praying with the team at the site of the new swaziland dream center
just got back from another mission to africa. this time with a team of 30 from hpc and the life church of memphis - one big go global swaziland 2008 team. we had team members (as dean turner put it) "ages 15 to rolfe" - rolfe mccollister being the senior member of the team as far as we know. no one really knows how old or young he is - i'm guessing 45, 46...
it was a very successful mission - we went to host basketball clinics and a big ol' three-on-three tournament and youth event at the new hpc campus in swaziland, and then to be a part of services at the campus there, and to visit the children's cup carepoints as well. everything we went there to do got done and got done with excellence. hpc_swaziland's staff and congregation were encouraged, swazi youth were given a great launch to a new weekly youth meeting at hpc, and a whole lot of children were shown a whole lot of love. there was no drama, no real problems, and a ton of cooperation and supporting each other on the team. i was overwhelmed with how it went.
lemme do just a quick rundown of the team and some of the things that stand out to me about each:
matt lebrun - the team's youngest member. at 15 he has been able to be a part of something that most people twice his age still only dream of. he was given a name by one of the bus drivers who went with us everywhere: "sipo si africa" meaning gift for africa....matt connected with a couple kids very closely, he served wherever we asked him to, and he did it well. he represented for the lebrun clan - great job mike and janet.
sherrie serca - the team nurse. don't know, don't care how old she is. don't really care where she's from (memphis) - she just served like a crazy woman. everytime someone said their head hurt or they had a hangnail or felt like barfing or maybe broke their arm, she was right on the job. and on top of that she was a leader, a woman of God and just did one seriously slammin' job serving.
shaun ray - something about going to africa with the ray brothers (last year i got to go with jared - shaun's brother) just makes me laugh. always surprising, never a dull moment, a whole lot of security in the airports love to check these guys closely... maybe the biggest thing about shaun that i will remember from this was how well he led - even though the spotlight wasn't on him, he led the clinics and camps with a quiet but well-executed, well-thought-through plan. so much of what we were able to do as a team would not have been done had he not been willing to lead behind the scenes as he did. and to see him do the african dance around the campfire - well those of you who were there can appreciate the significance of those moments from the gentle quiet one.
monica beemer - enduring a blistered heel through our 5-hour venture into paris, and serving everywhere she went, monica stood out to me not just for her participation in the ministry we were doing, but also for the depth behind her being there. having lost a brother to AIDS, her perspective on serving in a nation where 43% of the population is HIV positive drew out a different depth of compassion than i usually see. she served strong, she pressed in even when it wasn't particularly convenient to do so, and she loved the children deeply. a cool thing to see.
micki firmin - arguably the smallest team member, her serve was anything but small. she worked hard, served hard, prayed hard, and loved immensely. she brought what the children needed most - open arms willing to share Jesus' love. doug and connie - you would have been overwhelmingly proud.
kevin and jennifer jarreau - no way i'm gonna cover all i have worth remembering about these two on this trip. they're phenomenal. sometimes i get to be around people who are so driven that i wonder if they could allow God to direct their steps. and there's the other end of the stick where people are waiting for God to do it all and i wonder if he could make them get moving at all. the jarreau's seem to be a perfect balance of being driven but being submitted to God's plan and timing. i'm amazed at how impressed i am with them. i already knew they were cool before we went. no question. but seeing their serve, their ability to adapt and flex as part of a team in an ever-changing environment, and their total surrender to what God is doing - it blew me away. they engaged, they served, they went above and beyond what was asked and it was a blessing to be a part of them experiencing swaziland together for the first time.
lydia gomez - after accusing her of teaching basketball like a cheerleader, and being very aware that i just might have offended her with that comment (even though it was true - she did that little foot kick-up thing when she applauded their efforts) - i watched lydia totally lay it all out there for the kids. whenever there were kids around, she was loving, hugging, serving, being part of the team however she was needed.... she was a great testimony for the healing place school of ministry. very cool to have her on this team.
mary archibald - maybe the quietest team member, she certainly was not quiet when it came to serving. she jumped in whenever and wherever needed - even before being asked. and sometimes that meant some not-so-fun tasks, but she did it with her whole heart and God used her. what else can you really want? mary was a blessing - representing the DNA and heart of the life church of memphis peeps really well.
