After much clamouring from certain individuals, and in the interest of preserving an account of my cross-country journey for posterity, the black board will document a daily account of the road trip.  A few minor points before we begin.  I am currently writing this post on February 11, 2008 but as you can see, it is dated 1/31.  I am back dating all the posts to the day they occurred for my own sake really plus I think it will read easier.  Additionally, in the future, should I choose to commemorate any particular leg of the journey I will know which day to designate for the purpose.  (Actually, that was the only minor point, so just one point).

I will begin with the name…The “Go West Young Man Epic Voyage”.  Yes, I have christened my road trip after the cheesy Michael W Smith song.  Two main reasons:

1)  The title sums up succinctly what I am doing.  Going west.  I debated calling it the “To See about a Girl” road trip after the Good Will Hunting line but it did not seem to have the same ring.

2) I feel that a cross-country road trip has other similarities to a Michael W Smith song.  Namely, that you can appreciate it for what it is and perhaps deep down you really enjoy it and yet, at the end, you are relieved it is over.

The name is perhaps not as iconic as the worthy “Grueling Pace, Meager Rations Roadshow” to the Kastner’s wedding but I think “Go West Young Man Epic Voyage” will do.  (One disclaimer: these are the thoughts of a jaded Washingtonian (DC variety, not state) so if I inadvertently insult your state/town or you feel I do not give it a fair shake, then please forgive me as these are only my impressions.  I’m sure Sallisaw, OK is a lovely town once you get to know it.)  So, without further ado, I give you the trip account…

My friends in Virginia threw me a going away party to send me on my way to California.  It was amazing and so encouraging.  I am so thankful for the friendships the Lord has blessed me with in Virginia.  He always seems to bring wonderful friends alongside me to share each stage of life’s journey with.  I have made the best friends of my life here and I love all of you dearly and I will miss you tons.  It encourages me to no end to know the support and prayers that accompany me to California and from there to the mission field.  I don’t know what else to say but that I love you guys!  Big ‘n’ Rich of course snapped some quality photos which you can view here!

Hi everyone!  I hope you all had a blessed Christmas and fun New Year and are getting back into the post-holiday swing of things!  I have lots of changes coming up for me and wanted to give you an update on my path to the mission field and about an exciting thing the Lord is doing in my life!  The Lord has blessed me with the desire and opportunity to serve Him as a missionary with SIM.  During that process, God has also blessed me by bringing an amazing young woman into my life who is also an SIM missionary candidate like myself, we actually met at one of SIM’s orientation events.  We have been pursuing a relationship together which has been such an amazing blessing for both of us but which required some thought about our immediate plans as I was headed to Peru and she was headed to Africa.

After a lot of talking and praying together and talking with many others as well as SIM, we both have decided to put on hold our individual plans and pursue our relationship to see where the Lord may take it.  This does not affect my goal and desire to serve the Lord overseas, just the timing.  Although I don’t know the Lord’s purpose or timing at this point for bringing us together, I am confident that He has done so at this time for a reason and it is well worth my time and effort to invest in this relationship and see where it might lead.  Katie is a fun and wonderful woman and I am excited to have found a woman with the same passion for missions and desire to serve as me!  As such, my immediate plans for going to Peru are put on hold and I will be going to Los Angeles in order for Katie and I to experience the full breadth of a relationship and ministry together with the hope that we can go to the field together down the road.

Administratively, this plan has the full blessing of SIM and all of the financial support raised thus far will remain in my account until the time when I leave.  For those of you who have been supporting me monthly, let me say how very much you have blessed and encouraged me!  During this time, I would ask that you hold off on your monthly contributions until I have a more definite timetable for going to the field at which time you can pray about if the Lord is leading you to continue that support.

I know this is probably a surprise to some of you but I hope you will feel confident as I am that the Lord who straightens my paths and is leading me in service both here and overseas is the same Lord who has blessed me with the love of an amazing woman.  I would love to answer any of your questions or tell you more about Katie, she is great!  Of course, I need and appreciate your prayers as always!

Thank you for your constant encouragement and support, you are all a blessing to me!

