Salem Chapel Missions Blog

Last night the team made it back to Winston-Salem. They were definitely exhausted as they had been up and traveling for nearly 22 hours. It was a tiring end to a draining trip but they were all excited to see their families. Their families were definitely excited to see them.

The team did a tremendous job in Estonia. We know that it would not have been possible with all of your support. Thank you one more time for all of your prayers for the team while they were away. God worked mightily through the ministry of this trip. Continue to pray for the church in Elva and Josiah Venture’s ministry to the students of Estonia. They are doing a great work there…

It is surreal to be back in Tartu just one week later and yet think of how much has changed for a group of Estonians and our team. I think for many it will be a week they remember for a long time. I am happy that soon they will be able to retell their stories in their own voice, for many of you face to face, and I pray you will catch their enthusiasm for missions and this country.

Having grown up practically living at camp for the summers I am used to saying “goodbye.” But admittedly I find it harder to do over here after a week like this one. There is so much opportunity for further ministry that I hate to part from it as does many on our team.

On the other hand, I am so proud of our team and the way they pulled together and stepped up. One of the Estonian Interns today shared that she was worried when she first saw us! Many of our students looked so young and we seemed so quiet to her. She was wrong. Our team turned it on from the minute those campers showed up to the second they left. They shared their faith boldly and loved those God had entrusted to our care. I also want to give a little shout-out to the absent (yet present) Dave Jacobson, youth Pastor at Salem Chapel. You’ve done a good thing with these kids. I wish you had been here to see them in action.

The entire team deserves some well-earned R&R and our plan is to search that out tomorrow amidst the cobblestone streets and tall turrets of medieval Tallinn. We depart from Tartu at 6:45am and should arrive in Tallinn just after 9am. Our team has not yet seen Tallinn and I think they will very much enjoy it. The medieval city of Tallinn (Old Town) was first seen on a map in 1154 and it’s town wall dates back to the 14th century with 20 of its tall defense towers still standing. Unfortunately, you often need to pinch yourself to remind you that you are in fact standing in an almost perfectly preserved medieval city and not on the set of some Disney movie. It will be a fitting end to a great week.

Since I am not sure whether our not we will be able to update our blog again before returning home, allow me this opportunity to thank you for your prayers and (for many of you) your financial support that have made this trip possible. I do believe I am not overstating it when I say I think the trip has had a life changing impact on many. Thank you for your faithfulness.

I apologize my commitment to blogging was not as great as my commitment to sleep last night at 1:30am after I finally admitted I was older than everybody else and had to go to bed. In the next 12 minutes I have before our morning program begins I will tell you last night was really special.

There was pretty much silence throughout the entire message as everybody was totally dialed in. After in their small groups, many reported it being their best night of the week. There were several very open and frank discussions about the truth of the gospel and our team stepped up to the plate to answer them. When asked if they wanted to accept Christ, a couple of kids said “maybe” which I took to be very encouraging. In our last session today I’m going to walk them through what a prayer looks like and how they could begin to read God’s word. I think many of them will “knock” and find the door soon opened to them.

I haven’t been able to talk in detail to each group yet, but I can tell you of a conversation I had. A group of us were walking to the lake after the small group time and as we went somebody called my name. I turned and the group of guys who didn’t seem too interested at the beginning of the week began asking me questions. The amazing part was that many of their questions were not really questions but affirmations. They asked things such as “If you die apart from Christ you go to hell, right?” or “Jesus forgives all your sins even if you have a lot of them, right?” or “Other religions are wrong, right?” it was unbelievable. The conversation than turned to those questions that are not easily answered while walking to a lake through a mosquito-infested forest, the origin of evil, the perceived injustice in a deathbed conversion and a few others that can have strong believers scratching their heads. But I tried.

What warmed my heart the most was those were some of the very same questions I’ve wrestled with. I think they’re in a very cool spot. Praise God! Talk soon.

Making T-Shirts

Making Picture Frames

New Friends

Chicken Dance

English Camp Worship Team

uh… More New Friends

Evelin (Estonian Intern) and Brandon

Cafe Time

Midterm Reports:

The students have been great sports at doing whatever is asked of them, but there is always room for improvement so I thought I would post my thoughts on each of them while knowing they will not be able to read them until they return.

In no particular order:

Alena – I thought this girl was shy… uh… I was so wrong! She’s leading in worship and is a fantastic dancer. The kids love her and she is doing great.

Shelton – Also one of our worship leaders, Shelton has also been in some of the skits up front during the evening program. She’s spending a lot of time with the Esto girls in her group and seems to possess boundless energy and a distaste for shoes (this goes for the above and below as well).

