I woke up with nervous excitement today.
I'll refrain from breaking out in song Annie-style, but 24 hours from now I'll be checking my pack in at DFW and going through security on my way to Ghana with 11 friends. Woohoo! It's hard to believe the trip is finally here after so much preparation and discussion and waiting (on my part)...
I have high hopes for this trip. Not high hopes for my experience, although I know it will be grand and adventurous (I am, after all, a Nickson), but high hopes for the way God is going to use our team to influence the people we encounter, to love the children we meet. Our team is diverse, coming from Dallas, College Station, Orange, and even Missouri. I know most of the group, with a few exceptions, and cannot wait to share these experiences with them. In case you like names, here's our crew: myself, Chris, Stacey, Rachel, Allison, Marcus, Michael, Angela, Kristi, Levi, Jeremy, and Joanne. Please remember us all in your prayers this next week.
As expected with such a trip, there are numerous things that we simply cannot prepare for until we arrive. One of those things is the level of English that the children will be able to speak in Kete Krachi. Most of them haven't had much schooling, if any, at this point so I have a feeling that we'll be doing a lot of 'showing' rather than 'speaking'. The best part about this is that God's love translates from culture to culture, regardless of any language barrier. (Insert cheesy cliche here.) But we chose our themes for the week based on that fundamental truth, desiring to share God's love with these precious kids above anything else. Here are the verses we chose, in giant floor puzzle form. This puzzle will be one of our Free Time art activities, and I'm pretty excited about it. Also, this image is pre-puzzle piece cutting, so yes, there are more than 6 pieces!
Honestly, I'm pretty excited about the 2 foot tall lion. :)
Here's some good reading material for you while I'm gone. It's an
article about Congolese women and their running efforts to support each other. Written by Runner's World and very powerful. I guess running also translates cross-culture pretty well. That being the case, I should be in good shape in Ghana!
Well, that's all I've got this morning. Our flight leaves DFW at 11:45 tomorrow morning and returns at 10:45ish on the morning of the 30th. Ghana time is 5 hours ahead of Texas, so you can know what part of the day it is for us there. Thanks for all the prayers, encouragement, and support of this journey. I promise to return with more pictures than I know what to do with!
I'm sure I've posted this before, but I just really like this verse...
"Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it."
Be blessed this week!
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