So while at SIMCO, I was treated to a cornucopia, nay, a smorgasboard of vaccinations for every known disease and some that I had never heard of.  In this feast of goodness were two rabies shots…two of a series of three.  The third shot was given to me to take home and find someone to give it to me.  The quest for the Three-peat has been concluded!  My friend Aaron (yes he is a doctor) fixed me up with #3 which also provided some sweet party entertainment at Becky’s birthday!  You can scope some pics below.  I will add that in the one we are laughng because Aaron said “Ready?  1…2…” and then stuck the needle in!  I was like “What happened to 3??”  It was funny…maybe you had to be there!

“In everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” - 1 Thessalonians 5:18

“It is good to give thanks to the LORD and to sing praises to Your name, O Most High!” - Psalm 92:1

“Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.” - Hebrews 13:15

So, tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I am pondering God’s many blessings in my life.  I am struggling with writing this post.  Not because I am not thankful, I am thankful for so much and my burden is how to share with you my joy without sounding cliché or trite or flippant.  I’m not sure how.  How can I write what is in my heart, my inexpressible feelings for you all, for life, for my Creator, my Saviour?  How can I capture them all??  I can’t, but here is a start, in no particular order…

family, friends, laughter, colourful fall leaves, pizza, long conversations, long walks, Christ, the smell of snow, my job, grace, board games, Skype, clothes, egg nog, accountability, forgiveness, exploring, Thanksgiving dinner, brothers, clean water, love, flip-flops, questions, my car, hand-written mail, hugs, relationships, answers, prayer, smiles, computers, mountains, my 5 senses, cats, faith, airplanes, the Bible, singing, puns, firm handshakes, my house, spider solitaire, godly parents, dimples, giraffes, zebras, other crazy animals, creativity, God’s creativity, cheetos, sleep, faithfulness, the ocean, colours, integrity, kids, old people, stories, sanctification, mistakes, missionaries, discipline, football, phones, mind, heart, wind, the unknown, stars, spaetzle, silence, people, warmth, ice cream, wisdom, winks, the Holy Spirit, shade, frisbees….

I hope you will take my list for what it is, incomplete, imperfect, incapable of expression.  But I am so thankful for everything the Lord has given me, has given us!  I am thankful that He continues to be faithful even when I am not thankful.  Anyway, I hope everyone has a blessed and wonderful Thanksgiving!!

As I am a man of my word, my conscience compels me to write this post as a dedication to the hospitality staff at SIM USA.  Amy, I told you I would blog about the culinary delights of SIMCO so this post is dedicated to you!  As a single working guy, my diet is less than ideal.  After a long day at work, concocting a delicious meal involving all four food groups (or is it the food pyramid now??) is just about the farthest thing from my mind.  So, although I consider myself a fair chef (roomies, can you back me on this?  Bender, don’t lie, you love my beans and rice!), I usually opt for easy to make dinners which, generally speaking are not the best nutritionally.  Frozen pizza, ramen noodle, grilled cheese, chili, canned fruits or veg…sweet comfort foods you can nuke, boil or get out of a can!

I contrast that with SIMCO where I was delighted each meal-time with an array of delicious home-cooked delicacies.  Burgers, pork chops, pulled pork BBQ, pasta salad, soups….and the banana pudding and trifle still make me salivate when I remember them…mmmmm…good.

So a hearty and heart-felt thanks to you all for spoiling all of us who cannot live on bread alone!  I will think fondly of you over my next bowl of Ramen!

I will be bringing the note pictured above to Peru with me.  It will be in my carry-on so I will be sure not to lose it.  But David, why are you going to bring an ordinary hand-written note with you to Peru?  That seems silly?  Let me explain:

I am appying for a resident visa to live and work in Peru.  To do this, I needed to mail to Lima a copy of my passport that had been authenicated by the Peruvian Embassy here.  Well, I was thinking I could just bring my passport to the embassy and they could make a copy, stamp it and away we go.  That was not the procedure though and I had it copied and notarized, authenticated bythe Fairfax County Clerk of Courts and then the embassy would authenticate that it was a true copy.  Because of needing to do all of the afore mentioned during normal business hours, it took me about two weeks to get it all done.

