When I was praying, God said to me that I must go to other countries to tell them the Good News and to tell them something: You shall never have other gods.” - Frans (12 yrs)
“God said, don’t leave anyone behind – go to them. Preach the Gospel.” - John Lee (12 yrs)
“The Holy Spirit told me that there are a lot of people that still need to know God. So I can start while I’m still small to preach the gospel and when I become older I can travel around the world just to tell them the Good News.” - Shalom (11 yrs old)
“Last night when I went to my room to pray there was a feeling that I had: a feeling that I cannot explain. Such a happy feeling, like something has happened in your life. When I was praying something said to me, ‘Don’t stop praying. Don’t leave those behind who are behind you. Go and pray for others so they also can have the Word of God.”
There were over a hundred and twenty of us kids and counselors gathered, and I had given an opportunity; asking kids if they felt like the Holy Spirit had given them a word or a vision to speak to the other children at the camp. One by one a line formed until over a dozen children came forward, each wanting to share directly and purposefully, addressing the others gathered around.
“God said to me to tell everyone standing around here praying that you are not too small to preach. You are not too small to touch someone and just heal them. God will give you that strength, that Holy Fire to just touch someone and heal him.” (Willem (10 yrs)
In terms of children being called, trained, and equipped for ministry the camp was highly successful. One side that I didn’t even think about was the amazing impact that this also had on adults who helped at the camp. They too have come to me, amazed at how the Holy Spirit could move amongst children, amazed at how the children could respond so deeply, and amazed at things that God had also spoken to them personally with regards to children’s ministry.
What’s also amazing was what I call the “terrible tradeoff.” The trials and tribulations we suffered before, during, and after the camp that came in just too much of a flood to call them “coincidental.”
Right before camp, our dog that we really loved was run over by a car. At camp, we went to set the tent up, and Namibia got hit with a freak weather system causing rains at the coast and heavy winds inland, where we were. Thieves broke into the Bible School office and stole our two computers and my ipod. My sound system failed before camp, my backup sound system got fried by high voltage during camp, and on the last day of camp, the city turned the power off, and when they turned it back on again it spiked; causing the backup to the backup sound system to fail. And there were more trips to bring kids to the emergency room for this camp than any other camp.
In Africa don’t ever say “It can’t get worse!” I wanted to use my backed-up info on my wife’s computer and the powerboard on that computer blew. And my last resort external hard drive also joined the mutiny and stopped working. Ever feel like just going fishing?
Each challenge was met with prayer. Some of the prayers we saw immediate results for – such as the dramatic change in weather, giving us a pleasant camp environment for the whole week. Some of the prayers we are still waiting for answers on. I think that the most important prayers though, the petitions before the throne for a move of God amongst the children – I think those prayers were answered, being demonstrated by the response of the children at the altars and by the continued ministry involvement we are seeing by the children in the churches they have returned to. (see “And These Signs”)
I am deeply grateful for the answer to prayer for the health of Missionary Judy Mensch. She came all the way from Holland to help me do outreaches here in Namibia, the Ultimate Challenge Kids Camp being the foremost outreach.
A couple months before the trip she was having such a battle, especially with Shingles, and we didn’t know if it was going to be possible for her to come. So many people were praying and she pushed through, bringing a team of four short term missionaries from Holland with her. The team members were stellar in their children’s ministry: Rick (18 yrs old), Noa, and Woosjie (girls 9 & 11 yrs old), and the girls’ mother Carolyn. As Camp Director I was so busy resolving all the things we were getting hit with; I don’t know what I would have done if I didn’t have Pastor Judy and her team. Not only did they write the programs for the services, but they also ran them. What a big answer to prayer!
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