This summer my cousins and I joined an English summer camp. It was a privilege to be apart of such a neat camp.
The camp was held in TaiMaLi, an aboriginal village on the east coast of Taiwan. It was an English camp for elementary school students but we used bilingual coloring books that story the Gospel as the textbook.
A couple of factors made it so neat:
One is that team leaders wanted to serve Christ as families--so entire families served together. MKs were on the frontlines leading and serving at the camp. It was so neat to watch daughters leading worship right along side their fathers.
From the beginning the Gospel was the focus. Several different tools were used to share the Gospel. And, the neatest part of all was these first time hears of the Gospel were then immediately entrusted with the expectation to go and tell others this Good News they had just heard.
Also, the Gospel was told in culturally relevant ways. One example of this was using a large scale "shadow puppet" play to tell about Christ's death, burial, and resurrection.
Another neat factor was that the "foreigners" and "locals" teamed up to work side-by-side. Not only did we work with the pastor and believers in TaiMaLi, but a church in Taipei sent Taiwanese believers on a mission trip to help out with this camp. It was neat to watch the reality that we are one big family in Christ play out as believers from different countries complemented each other's work.
Over the course of the week, over 70 accepted Christ as Savior. That Friday night we had a celebration party and 17 were baptized in a small inflatable swimming pool!
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Here is a video of one of the boys in my small group being baptized:
This little guy's English name is William. Would you please join me in praying for him and the others that choose to believe in Christ one week this summer at the Joyful Hope English Camp?
Weeks like that make being here, oh, so very worth it!!! :)
I'm praying for favor over your life and work. I'll pray for William too. That's always so exciting to read. God be praised.
Posted by: AllyJo | Wednesday, November 07, 2007 at 11:24 PM
What an encouraging story to read! I'll pray for William.
Posted by: Ashley | Thursday, November 08, 2007 at 12:36 AM
How wonderful!
Posted by: Cahleen | Thursday, November 08, 2007 at 12:29 PM
It's so great that we are a big family around the world beacuse of His name! Praise our Savior! He did a wonderful work through His children. I'll pray for you and William, too.
Posted by: Lawrance | Thursday, November 08, 2007 at 09:37 PM
Yesterday at church, God put you in my mind, so I prayed for you. Are you feeling better and looking forward to the holidays? Do you need anything? You want some black cherry kool-aide?
Blessings to you.
Posted by: AllyJo | Tuesday, November 13, 2007 at 05:33 AM