paul musso - the pretty boy. you can read the whole story about this on dean turner's post about it, but basically, paul was received comparably to ringo starr - girls screaming and weeping, never going to wash their hand he shook... pretty funny to see. there was a lot more to his swaziland impression though. he showed some sick madness on the court. he taught kids in the clinic as sifundsani primary good ball-handling skills, and he was part of the american team that eeked out a win over the sifundsani high-school team. he was a ref during the tournament, and he was one of the coolest guys to be around. i think if he can avoid realizing just how cool a guy he is, and continue to act like he has no clue how gifted and good-looking he is and just continue to be himself, he's going to be someone that everyone wants to be around. he's one of those dudes i look at and think, "wow, God - what are you setting up here? this is gonna be good." thanks to all the musso's for bringing up this boy the way you have - i know it's a full-family effort in the musso clan.
angelle carmouche - being one of like 43 siblings, angelle was very at home with a team of thirty. she, like the rest of the team, served like crazy. one of the standout moments i saw was maybe too simple to impress you with, but i was very impressed. at the tournament, trash was building up and so i grabbed a roll of trash bags and started looking for team members. angelle was one of the first i ran into, and it was like she just very naturally and smoothly slipped into the role of garbage picker-upper. nothing foreign to her - it was just natural. simple, but spoke so much about her heart to serve.
dave and mallory morgan - serve, serve, serve. it's what they did. mallory helped with worship in the services at hpc_swaziland, and they both served in the tournament refereeing, cleaning, setting up, tearing down, looking after some of the younger team members, hugging carepoint kids, loving people everywhere. and they brought a cool factor to the team that we all needed. i'm so glad they were part of the team.
ryan fontenot - still looking for the 'stache he lost in africa. he had a little trouble with his credit card, but other than that everything went well for him. like the rest of the team, he served like crazy, and he made every kid he encountered feel important and loved. a cool thing to be a part of seeing him grow like he did on this trip.
lacey dotson - as far as i know, she's the only team member who actually got to experience liquid singing on this trip. but after one hurl, she was good to go again. and i saw one of the most hope-giving things i've seen in a while - while talking to her across the driveway, she was holding a garbage bag, and there was really no more trash to be seen. a lady walked by holding an empty paper cup, passed by her about 6 or 7 steps, then turned around and came back and put the cup in lacey's trash bag. woooohooo! lacey and i looked at each other in disbelief (it seemed prior to that that no one in swaziland uses trash cans) then after the lady was appropriately a safe distance away, we cheered gratefully - thinking maybe that someone had gotten the message - if by her example of taking care of the property someone else had decided to do the same, we had accomplished something. yay lacey.
jeanne mccollister - i'm suspicious that she was a lot of the energy behind the idea of the mccollister three coming to swaziland (she and her dad and her sister). if that's true, i want to thank her hugely for bringing that energy. jeanne was a big win to have on the team. she taught defense in the basketball clinics, she played in the tournament, she served with a vengeance, and she honestly just made the whole team better by her being there. the way she engaged with the kids at the carepoints was fun to watch. and the way she connected with the rest of the team who for the most part did not know her at all prior to the trip - well, i'm amazed and thankful all at the same time.
nathan robert - or is it paul nathan? or robert paul? i do know that my chest hurts. nathan is a shooter. i didn't know this prior to the trip. i knew he was a servant, a musician, a people-lover, a hard worker... but i didn't know he could stinkin' shoot the lights out of a basketball goal. a beautiful thing to watch. especially to see him get to teach young swazis to shoot like he does. what i didn't know was how thick and dense his body mass is and how much inertia he has when he tries to run through a pick. i set a pick for him which paul skillfully ran him into during a pick-up game we were playing among ourselves. nathan layed into me and i felt like the sinews and tissues of my chest muscles were agonizingly separating from my chest plate. but he did do more than just brutalize us on the court. nathan loved and served and showed the love of Christ to a lot of kids and that's what i remember and what i know they remember most about him being there.
