I’m sitting in the Best Western in Richmond, VA at the continental breakfast bar area. It’s been about 7 minutes since I had one of their breakfast sandwiches and things are already getting interesting in my stomach… but I guess that’s a story for another time… I’m here with Tom Ward of East Point Community Church in Deleware and George Palo of Harvest City Church in Ndola, Zambia. We’re meeting with some guys from our network, Ecclesia and we’ll be talking about more details regarding the partnership between George’s network of churches and our network. We had a great conversation on the way down about the current way of connecting churches in America and Africa and some of the challenges this approach brings. Basically, the...Read More →
Category: Zambia 2008
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August 27, 2008
Ecclesia, Africa and Best Western Breakfasts
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July 10, 2008
Why Community is so Important to Mission
So, I’m almost on two weeks since I got back from Zambia. I feel like I was pretty prepared for the “missions trip high” (for lack of better way to describe it). I’ve done this before and like most people I usually crash spritually and revert to my old self within two weeks. I’m coming down off my cloud a bit but I’m happy to say that we have not moved away from the direction we sense our lives moving. What direction is that? The basic story is this: we need to live more sustainably so that we can be free to respond to God’s daily calling to spend ourselves on behalf of others. This has to do with big things like debt reduction and...Read More →
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July 2, 2008
Are You Rioting with the Suburban Mob?
Okay, its been about a half a week since I’ve been back from Zambia. I’ve not done much deep writing around the trip because there is so much in my head that I am just trying to sort it all out. Sunday morning, I preached a mess of a sermon that I am hoping made sense. I really tried to share my heart and what God is doing with Melanie and I since I’ve returned. The sermon didn’t record for some reason so I’m going to try and lay it out in a shorter version here: Thought #1 – The culture in Zambia is beautiful and they get worship, prayer and community better than we ever have. Its part of their DNA. It’s beautiful really....Read More →
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June 28, 2008
Final Zambia Reflections
I am finally back from Zambia after two weeks of spending time with Pastor George Palo of Harvest City Church in Ndola, Zambia. I have a ton in my head and I have to say that these two weeks will likely turnout to be a watershed moment for the lives of the Hiestands. You’ll have to be in church tomorrow to get my more complete reflections (or listen online when i post it) but here are some major themes/thoughts: Community Sunday night was awesome as we sat around the fire sharing stories with the men from Harvest City Church after studying the scriptures together, taking communion and praying for one another. They told some awesome stories about the community and life in the bush. From...Read More →
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June 21, 2008
Zambia Update: Saturday, June 21, 2008
I am sitting in nice cosy guest house that we are in and just reflecting a bit on our last two days. Its been an encouraging and challenging two days as we have begun to meet with the Zambian people and specifically some of the church leaders. Last night Tom and I spoke at the leadership team meeting for George’s church, Harvest City Church. There were about 40 people there. Some were pastors and some were lay leaders. We spoke on the topic of leadership and creativity. As I wrote in my last blog post there is a challenge of having creativity as they seek to be witnesses to Jesus here in Zambia. This is mostly because the western missionaries brought with them a “correct”...Read More →
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June 20, 2008
Zambia Update: Friday Morning
I only have a limited amount of time here on the web. I have to buy it by the half hour and I’m trying to get as much done in this time as possible. But, not surprisingly, the web is so slow. So, I am going to brain dump as much as a I can here: I jumped off a bridge at Victoria Falls with a rubber band attached to my ankles. Pictures are on my flickr account. It was nuts. Video will be coming home with me. Google: Victoria Falls Bungee Jump and you’ll see what I did. We started this trip with two days of downtime with a trip to Victoria Falls (google this, it makes Niagara falls look like a kitchen sink...Read More →
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June 18, 2008
Zamba Day 1-3: Sleep, Pot Holes, Victoria Falls
So, after about 36 hours of travel and maybe 2 hours of sleep, we arrived in Lusaka. Sleeping on the plane was harder than I thought so I ended up just watching movies. Five of them. So, I saw: Charlie Wilson’s War, Semi-Pro, Jumper, The Great Debaters, and one more that was apparently very forgettable. The only problem now is that I have used up all the decent movies on the way there and I don’t know what I am going to do on the way back. After we met up with Pastor George, we grabbed some breakfast and then quickly took a much needed five hour nap. So, the first day here (Tuesday) was pretty much a bust. We were supposed to start speaking...Read More →
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June 15, 2008
Waiting in JFK
So after a fantastic service at The Well this morning we’ve finally made it up to JFK airport in NYC. (If you weren’t at The Well today… go to our church website and listen to Gary’s sermon on Acts 19. It was fantastic. Definitely worth 29 minutes of your time. I was thinking today during our service that I am so happy to be able to say that I love the church family that we are leaving behind for the next two weeks. In fact, in a sense, The Well is coming with me because who I am is a result of all these people and I bring with me not only my passions but theirs as well. They were such an encouragement this morning...Read More →
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June 15, 2008
Zambia Interary
This is the tentative itinerary for our team while we are in Zambia so that you can pray more specifically while we are gone. I might be posting updates here on my blog during the trip if time and technology allows. In case you missed it, there are two main goals for the trip: The first is the immediate interaction with those we are speaking with and meeting. Obviously the goal here is that we can be an encouragement and begin many friendships that where we can learn from each other. A lot of our interaction will be in the areas of leadership development and pastoral encouragement. The second is that this trip would be another step towards a long-term partnership between The Well and...Read More →
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June 14, 2008
Zambia by the Numbers
It’s now just under 24 hours before me and two other pastors (my good friend Tom Ward is one of them) make the trek to JFK Airport and head for Zambia on British Airways. Here is a rundown of the next two weeks by the numbers: 3 – The number of people on our team that leaves Tomorrow. 7 – The number of hours it takes to get to London from JFK in NYC. 10 – The number of hours we will toll around London looking for a good English pub. 10 – The number of hours it takes to fly from London to Zambia. 13 – The number of times we will be speaking to pastors, college students and others during the trip. 10...Read More →
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June 3, 2008
Zambian Food – MMM, MMM Good
If you are a regular reader you know that I head to Zambia in two weeks. One of the pastors I am going with noted the wikipedia entry has some good information about Zambia. An excerpt: “There are a lot of Zambian foods which are peculiar to Zambia such as inswa (flying ants), fyunkubala (caterpillars), Hopani (monitor lizards), Mbeba (mice), magande (giant toads) and Kolwe (monkey meat).” Wow. That sounds awesome! I can’t wait to try some giant toads mixed with some moniter lizards and then wash that down with some monkey meat…
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May 19, 2008
Is the Bible “Missional?”
