1/7/10 from Johnny

Hello friends,

I am very excited to be posting on the STS Trip Blog for January 2010. First, I am very excited to begin a year in which I will be working for STS from Mufulira, a ministry which I feel the Lord has been preparing for me over the past few years and which I am deeply grateful to be a part of. The first few days (and travel from Virginia to Mufulira which began on Friday 5pm at Richmond Intl Airport and ended Monday at 5pm when I was dropped off at the bus station in Mufulira), I have felt the Lord’s hand on me and on the group of Americans and Zambians which are spending this week in training in preparation to lead the clubs we are coordinating in several communities across the Copperbelt. Today was especially powerful- we had some really beautiful and moving worship to start the day and just before lunch break. The way that Zambians allow music, song, and dance to attune their spirits to worship resonates with me, I dig it! Despite their already impressive enthusiasm for and ability to soak up all of the training sessions’ content, the facilitators continually bless us with their passion to take their learning back to their students and to plan outreach activities to cover an even greater number of people (many of whom were not and are not reached by government and other NGO programs).

1 Thess. 5:11,14 was embodied through an amazing testimony from a Zambian woman who shared with our facilitators the fact that she has tested HIV+, the struggles she had experienced before she came to accept her status, and the overwhelming love of God which has given her a renewed sense of belonging and purpose in Christ. Likewise, many of us were encouraged by her request to test, thus knowing our HIV status, and we had # test today, some of whom it was their first time. Praise God!

Pastor Terry shared a message on “Vision,” it was a powerful word which the Lord gave us through him! I could feel everyone’s spirit buzzing, as a result, we transitioned directly into some awesome praise songs. Pastor Terry said that there are people who don’t know what is happening, people who ask “whats happening?” and finally people who makes things happen. God’s calling of our Zambian and American volunteers to this ministry is evidence that He is with us, He is in the lives of the people we live and work with and pass on the street, and that He is making things happen! My prayer is that we continue in faith and obedience, allowing the Spirit to work in our lives and in STS’s activities.

The community which I have already found and which I expect to build an even deeper relationship with in the volunteers and other persons associated with STS is something that I have been thanking God for constantly, and I encourage anyone who is reading this trip’s blog who has experienced the same reception and fellowship with STS as I have to find an opportunity to let them know what they mean to you.