Hey Everyone!!
Girls's Camp Zambia style was a great success!! I'm going to try and give you highlights for each day.
Monday
Arrival day!! Some of the girls leave from Kalene Monday morning but Carole isn't ready to leave until after lunch. The campers also come from Ikelenge and two other villages that I can't remember the names of. Right after Carole and I arrive the girls are organized into their teams. Most of the girls don't having swim suits so they all choose one out of the swim suits that have been donated and then we are off to bathe. At Joy Bible Camp the girls are required to have a shower at LEAST 2 times during the week. Here, they want to do it every day. It's the same at home in the villages. Afterwards Carole and I leave for the evening, but the girls go on to have a supper of nshima. After everything is all cleaned up they have their first campfire.
Tuesday
Every morning the whistle blows at 6 o'clock in the morning. The girls come out of their chisolus (grass walled shelter) and dance and sing to warm up. Breakfast is readied and they eat around 8:00. At 9:00 is the first message of the day. This is generally taken by one of the mamas. Any of the older Zambian ladies are mamas. Anyone who is not a Zambian is a sister: Sister Alice, Sister Catherine. Some one correct me if I'm wrong. After the message we either played sports of did Bible drills. For today we played netball. I have never played before so I was a bit confused at first, but I think I got the hang of it. Quite a few of the girls played like pros. Thankfully are team leader(team 5) was one of them; we won out game against team 6! :)
Wednesday
It's raining. It's pouring!! We did our best to stay warm and dry. We played sports when it wasn't raining and then lunch. Right after it rained again. Mel F. did her message on purity. It got many of the girls' attention. This is something many of them struggle with in their culture. A world wide struggle, I think. Mel took Kinsie and I back to Kalene after her talk. We were going to stay the night but then decided to go back to Alice's because it was too wet.
Thursday
Alice talked about Principles of Christian Conduct: How to make choices. She gave sixteen questions to ask before making a choice. A couple are: Is there any glory for God in it? Would Jesus do it? Which nature does it feed? Alice asked me to give my testimony. She wanted the girls to know how I was able to stay pure. I had to write it out so I could keep my train of thought while it was being translated into Lunda. Many of the girls gave their tesimonies that night at campfire.
Friday
We went to the rapids and then to see the hydro with the girls. I got many pictures, but most of them won't go up until I get back to Canada. We watched a movie about the life of Jesus at campfire. The twist was that it was in Lunda.
Saturday
It was the end of a very long week out in the sun. I wasn't feeling very well so I couldn't do too much in the morning. I had to lie down until lunch time. As the day went on I felt better. Campfire started with dancing with the ants. Or rather trying to not step near the ants. Ant bites are not very pleasant. I got one bit and it stung for quite a while. I was able to enjoy a campfire full of great Lunda songs and skits. Most of the skits were translated for me.
Sunday
Alice finished her message from Thursday, and then we handed out prizes to all the girls. We laid out all the clothes, Bibles, watches, and bags on a tarp and the girls came up one by one to choose their prize. The truck that was going to come to pick up the girls never came so Alice's van made about 5 trips from the camp site back to Kalene.
*Prayer requests:
-girls's salvation
-a couple girls were thinking of joining a Satanist group, but both cofessed this to the counsellors. One has said she has repented and asked Jesus to be her Savior! Praise God!! Pray that God continues to work in these two girls's lives.
-that the girls keep their testimony as they go back to their villages.
-that God continues to use the camp to have such a positive effect on the girls.
-the women in charge for when they get ready for next year and years to come.
It rained Wednesday starting in the morning off and on and didn't stop until about 2:30 that afternoon. We danced around the fire in an effort to keep warm.
It started to rain again as we were finishing lunch. We all rushed to the tarped chisolu to try and stay dry. We had to keep tightening the tarp because the rain kept pulling it down. Eventually someone came with ropes to tie it down.
This is the room I stayed in for most of the week. Alice T. graciously put me up for the week. If I had stayed at the camp I would have been sleeping by myself for most of the week.
Kinsie and I stayed for one night in a chisolu. This was the day after it rained so the ground was still a little wet. Thankfully we had a tarp to put under our sleeping bags.
Thursday night several of the girls gave their testimonies. Most were salvation stories, but some were admitting that they were in sin and still hadn't accepted Jesus as their Savior. Please pray for these girls that the will find our prescious Savior.
This is Louie. She is the sister of one of the grade 4 students at Sakeji. I got to know her a little bit during the week. I am happy to say that she knows Jesus as her personal Savior. :) She gave her testimony on Thursday.
The girls wanted to pose for pictures when we went to see the hydro.
Thank you God that you are always there through the storms even if at times we can't seem to see you.
On Friday night we watched the "Jesus" film at the campfire, but it was in Lunda. It was very interesting. I was able to follow most of the movie having grown up hearing about Jesus life.
