work several years back. I’ve traveled to the Appalachian Mountains, to a Navajo Indian reservation in Gallup, New Mexico and for the last 4 years, to Juarez, Mexico. Most of the mission projects I have participated in were building projects, however during each one there were people met along the way and lives changed forever, mine included. Now, I feel I’m being called to South Africa. Why South Africa? This year World Vision brought a traveling African village to my church. They talked about the children who have lost their parents to AIDS and how their own family members, aunts and uncles, wouldn't take them in because they were afraid that the kids had AIDS and would infect them. I would like to think that my family wouldn't do that to me! These kids then are left to fend for themselves. Upon entering the exhibit, you were assigned a child and given an MP3 player to listen to your child tell his or her life story. These were actual kids telling their stories, not actors playing the part. Hearing the story was heart breaking, to say the least and personally, I was moved. I kept asking myself, what can I do? Right then, sponsoring a child was not an option for us, but I did not forget and knew that God would provide an opportunity to serve. In November, the opportunity I had been looking for and praying about appeared in the newsletter from our church and I felt God telling me to GO to South Africa. I feel in my heart that I am supposed to serve the people of South Africa by building homes through the Mission South Africa work project. I am asking you to partner with me, so I can help a few of the millions that are hurting.
The goal of the mission is to build houses on land owned either by a church or a non-profit organization. The houses will be built in a circle, with a courtyard in the center. Since a lot of households are child led, meaning no adult is present (most likely due to the death of the adult caretaker from AIDS), the hope is to have one of the houses be for a "mother" figure who will help lead any child led homes. The houses are built here in Iowa, disassembled and shipped to South Africa where we will re-assemble them. If you are interested in learning more about the houses, the website address is: http://myabod.com/.
There are several ways you can partner with me as I prepare for the mission work in Africa. First and most importantly, I would ask for prayer for the participants, the details and planning of the mission, and for the people of South Africa that we will meet and have the opportunity to serve.
Secondly, in order for me to go, I need to raise $4000 for the 13 days I will spend in Africa. I ask that you prayerfully consider this opportunity. Any help you could give to this trip financially, ($25, $50, $100, etc.) would be greatly appreciated. If you choose to support me financially, please make your check out to Lutheran Church of Hope. The contribution is tax deductible as long as my name does not appear on the check. It can be mailed to my home address at the top of this letter no later than May 15th, 2009. If you have any further questions about my mission trip feel free to contact me by e-mail: sendmarktoafrica@yahoo.com or in writing. I would love to hear from you!
Lastly, you can help me spread the word about the South Africa mission to anyone you know that might be willing to help by way of prayer or financial support. You can send them directly to my blog spot or share this letter with them.
Thank you for prayerfully considering this opportunity to support me on my journey to South Africa.

In His name,

Mark

And it begins

Here we go, the fund raising letters are now being sent. I agonized over what to include in the letter and what to leave out. I wanted it to only be one page long, so people would read the whole thing. If I put everything into it that I wanted, it would have been 5 pages long and I'm guessing most people I sent it too would loose interest after the first page. I'm passionate about my missions, so I may tend to bore people with the details. I'm reading a book now about South Africa, that is a bit dated, but gives a lot of history of apartheid and race relations. As I read it, I find it hard to believe that people were treated in the way that native Africans were treated by the European settlers. I know the US doesn't exactly have a stellar record on how we treated people (African Americans, American Indians), so I guess I shouldn't be so shocked. I hope to find a few more current books to tell me how things are going now. I'm looking for websites as well and will post them on this site when I do. I'm also including the letter I'm sending out, just in case someone happens upon this site and wants to see it. Thanks to everyone who has passed along their encouragement, it means a lot. A big thanks to Marcy for helping me not sound like an idiot, in the letter that is, she can't help me on this blog:) She is my number one supporter and has worked as hard as I have to get this thing rolling.

How to donate update

I've had a couple of people ask me about monthly giving, seeing as how they didn't have a block of money to donate but wanted to help. That is great, in fact, I'm willing to send you a monthly reminder and even a self addressed stamp envelope for each month as well. I want to make this as easy as I can for anyone who is willing to help me. If you want to get in on the monthly donation road, send me an email and I'll get you set up. Remember, this will only be through June, since I leave in July, so it won't be a year long thing. If anyone has any other ideas on ways I might be able to raise money, send that to me as well. Thanks again for your help!

FAQ 3

Here are a few questions that people asked at a meeting I was at today.