CrysAne – Taught full out ninja-ing to a group of campers who thought she was 20. She played a convincing Paris Hilton in a skit and has been our main “hemp” instructor she’s a born leader.

Dustin and Brandon have somehow crossed the “gangsta” barrier and have those guys talking to them, while Taylor has maintained a high-level of ministry to some of the young Estonian ladies here. All three of them have done a real good job of not hanging out together and have totally immersed themselves in the relationships here. They have far exceeded my expectations.

Laura – has been really great (they thought she was 20 too) building relationships and also coming out of her shell even participating in all the upfront games.

Chrissy – has been injured in every game of football (soccer) he’s played but continues to play on. Today he was on the “hot-seat” (I’ll explain later) and was told he looked like Squidward. The resemblance is uncanny.

Carlye – is truly gifted for these sorts of things. She totally gets missions and is great with students. She is a fantastic asset and we are blessed to have her. She too was in the “hot-seat” and asked whether she thought Americans, Mexicans or Estonians had the most attractive men. For the record she answered “Estonians.” Also for the record, I am an Estonian.

Dusty and Jill – Dusty has been the host of everything upfront, and let me just say, unexpected. I had no idea this guy was so funny. Seriously, he has had some great material as well as a stellar heart for the students. Jill is well loved by our girls and is being stretched by having the “heckler” in her group, you can pray for her!

Kimberley – As the veteran of youth ministry here she is doing many of the things she is so gifted to do. Still haven’t been able to get her upfront though.

Josh – It’s been said this week that Estonians have the most attractive men. I am Estonian.

I’ll be completely honest with you. I’m a little tired. And the trip is going great. I’ll also apologize for the lack of other perspectives on this blog. But there is limited access to wifi and we’re generally with the campers 24/7 and I hate to pull others away from what they’re doing to update you on what they would otherwise be doing if they were not updating you, make sense?

Yesterday was our first day of running English environments. The two we ran were “Speed Dating” and a numbers/team building activity. I was involved with the “Speed Dating” environment (don’t tell any Elders) which essentially was you sitting across from a member of the opposite sex and asking questions of each other for 4 ½ minutes before moving to the next person. The campers definitely got to work on their conversational English and get to know each other at the same time. The other environment involved a gym, numbers and lots of running. There were 50 numbers randomly placed on the floor and your team needed to touch each one in order in less than 30 seconds. This couldn’t be done as an individual and required you to work as a team, though I’m told Brandon was convinced he could. He couldn’t.

The session and small groups went well last night. The subject was “love” and the differences between humanity’s understanding and God’s. There are several public non-Christians here who have admitted they’re interested in hearing more, as I type they are all in their small groups and I pray getting even more so. Tonight’s message looked at The Fall. We began with the Parable of The Prodigal Son and then moved to Adam & Eve and The Fall. We purposely left the gospel until tomorrow night to allow the campers time to process. For several of them they had never heard of any of this, so we’re allowing lots of time.

The English environments today were a Bingo type thing and a “make your own commercial.” The bingo game had two sides. They would read a word in Estonian and the Americans had to find the Estonian word on their board and the Estonians had to translate it to English and find it on theirs. Pretty cool way of helping both groups work on the others language. For the record the Estonians are far more proficient at English than the Americans are at Estonian. The commercial thing was making commercials. We’ll see them all soon I think, they’re supposed to be pretty funny.

Even our crafts have been a hit! The tie-dye shirts were great and our picture frames seemed to have gone over well too, and hemp has been the new “Slinky” everyone wants. I’m personally looking forward to Chris et al. teaching everyone to make duct tape wallets as I’m guessing that hasn’t crossed their minds before.

It is incredible to realize we have passed the halfway point of our ministry here. We are getting tired though we know there is much ministry to be done. Please pray for a strong finish and that some of these kids would make a decision for Christ tomorrow night. Our session will be at 11:30am and our small groups at 1pm your time, if would and are able, please be in prayer for both those events.

Camp has begun! Sorry for the delay getting this out, the Internet was down.

All of the prayer, planning and preparation have come down to this! The campers are here and it is going great. Your students are doing fantastic! I was so pleased to watch them totally jump in and greet the Estonian students and be the first to take steps towards them. We separated them into their small groups and did a bunch of team building activities that were not only funny to watch but productive as well.

Our small groups got off to a very promising beginning with much discussion happening. Many of the Estonians were unusually transparent and seem to be openly searching. That is very much an answer to prayer, as Estonians are not known for their initial openness.

Be praying for continued openness and the softening of hearts. There was one student in specific that was heckling through the message. Thankfully, though he was trying to distract his friends (all wannabe gangsta’s) they were not interested in him and were very much paying attention. The staff here says they’re not used to groups being so interested so early, I firmly believe this is a testimony to your prayers. Continue on!