In about three weeks I head to Zambia. I’ll be spending two weeks there working with Pastor George Palo of Harvest City Church. I’ve known George for about a year now and I’m really excited to see his country and see in person all the people and stories that he’s shared. One of the things that is most exciting to me is George’s heart for mission. It was not too far into a recent conversation that I realized that he really understood and had a great grasp on the fact that the church is called for the sake of mission, for the sake of being a community that is a “sign witness and foretaste of the Kingdom of God.” (From Newbigin I think). He used...Read More →
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May 8, 2008
African Friends and Money Matters: 1-5
As I stated recently, I am reading the book African Friends and Money Matters in preparation for my trip to Zambia. This book is broken up into 90 general observations about the differences between African and Western cultures. The author appropriately states that these are general observations and, like in any culture, there are exceptions to them. I am basically going to try and read about 5 of these observations every day or so until I leave. We’ll see how my plan goes. I’ve found these observations really, really fascinating. Here are the first five: The financial need that occurs first as the first claim on the available resources. Resources are to be used, not hoarded. Money is to be spent before friends or relatives...Read More →
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May 6, 2008
Westerners in Africa, The Challenge
Since I am heading to Zambia in June this year I’ve been trying to do some reading and education about the challenge of westerners living and working in Africa. This challenge was made clear to my by my dad who spend about 10 years serving in sub-Saharan Africa as a representative of larger worldwide missions agency. We didn’t live there or anything but he did travel there a lot when I was a kid. He basically spent those 10 years trying to work out relationship between the Church in the West and the Church in Africa. When I told him that I would be going to Zambia with this very purpose in mind, I was surprised by his lack of enthusiasm. It wasn’t because he...Read More →
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April 16, 2008
Information about Zambia
Some Facts About Zambia: 64% of the population living on $1 or less a day, Unemployment rates hover at more than seventy percent 30,000 children being born HIV-positive each year Of the population of 11 million, almost 10% or orphaned street kids. The price of being peace makers I was shocked to hear that Zambia is one of the few countries in the world to never go to War. Pastor George told me that when the country was founded it was founded by refugees from neighboring countries that were at war. Because of this, they built into their DNA that they would be a helping country. And they did just this. Early on in the history of the country, an immense amount of their national...Read More →
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April 16, 2008
Zambia or Bust
After a few weeks of praying and processing, I’ve accepted the invitation to head to Zambia, Africa to spend two weeks working with my good friend George Palo (a pastor from Ndola, Zambia). George will be leading me and two other pastors as we visit his country and meet and encourage the pastors there and see first hand the desperate poverty of this beautiful country. We are hopeful that this trip will begin a long-term relationship between the Zambia churches that George is affiliated with and my church network (Ecclesia). Zambia, like most African countries, is in desperate times. I’ll be writing more about this country in the weeks ahead but one example is that of the approximately 11 million residents of this country, 10%...Read More →
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April 16, 2008
Zambia 2008 Trip Itinerary
Tuesday, June 17 Arrival and rest Evening tour of Lusaka (prayer for the Street Kids) Wednesday, June 18 Speaking at Lusaka Leadership Conference – 4-hour bus ride to Livingstone in the evening Thursday, June 19 Speaking at Livingstone Leadership Conference Late afternoon tour of Victoria Falls 4-hour bus ride to Lusaka in the evening Friday, June 20 Flight to Ndola (or 4-hour bus ride) Evening of ministry and speaking with Harvest City Church’s Leadership Team Saturday, June 21 Speaking at Ndola Leadership Conference Spend the night at Nsobe Game Camp Sunday, June 22 Speaking / Preaching at Harvest City Church Afternoon spent visiting Nissi Orphanage and Dola Hill Village Evening meeting with area pastors Monday, June 23 Speaking in Kalulushi for an abbreviated Leadership Conference...Read More →