10. What is the weather like, seeing as how it is winter in Africa in July? I asked my friend Bobbi that same question a week back and she told me the same thing they said today. The temps can get into the 30's at night and up into the 70's during the day. Sounds like my Mexico trips in Feb. I also learned that the facilities are the same as Mexico, no heat and no air conditioning. Two years ago in Mexico, it snowed on us. I was on the roof of the house working with my winter coat on and snow in my face. I never thought I would see that. I'm sure we won't see snow in Africa, if we do, I'm going back to my elementary school teachers and telling them they lied when they said it was always hot in Africa. That might be true in northern Africa, but they didn't mention the southern part.

11. Is it safe? I talked about this earlier, but I have new info. Again, my friend Bobbi said it was really no different than major cities in the US, which is exactly what they said in the meeting today. But, seeing as how we are staying in a rural area, it is very safe. Dr. Blessman compared it to Polk City, which is a town north of Des Moines. For those of us here in Iowa, we know it don't get much safer than that.

12. Will we be working with the kids, like the medical missions do? Maybe. The building trip has less interaction with the kids, but we will be around locals and kids might be there. This was important to a few of the women that were at the meeting, which I can understand, but as long as I am helping, I'm good with whoever God puts in front of me.

Meeting #2, houses we will build

I had my second meeting of the weekend, this one more specific to the trips and not the whole ministry that we will be serving. I learned a little more info about the houses we will build and where we will stay while we are there. The goal of the ministry is to build the houses on land owned either by a church or a non-profit organization. The houses will be built in a circle, with a kind of courtyard in the center. Since a lot of households are child led, meaning there is no adult present, most likely do to their death from AIDS, the hope is to have one of the houses be for a "mother" and she will then help lead any child led houses. Not all of the houses will be occupied by child led families, some might actually be full families, but the circle will help if need be. It sounds like a great plan, but it really is untested since the houses we build will be the first the ministry has done. Their hope is that, in the future, they will be doing a lot more houses. From the sounds of it, the housing situation is a lot like Juarez, where the homes are really shacks. The houses we build will be a major step up, although not luxury. I was really impressed with the thought they have put into the plan, the houses themselves and the dedication of the team to branch the ministry into housing, while still working the medical side.



I also found out a little about the trip its self. Sounds like we will fly into Johannesburg, spend the night, then drive to the game lodge (I think they said it is 2 1/2 hours north), where we will spend the rest of the trip. We stay at the lodge and drive 1/2 hour each morning to the work site. The last 2 days we spend in the park with the ability to take pictures or go on a hunt. Seeing as how I don't hunt, I'll do the pictures. Since I'm horrible at photography, I'm sure my pictures will look like one of my kids did it, but oh well. Tonight, I'm filling out my forms and writing my non-refundable deposit check. Pray that everything else works out.

Meeting #1

I just spent a few hours with Dr. Blessman, whose organization I will be going through, and was really impressed with his heart and the things they have been able to accomplish. The meeting has charged me up to find all of the money I need to be able to go. I spoke with him briefly after the meeting and asked how many houses they hoped to build on the trip. He said his goal is 20 at $4000 each, but he'd love to raise enough money to ship 30 pre-fabs down. I'll be interested to see what our church can do. When the body of the church was asked to donate to sink water wells last year in Ghana, the goal was 15 or so, can't remember the exact number. After all was said and done, we raised enough to sink 59 wells, which didn't surprise me one bit. I don't think I have ever been apart of a church that got "IT" as a whole. They understand the need to help, and for most of us, that means we give money. The church is so large, that even those of us that don't have a large amount of money, when put together with our other brothers and sisters in Christ with low funds, we can make a difference. Not everyone in our church could travel to Ghana to dig wells, but they gave what they could and then, hopefully, took joy in the final outcome knowing they were just as big a part of it as everyone else. It's a team effort, Team Christ, if you will. As a team, we are undefeated. We can't loose, but we should refuse to take our trophy and go home. We need to take our trophy to wherever we can, show it to everyone, and ask them to join the team. The best part of the team? You can't be cut and you will always be asked to play.

I have a trip meeting tomorrow, I'll post more info after that. Today's meeting was more for the whole ministry, which included the game farm, which was really interesting. Part of he money you pay to hunt on this farm, which is owned by the ministry, can be tax deductible. That is really cool. I'm not a hunter, I want to do a photo safari, but if I was a hunter, this is a great opportunity to bag an African animal and provide for a mission at the same time. A new sport for team Christ, hunting, who would have thunk it.