Greetings from Otepää!

Day two is coming to a close and I thought I’d let you know how things are going. We are less than 12 hours from welcoming our Estonian campers to camp and making final preparations for their arrival.

We began the day (well not all of us, some slept in, naughty missionaries) by grabbing some breakfast in the same little place we ate yesterday off of the town square and then walked to the Atlantis club for church. It was really cool to have church in a room with a disco ball! The service was really good and I think eye opening for our team. It was special to sing songs in Estonian that we knew in English and their band even led some songs in English, which was nice. One of their pastors spoke on the parable of the Good Samaritan from the Samaritan’s point of view giving a monologue of sorts for the majority of it. (Having said that, my Estonian is pretty weak so perhaps he was speaking on Leviticus.) They then celebrated communion in a way I had never experienced before and many of our team hope we’ll try at Salem Chapel soon. After the service we hung out a little with the church folk while their team tore-down their stage. It was total deja vu when I looked over and Laura was helping fold their curtains. You can take the girl from set-up but you can’t take set-up from the girl!

We then headed to Estonian McDonalds for lunch (imagine smaller portions and paying for ketchup) and stocked up on soda and snacks at the nearby Statoil and we awaited our rides to Otepää. There was some car trouble so we had to wait until we had enough rides which took a little while to sort out, but we arrived safely at the Pühajärve (Holy Lake) Elementary School a short hour and a bit later.

Upon arriving we began the task of transforming this school (where have you heard this before?) into a fully functioning English camp. We created an auditorium for our sessions complete with screen and banners and changed a classroom into a real cool Café for hanging out in. After setup we had our first mostly authentic Estonian meal (very good) and then came together for some team building activities.

We then split up into what will be our small group leadership. Here’s what the teams look like:

Carlye & Brandon
Chris & Shelton
Dusty Bottoms, CrysAne & Matthew (Estonian youth)
Kimberley, Alena & Marilyn (Estonian youth)
Laura, Dustin & Marie (Estonian youth)
Jill, Taylor & Laurie (Estonian youth – that’s a guy)

The plan is to add about 3 Estonian campers to each group and spend the week together. Please be praying specifically for these groups. It will be in these groups that relationships are formed and the gospel presented. It will be a stretching experience I’m sure as there is bound to be several kids who have never heard about Jesus at all. Ever. The heavy thing for us is that some might never hear again. Estonia needs more missionaries.

Our next event is “Good Morning Sunshine” where Innar (an Elder at Risttee), Carlye, Elena and Shelton will be leading us in worship, as we get ready for the campers arrival sometime around 11am. Be praying that both groups would warm up to each other quickly and for our first session tomorrow afternoon.

Here we are in front of the “Kissing Fountain” in the Tartu Town Square. (Don’t worry parents, I made sure nothing happened!) Talk soon.

It’s hard to imagine day 1 is in the books! We’ve just returned from hanging out at Pastor Peep’s house after an evening of grilling out and true Estonian sauna. We spent the majority of the day in training covering cultural dynamics and preparing for leading the small group times. We are expecting around 20 students to attend the camp and covet your prayers for more last minute decisions who might plan on joining us.

We began the day walking to the city center of Tartu and had breakfast off the town square. Tartu, founded in the year 1030 (that’s not a typo) is definitely postcard worthy and beautiful. We then moved to some rented facilities and joined up with another team who will be in a differnt city and did our training together.

We’re staying in a sweet hostel just south of the town square. Tomorrow we will be attending Risttee Kogudus (Crossroads Fellowship) for their morning service. Risttee is a church plant of Salem Baptist here in Tartu (weird huh?) that started just over a year and a half ago. They are doing a fantastic job and reaching many with the gospel of Christ. After church we will be heading to our camp location just outside of Otepää and getting ready for our camp. The students we will be ministering to will arrive on Monday morning from the town of Elva.

Please continue to pray for us. It’s just before 12am here and the sun looks like it has finally retired for it’s short rest. Many are suffering from a little jet lag and need a good nights sleep. The team is getting along great and we’re all having a good time.

It has been so encouraging for me personally to hear them all trying to speak Estonian and I know that goes a long way with the nationals. Having said that, one of the cab drivers that drove us back from Pastor Peep’s house was undoubtedly confused when Chris Wiles said “Tervist” AFTER the ride. “Tervist” means “hello.” I think Chris thought it was “thank-you.” So while wrong, Chris did say it with great passion as he exited the cab.

Aitah, Chris for the laughs.

“Aitah” is thanks.