PFB High School Missions Lithuania Trip 2010

A Complete safe return

2010-07-20T00:05:00.000-07:00

Thank you to all of our supporters for following our journey thus far. Your prayers for our outstanding team member were answered as they have returned home safely to their family. Thank you for those prayers for a safe return. All of us are back in the United States now and are fairly well adjusted back to everyday life. I cannot thank you enough for the prayers provided for this team as we make our attempt at glorifying God's kingdom.
In His grip,

Team Lithuania<><

A Safe return

2010-07-08T20:41:00.000-07:00

Dear followers,
I want to thank you again so much for supporting this trip both spiritualy and financially as it was a success in God's terms. Monday night was a long but sad night as we said our final goodbyes to many a good friend that have helped us, and been a real encouragement to us throughout this trip. With the final exchange of contact information and a few teary photos we set off to bed after snacking on a thank you gift of lazy cake. The next morning we arose early at 04:00, grabbed a quick breakfast and headed of to the "International" airport in Palanga (a one plane, one terminal, one gift shop, airport). Our layover took us to Copenhagen, Denmark where we sadly had to leave one our team members behind because they had had personal business in Germany. It was a bittersweet goodbye because we knew that they were going to have a blast in Germany, but it was bitter in the scence that we were minus one irreplaceable member, leaving an empty space in our crew during our travel home. We had a great flight home after another layover in Munich, Germany with some rest and at least one of us got to share a little bit of the gospel with one of our neighbors. We landed at LAX on time at 19:00 (7:00 P.M) and thanks to all your prayers found all of our baggage and passed through customs effortlessly. We continue to ask for your prayers for those we came into contact with whilst were gone, that they my accept Christ and begin to see him moving in their lives. Also I'd like to ask for your prayers for the comfort and safety of our remaining member overseas and also that their family will be comforted as they our without a family member for what will be a month upon their return. Thank you so much for all of your support through prayer and funds, for without it this trip would not have been possible.

In His grip,

Team Lithuania

The last day

2010-07-05T13:45:00.001-07:00

Hello Family and Friends, we are praying for all of you on our last day here in Lithuania knowing so many have been faithful in supporting us in prayer during our trip. We thank you all so much it was a wonderful trip and we couldn’t have done it without your support both financially and spiritually.

We are wrapping up our last day here at the City Church (taking place at the same building as Manna House) and it has been a lot of fun. We’ve had approximately 30 kids actively attending and it’s been a well balanced schedule of play time, snack time, worship time and Bible lessons. The camp is formatted to give kids time to spend with their family in the afternoon and we are keeping them active and engaged for the morning and evening hours which allows the parents to focus on their own worship and study times. It’s been such a blessing to be a part of the movement we’re seeing here as people are whole heartedly worshipping and people rededicating their lives to Christ. Baptisms took place yesterday and about 8 people got baptized in the Baltic Sea as the church members cheered them on.

It is time for us to pack now as our flight leaves 6:45 am tomorrow morning and we will soon be busy with the evening activities with the kids including a talent show tonight. Please be keeping the kids and their families your prayers, for stronger families, stronger relationships with Christ, and the excitement we’ve seen to continue to stay strong and spread infectiously. Our team will be keeping the Gilliland family, Manna Church, and all of the wonderful people we have met through these camps in our prayers. We feel so blessed to have had this experience and are excited to see what God has in store for this country.

See you soon!

In His Grip,

Team Lithuania<><

Water Camp

2010-07-02T15:17:00.000-07:00

Rewind: Thursday

Hello and thank you for your prayers, especially the last few days, as have been hectic but great. It’s a lot to catch up but we’ll do our best to bring you up to speed. Picking up where we left off, Thursday we worked on finishing the preparation for camp. Bethany and Saruna stayed behind working on the rest of the preparations while we were away at the Water Camp. We were able to complete the painting of the rooms where Pastor Saul’s family has moved into now. They will be staying here in Manna House for the summer and who are accompanying us for the Church camp taking place this week. We packed our bags and with our final jobs completed we took the opportunity to try some American food at the nearby mall. We treated ourselves to some hamburgers and fries, realizing in the process that it was different than our hamburgers. Portions were smaller and we ate in a place that faintly reminded me of the Rainforest Café back home, not as elaborate but dark and with decorative pillars surrounding the eating area. The mall was huge, including a room behind the restaurant where kids could get inside balls (like hamster balls) and run around for a few minutes. The mall also included an ice rink in the center of the mall and some singers in traditional German garb were singing in the halls as we passed through the mall after dinner. We took the opportunity to swim in the Baltic Sea while we had a chance and though it was drizzling and the Sea was cold but enough to stop us from swimming. We had another worship time with the people of City Church (the Church here at Manna House). It’s a blessing to be able to worship with people of another culture and sing songs worshipping the God of all nations, peoples, tribes and tongues.

