My recent trip to Africa

Well, I'm recently returned from my trip to Ethiopia. My stomach still isn't sure what to make of things, and I still can't stay awake past 7:30PM, but I'm beginning to adjust.

I went with Mark Fields, who coordinates the international mission effort for Vineyard USA. This trip had a few goals: 1) continue to build relationships with Woody and the Ethiopian pastors and leadership team; 2) get a feel for what was going on in terms of the church growth and health; 3) impart some Vineyard values and conduct training, especially in terms of relationships and leadership. I hoped for a fourth goal ... to learn from Mark Fields and test my intuitions against his experience.

Here's my day-by-day story of my trip ...

Monday, June 9th: I departed for Ethiopia. I was pretty sad leaving this time, being that it was second trip in four months. On the way over the Big Pond I read Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Why We Can't Wait. It was great. I had never read "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" and was powerfully moved by both the content and style of King's writing. It was just what I was looking for. Otherwise, the flight was uneventful.

Tuesday, June 10th: I laid over in Amsterdam's Schirpol airport. Nothing special, other than that they had a mini-exhibit from the art museum, which I thought was super cool. Very nice to be able to take a few minutes break and view some amazing paintings for free. DTW should do that with the DIA. I wish I had like two hours more, and then maybe I could have gone into Amsterdam. Oh well. On the flight down to Ethiopia I read The Shack. I know it is so cliche, but I literally couldn't put it down. If I had not been jammed up against the window in a crowded plane, I would have laughed out loud and openly wept. I was choking back tears. It was very good - blew away my expectations. It is a novel, a little like Pilgrim's Progress. If you're looking for a book to help you think more about finding God in the midst of suffering and such, then I think this is a good book for you. Anyway, there was a big sandstorm in the Khartoum area, so we almost didn't land there to refuel. In fact, it turns out (I found out later from Meg - who understandably freaked out when she heard the news) a plane had had a weather-related accident in Khartoum a few hours before we got there. But all was well. I landed in Addis uneventfully and, having met Mark and Woody at the airport, we went to our hotel.

Wednesday, June 11th: Despite a late night, we got started very early on our trip up to the northwest Addis churches. We picked up some bread and snacks for lunch at a local market and then headed out. A breakfast of coffee, tibbs (sheep meat in broth) and injara (bread) awaited us, along with some local pastor friends, at a restaurant in Holeta. They piled in our Land Cruiser and we were off. That day we visited the churches in Minke and Minaare, as well as saw the new property for the church in Mugar. Because it was the rainy season, most people were out in the fields farming, so the turnouts at our little gatherings were less than last time. That night we ate at the Chess Hotel (yes, complete with outdoor murals of people playing chess) in Mugar. We didn't play chess, but we did dash across the street to our hotel rooms because the rain was pouring down. I stopped eating injara by this point, as its slighly sour flavor was definitely not sitting well with my stomach.

Thursday, June 12th: While Mark (and our driver) stayed behind to work, Woody and I, along with a few local friends, rode horses to visit the new church across the valley from Mugar. This church was in a small village called Dhekuqersa, and they had never had the opportunity to hear the gospel until the church was planted there in October 2007. The 90 minute one way horse back ride was something else, and included fording a river with a major waterfall. This was definitely not the States, as you could walk right up to the unprotected edge of a falls easily as big as Niagara.




The people of Dhekuqersa were great. They loved getting their family portraits taken. What was also amazing was that we still had cell phone coverage here! We were able to share a word with them from the gospels and then pray for their church. We were also able to pray for healing (for a disabled foot) for a new disciple in their church who had recently been delivered from a number of demons. God did restore to her more feeling to her leg and foot. After riding back, we had a short gathering at the new Mugar location (which involved me do a little Children's ministry with all the kids that had gathered) and also visited the church at Ulagora, though, unfortunately, we were like 2 hours late so most everyone was gone. Then, after a brief visit the church in Holeta, we returned to Addis and our rooms at the Blue Light hotel.


Friday, June 13th: Today we spent the day in Addis conducting training for the pastors and leaders in the churches of Addis and the surrounding area. We were at the new Living Stream Vineyard. I spoke in the morning on Kingdom relationships in life and ministry and Mark spoke in the afternoon on Servant Leadership. It was very productive. That night the pastor invited us over to his home for a wonderful dinner and coffee, along with Woody, his wife and our friend Shimeles. He told us stories of how the churches under his supervision are seeing many Mslms come to Christ in a different part of Ethiopia. Dreams, visions, healings, you name it. God is at work.

Saturday, June 14th: We had coffee and breakfast at Kaldi's Coffee, the Ethiopian Starbucks knock-off. It was great. Their Americano was great, though still not as good as a regular cup of Ethiopian joe. Then we departed for Awassa. Along the way we visited a couple of churches where they are seeing some significant ministry - both among the disabled poor and to Mslms. We passed by one district where there are 8 churches working primarily among Mslms, all with evangelists who grew up in the community. Because of some cell-phone network outages on the road down, we weren't able to visit some of the churches in the Awassa area that we had planned on visiting.
So we spent a little relational time together - Mark, myself, Woody, Chemdessa and our driver, and we took the boat out to see the hippos on Awassa Lake. After a beautiful boat ride we passed a fisherman and then came to the hippos - about 10 or 12 in all, only maybe 100 feet from our boat.


Woody and I were up late that night talking over dessert and we were able to link up with some of the area pastors and chat with them.

Sunday, June 15th: We facilitated a half-day training in Awassa. For the first half we spent a few hours answering a number of questions that the local pastors had about the Vineyard, etc. Then we transitioned and I did my teaching on relationships. One funny bit was that I ended up giving my shoes away to someone there, as they had gotten pretty wet from the lake the night before, and I figured someone there would prefer to have them than me taking them home only to throw them away. After spending some time chatting with our friends, we headed back to Addis and Mark and I joined Woody, Shewaye and their eldest daughter (Eden) for dinner at the Zebra Grill - 9 stories up - where, among other things, they had chicken wings! But I didn't try them. That night we stayed in a guest house that had formerly been the Palestinian Embassy - is it possible Yassir Arafet had climbed those same steps?

Monday, June 16th: Mark and I have breakfast with Shimeles at Kaldi's. We had a nice chat and then Woody took us to the airport. All around it was a great visit. On the plan ride out I took several hours to catalog all my thoughts. Near our refueling stop in Rome I happened to see Mt. Vesuvius. Eli loves volcanoes and so I was excited to be able to take a picture of it. I was able to see an old friend of mine during my 13 hour overnight layover in London. We had a late dinner and coffee, then I found a little seat on which I "slept" for a few hours.



Tuesday, June 17th: I fly home to Detroit. On the way I read The Multiplying Church. I also watched 10,000 BC on my on-demand entertainment screen. I had to work at finishing both. Mostly, though, I just looked forward to finally being home and seeing my family again.

All in all it was a great trip. I learned a lot. And I think we accomplished all three of our goals, and I also accomplished my fourth.

Thanks to all of you who made the trip possible (through prayer and supporting Meg and my family). Peace.