Next step was mailing it to Lima, Peru to the SIM ofice there.  As these are important documents, I wanted to entrust them to a trusted international courier so they would get there safe and sound.  So I took them off to the news agent shop near my work who is an authorized FedEx, DHL, UPS shipper.  I told him I wanted to send them FedEx and we packaged them up, addressed them, he gave me his phone number so I could call and get updates and that was that.

Off to Charlotte I went for the SIM orentation, blissfully assuming my documents were speeding their way to Peru.  A couple days later I phoned the shop to check on the progress.  “No it has not arrived.  Maybe call back tomorrow.”  The next day, he called me and said the address I gave him was wrong and they needed the phone number or email of the recipient so they could deliver it.  Strange, I thought.  The address had been correct.  Oh well, no biggie.  I emailed Peru and got their phone numbers, emails etc and the next day called the shop and gave him the info.  A couple days go by,  email SIM Peru…no, no one has called them or emailed them about the package!

I called the shop back.  He said that the FedEx office had tried emailing and calling but got no response.  He also said that if nobody claimed it in the next 48 hours it would be abandoned and destroyed!!!  WHAT?!  I informed him that the recipient had neer been contacted and asked him to give me the tracking number which I would pass to Peru so they could use that to claim it.  So he gives me the tracking number which I then email to Peru…

I am in class all day and get back in the evening to check my email and find a note from Peru that they called and told FedEx the tracking number but that FedEx claimed it was an erroneous number and that, in any event, they didn’t have any documents to deliver to SIM!!  WHAT?!

So I am very concerned.  I try calling the shop that night but they are closed of course.  The next morning I try again and they are not open yet.  I called FedEx directly and explained to them the situation and they asked for the tracking number.  I tell them.  “Oh no, thats not our tracking number, that is a UPS tracking number”.  JIGGA WHAT?!  So I call UPS, yes it is their number, yes it was for a package going to Peru, but no contact information had been provided to them so package had been abandoned!  WHAT?!

At this stage, it is like 8am.  I am very angry.  The agent guy at the shop had totally botched everything.  Why he took it out of the FedEx envelop, put it in a UPS one, messed up the address, then lied to me about it and not given the contact info I gave him…I don’t know.  Let me insert here my many thanks to Katie who was on the scene like a champ.  Katie, if you are reading this, you are a blessing thank you!  She let me vent about the situation and prayed right then for me and that the papers would be found.

I emailed Peru, explaining to them everything I had found out and telling them I would speak to folks at SIM to figure out what to do next.  I went to the morning prayer meeting vexed but after some worship, I turned the situation over to God and since there was nothing that could be done, I prayed silently and just decided to take a good attitude and put it behind me.  Continuing to be mad was not going to accomplish anything.

Later that morning, Bob comes in and slips the above note in front of me during the class!!  WHAT?!  They received the package???  PRAISE GOD!!!  I found out later that the Peru office had prayed together that morning about the situation and had called UPS on the off chance that it was still there and it was!!  Just thinking of it even now makes me so thankful!

So, back to the original question: why am I keeping this note?  In the Old Testament, the Israelites would often build piles or rocks or do other things to commemorate events in which God had demonstrated His faithfulness and His grace.  This note is my pile of rocks!!  It reminds me that God is sovereign.  That God is good.  That God is faithful and I can trust Him.  I know that hard times and difficult situations will come up while I am in Peru.  It will be nice to look at my simple, hand-written note, remember a time when God demonstrated His great faithfulness and be encouraged that He will do it again.

“What you are filled with will spill over when you are bumped” - Ravi Zacharias

That is a quote (not sure if it exact or not) that I heard today.  I have been thinking about it and it really is intriguing to think about.  It implies two things, no actually three things: 1) that I am filled with something, 2) that I will be bumped and 3) that something, whatever it is, will come out when I am bumped.

1) What am I filled with?  Well, the quick answer is the Holy Spirit but I think we can go deeper then this and think about actual behaviour.  Am I filling myself, my thoughts, my actions with love, respect, kindness, patience, etc…or something else?

2) What is going to bump me?  People.  Situations.  Events.  Relationships.

3) When I get bumped in life, what flows out?  What is my reaction?

Interesting to think about.  I hope I am filling myself with the fruit of the Spirit!  (Galatians 5:22-25; Philippians 4:8-9; James 3:17-18) That is what I want to spill out when I am bumped.