rico melancon - wow. i'm so happy i got to know rico in africa. he's got a phenomenal testimony of being delivered from drugs and alcohol addiction. crazy stuff. but he's so much more than just a what-he-got-set-free-from story. he's a leader, a people-lover, a smart, coherent, engaging person, he's got insight into people like few i've known, and he's one of those people that makes everyone feel like they're his long-time friend as soon as they meet him. i love this dude. he helped shaun with the tournament and the clinics, bringing a ton of leadership to the table. he loved the young people and i think there's going to be a lot of them who remember his love and his encouragement for a long time. thanks to rico's wife for letting him come with us. he's not so efficient in the paris subway, although he survived well. a face-squeeze from the entrance doors, and his backpack hanging outside the train all the way from st. michel stop to the next.... he is a survivor for sure.
tramar leblanc - maybe the refuge student i knew the least about going into this trip, i was very impressed with how well he flowed in the team and how much initiative he showed when it was time to work, time to play with the carepoint kids, time to serve, clean up, set up, carry stuff, whatever. very cool kind of surprise to have. he's amazingly funny - don't let the quiet fool you. i'm so glad he was on the team.
elizabeth mccollister - just moving back from california just before going to africa with the team of people she'd only met a couple times at team meetings, she fit in quickly and strongly. she's a cool, smart, thoughtful, caring, loving person who showed all of that to a bunch of kids, a bunch of missionaries, and a whole team from hpc and life church. and she's at the center of one of my best memories of the trip. i won't try to tell the whole story here, but suffice to say elizabeth sweeps with excellence now after the training session her dad gave her before the tournament. she's a blessing - so glad she was on the team.
kassie perrit - the youngest of the three memphians on the team, and one of only two veterans of swaziland missions other than myself. she knew what to expect from the swaziland kids, but this team was different than any other swaziland had ever seen. she fit in tremendously well. she served hard. she was part of the few that got to be in on the giving away the shoes that the life church had collected - brand new nikes that the moneni carepoint kids wore with some huge pride. amazing to see the smiles that those shoes made. kassie was a blessing to have on the team - and a blessing for the kids in swaziland who got to meet her.
jamie phillips - the team photographer dude. yeah, he's a pro now. shooting pics in africa will make you feel like a pro. we're working on getting all his pics uploaded to the web, but seeing's how it's like over three thousand of them, it's taking a little while. jamie also was in charge of the canvas bracelet project - you'll hear more about that soon i'm sure. ingenious and very cool gig. jamie was a blessing - not just for his smarts, but because he was soooo teachable and such a servant. one of the standouts in his level of serve - and on this team that's saying a lot. i love this kid.
heather leblanc - never standing in one place too long - she served and served and served - looked aggressively for ways to help every second of the trip it seemed like. comes from a long line of servers (joe and the doc are amazing too) so i kinda knew what to expect, but heather did not disappoint. there's a lot of kids in africa who are better today because they met heather.
nancy clary - the agility award goes to this lady. not only was she incredibly flexible, taking on changes and new assignments and alterations without complaint, but she was agile - strength in her flexibility - to deliver well in the new spur-of-the-moment assignments. like "hey nancy we need you to come up with a devotional you can give 6 kids at a time for two days straight?" and "hey nancy can you do kids church tonight in 5 minutes?" - always a yes! and always delivered with excellence. she's a massive blessing to have had on the team. can't imagine this team without her.
telia goudeau - a.k.a. "freddie" or "blue-hair" or "st. franny" or "loudmouth" or any host of other nicknames she picked up. telia was second only to rolfe for cheerleading volume and energy at the primary schools. she freaked many kids out with her calisthenics routines from looneyville. even freaked out many of the team. she definitely always brought a smile to the table. such a testament to the joy of the Lord - and she's contagious about it all, too. just what every great missions team needs.
dean turner - my roomie. dean was amazing on this trip. he flexed and bent and twisted and stretched like crazy. 12 hours before the tournament where 400+ people would be showing up, he accepted the job of security chief for the event. and he delivered. dean took charge of many of the projects we had, helped track what reebok stuff had to be ready for what location each day, and he was massively dependable whenever i needed help keeping track of moving 30 people from one place to another. he can count to 30 better than anyone i know. dean (not being the i-wanna-speak-in-public type of dude he is, handled the "hey dean, why don't you lead us in prayer for this..." that he heard a couple times very well, including the prayer with the kids at the orphanage where we all met pepe and banele. dean is a blessing. can't say it any better than that. check out his picture gallery from the trip here.