Wow, I wish y’all could have heard the testimony we heard today at church, it was amazing.  A bunch of us went to an Arab-Christian service this morning which was really great.  I have said this to a few of you but let me state it again, one of the most amazing things about the church is its diversity!  Worshipping with brothers and sisters from a different culture and language is breath-taking and I am sad that so many people will not experience the full richness of the Body of Christ until they get to heaven.

Anyway, back to the service it was small, maybe 20-30 people and it was so fun to listen to the worship.  It was all in Arabic (we had ear pieces that a translator translated into English).  It is funny how you don’t need to know the words to understand the praise in a song to God.  After some songs, a young lady was asked, impromptu, to give her testimony which I have summarized below:

She was a lawyer in a big law firm in Kartoum, Sudan.  She had wanted to learn english and one day saw a Westerner reading an english newspaper so she asked him if he could help her learn english.  He gave her an Arab-English Bible and helped her learn using that!  As she read and began to understand more, she starting thinking about Jesus more and secretly was reading her Bible.  It came to pass that her father died.  The woman came to the home and the family were there crying over the dead father and she prayed to Jesus that if he was really who he said he was, then to prove it and bring her father back to life.  The father opened his eyes!!  What?!?  What!?!

As a result, the woman gave her life to Christ.  She was meeting secretly with other Chrsitians and continued to study the Bible, pray and know the Lord.  One day, after returning from work, her family had found her Bible and began to beat her.  They accused her and questioned her as they beat her asking “Are you a Christian now??”  She remembered that Christ said that anyone who denies Him, He will also deny so she held fast to her faith in spite of being beaten nearly to death.  She managed to escape and walk across Sudan to a town with more Christians but had to leave the country for fear of her family finding her.

Her testimony was meant as an encouragement to us missionaries who were there.  If that man had not introduced her to Jesus and the Bible, she would be a successful lawyer in her own country, living at home with her family but she would be dead in her sin.  There are so many milions of people who have not yet heard the news of salvation and forgiveness in Christ.  They will not hear unless someone tells them.  It was such a powerful testimony and I wish you could have heard it.  God is at work all around us and all over the world in powerful and amazing ways.  He can raise people from the dead for His glory.  He can protect His people from harm and bring them to physical safety for His glory.  He can forgive sins and change lives for His glory.  Awesome!  This is our God!

Tonight a bunch of us went on an excursion to downtown Charlotte.  Well, back that up.  So after a full week on the SIM campus going to class and whatnot some of us wanted to get off-campus for the night to relax and have fun.  So we borrowed/rented a sweet ride from SIM: a nice, white Ford Escort henceforth know as “Florence” or “Florence the Yeti” as it was a white beast!

The plan was to go get some Thai food and go bowling.  Thai food eaten, check.  On to the bowling alley which was, as bowling alleys all around the country are on a Saturday night, full of league players.  The highlight of that failed attempt was, however, the discovery of a vending machine that sold socks and band-aides!!  How awesome is that?!  Who would have thought you could get socks from a machine!

So we decided to roll into downtown Charlotte and find a coffee shop to hang out in.  We got down and had a long walk all over downtown Charlotte, to no avail, no coffee shops aside from the Bux!  There was a cool band on a corner singing some Christian songs so we listened to that and generally just hung out.  We did eventually go to Starbucks.  So I am sitting there and there is this guy with a chess board set up on a table and he is just sitting there.  So I asked him “Excuse me, are you waiting to playing someone?” to which he replies “Do you play?”  “I know how” were my fatal last words!  Joe demolished me in like 10 minutes!  It was pretty funny!  He was a serious player I think.  I tried stiking up a conversation but I think he suspected me of trying to distract him and divert his attentions from the game!

In all it was a very fun and relaxing night!  If any SIMCO buddies are reading this, I enjoy you guys so much!  It is fun to see how close we have gotten already!  We were all beat tired after we got back but hung out chatting and telling stories.  Katie and Ryan have been impressing me with their SoCal slang so I think I am going to try and implement “rad”, “gnarly” and “stellar” into my NOVA slang!  OK, well we are going to a service at an Arab-Christian church tomorrow and then going hiking in the afternoon so that will be cool!