rolfe mccollister - a.k.a. "broke arm" and "daddy" and "seth godin who?" and "reverend rolfe" and a i'm sure a few others... rolfe blew me away. despite being one of the most revered business leaders in baton rouge (ceo of baton rouge business report) and respected across our nation for his business leadership wisdom, he joined this team to serve, to get down underneath all of us and support however, whenever it was needed. rolfe was amazing. he sat by a puking kid from houston to paris. his cheers with telia and the kids they taught passing drills will echo in my memories for years - "we are the stars, couldn't be prouder... if you can't hear us, we'll cry a little louder!" dude! we can hear you!!! he played basketball (full court) with our sports team leaders and very much held his own. he preached at hpc_swaziland about slaying the giants in our lives. he carried water for the team. and he broke his arm. some say it was while swatting a shot by one of his 7-footer wnba-hopeful daughters. some say he was saving an orphan from a runaway dump truck. he insists he just slipped off a stair step and caught himself with his arm. i say whatever it was, he's a hero. he gets the purple heart award. he also got his cast signed by the orphans at the place pepe and banele live. he taught at the children's cup/hpc_swaziland staff meeting and brought some gold that (as ben told the staff afterwards) business leaders pay thousands of dollars to go to conferences to learn. we're talking blue circle, big rocks, company culture and DNA, and even a little lesson on "assume." the coup de gras had to be for me though, when he brought me a thing of ice cream on the long air france flight home. dude's amazing.
jason and jennifer laird it's really not fair that we got to have them together on this trip. they are soo stinkin' cool and soo totally in love with God. i love them. tori always tells me they're her favorite people in the world, and i totally understand why. jennifer was in charge of the paperwork and logistics and everything for the team. she brought balance to us right off the bat when the continental lady freaked upon learning that we (a big group) were flying together and she had to check us all in. i thought it was odd of her to freak, but jennifer just kept smiling and loving the lady. jennifer didn't just lead the logistics of the team though. a lesser person could have hidden behind that and missed out on the opportunity to serve. not her - she jumped in and led, served, prayed, hugged, encouraged, cleaned, made wake-up calls, and did whatever needed to be done. and jason - now there's a piece of work. what was God thinking when he made this one? wow! i laughed. i cried. i stood in awe. i felt like a worthless worm. i felt like i mattered. i was encouraged. i was challenged. all just standing by jason on this trip. he's got a gift. he's one amazing person i get to call my friend. jason preached sunday and brought the goods. he emcee'd the basketball tournament, even doing play-by-play announcing of the championship game. he didn't miss a single touchdown call or home run. he led team prayer with a serious touch of God on his words and his heart. all i have to say is that i believe God has some huge huge stuff ahead for jason and jennifer laird.
and me. that's the team. there's still so much more i could write, but this has taken me like all day today to write, so i'm probably gonna end up just dropping the other stuff in here whenever it comes to me. God showed us so much about ourselves on this trip. i'll end with a thought that i know God gave me that i shared with our team.
this trip isn't honestly about africa, or the kids or the church here. it isn't about you having a great experience seeing amazing animals or even showing God's love to hundreds of kids. it isn't about africa. it isn't (as much as missionaries are needed out here) about you deciding whether or not God wants you to be a missionary here one day. it is about God drawing us close to him. that's it. if it is about africa, then when it is over, we wrap it up and put it on a shelf and that's that. but God wants to use this trip to draw us close to him so he can speak to us and we can hear his voice. it is all about hearing God and obeying him. if we do that - hear his voice and simply obey - then all the needs of the orphans and the youth and the church out here will be met. guaranteed. our job isn't to find the solution. our job is to get close to God, hear his voice and obey completely. that's it.
thank you to those who prayed, sent your kid or spouse, gave toward the trip.... it couldn't have been done without you. and thanks to the hpc_swaziland team and children's cup team and go global team - y'all are all amazing.
if you want to read more, see more, etc. from this mission, check out the team blog at swazilandsummerteam2008.blogspot.com.
please join me and hundreds of others in forty days of prayer for the children (learn more at fortydays.childrenscup.org) - and let's keep the momentum going in the spiritual battle for these precious kids.
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