Rewind Friday, June 25th

Friday morning we pack the Gilliland mobile high with supplies and squeezed everyone into the van with hardly any room to spare. It was a three hour drive of beautiful countryside with forest and field binding together seamlessly. This country, like Germany is full of green with the exception of occasional splotches of yellow. When we arrived we settled into our rooms and got to meet the rest of the staff there (about 23 leaders including us). After we settled in the entire staff set off to test try a ropes course that we were going to secretly take the campers to in the middle of the night during the week. The ropes course was fantastic, but with noticeably different safety regulations. We all finished safely with only minor bruises from the ropes and harnesses (to be discovered the next morning). One of the courses called the “black” course was rather challenging. The amount of encouragement that we were constantly giving each other really helped us bond as a team and built our trust towards each member individually. We all faced different challenges throughout the course but fortunately we had each others’ backs through our own prayers and the prayers of others. This course has really epitomized the course of this trip thus far. It started out easily, became more challenging, required lots of help and prayer, took a lot of faith to get to get through, and in the end was a huge thrill! That night was really our last full night of rest before we started camp.

Rewind Saturday-Thursday

Saturday, June 26th

The Water Camp near Vilnius was amazing but for the sake of time I will try and keep this post concise and leave the details till we see you, our friends and family, in person. Saturday was a chance for us to help with the preparations for the camp and for us to see some of the capitol city, Vilnius. It was an interesting contrast to the seclusion and quiet of the campground which is so far removed from the city, nestled in the woods and rustic. The town maintains its historic roots with cobblestone roads and buildings which date back to the 13th century. We visited the KGB museum which was a very somber building which reminds me of the holocaust museum back home. We saw St. Peter and Paul’s Cathedral which was a beautiful building with art work which I’ve only seen before in my Art History books. After a dinner of pigs ears and cepelinai (a potato dish) we headed back to camp to continue helping with preparations and bonding with the staff.

Sunday is when the campers arrived. We had a prayer meeting early in the morning with the leaders, as we always did, followed by breakfast and more preparations. We went together on a drive to a castle in Vilnius where the kids met us for a ferry ride to a location near the campground. Emus, the camp leader, loves surprises and keeping the kids guessing and so it was a fitting way to start the trip. The kids rode the ferry with us which gave us a chance to already start bonding with them before the camp started. We were dropped off at a point on the edge of the lake where we would have to hike the remainder of the way to camp, taking about 3 hours or more to make it to camp. We continued meeting kids as we hiked and enjoyed this time for long conversations with the kids free of most distractions. Our group was in charge of games so we stopped a few times to break up the hike and do a few games as icebreakers for the kids to make new friends. This came has been going on for 5 or 6 years so some kids were familiar with each other from previous camps and others knew each other from being a part of the same church groups. We found the kids, as we had with the camp leaders, to be very kind and intelligent people and it while there were some who were uneasy with using their English skills I thanked God that so many were willing to try a foreign language which normally was only used in a school setting.

To give you an idea of the schedule as we were at camp the next few days, we normally got up before 7 so that we could getting to the leader meeting in time and the exercise time that followed. This was followed by breakfast which was followed by a morning lesson which was lessons based off of the camp theme, water. The lessons were varied, some more educational about water while the majority have been very much about a personal relationship with Christ. Personal testimonies, challenges to devote their lives to following Christ instead of their own path, and stories about the Samaritan woman and Peter walking on the water are just some of the subjects talked about in the midst of the lessons in the morning and evening. Craft and hobby was around 11 (time was flexible and we ran on camp time, 2 hrs behind the actual Lithuanian time zone) and this was followed by lunch, chores, and then some free time. Another leader meeting at 3 to discuss the rest of the day, especially the game time, a game time from about 3:30-6 which was followed by dinner. After this was a lesson around a campfire which included worship time (as did the morning lesson) and I was happy to be able to play the drums for the worship time. After campfire was hot stump time, a time where kids would be able to listen to answers from a camp leader answering anything they had written anonymously in the question box. There was a lot of structure and at the same time a lot of freedom for the kids to enjoy themselves and do the activities they like to do. Playing volleyball, basketball, soccer and swimming in the lake definitely kept us busy.

The camp leaders felt like there was a lot of burdens weighing down on them and especially feeling like Satan was attacking them in different ways. Thanks to early meetings, late meetings, active days, the hot sun and midnight runs to the ropes course with the students on two nights, it made for a trying time. But, most of all I think we all felt it was largely because Satan was trying to stop good things from happening at the camp. We felt bittersweet leaving the camp, sad to leave all the relationships behind knowing that there were a lot of doors being opened and that God was moving in their lives. The demeanor of the students and staff, the wonderful conversations we and other camp leaders were having with students, makes me feel absolutely certain God was working there and will continue to through the rest of the camp time. Please be praying for the rest of that camp to include new additions to God’s kingdom and for lives to be rededicated to him. The harvest is ripe. Thursday night, after some tearful goodbyes and lots of exchanging emails and facebook info, we headed back on the 3 and half hour drive home. While we loved our time at the rustic camp, we are happy to be back at Mana house and working on the next camp too.

In His Grip,

Team Lithuania<><

Atsiprasao (Sorry)

2010-07-02T06:33:00.000-07:00

Hello Friends and Family! We just finished our camp adventures and are now able to communicate with all of you and share how God has changed our lives for the better and how He has used us to make a impact on the best kids we have ever met. We have many stories to come in the next few blogs about roosters, ropes, bug bites and about 120 students on thier search for God. We are sorry we could not communicate during our time in the camp as we were with out the internet, but now we are glad to share with you our struggles, our joys and everything in between. Thank you again for reading, and make sure to keep checking as we will gradually share our past week with all of you : ) Aciu (c with a bird, u with a line), or Thank You, (in Lithuaina) for keeping us in your prayers!

In His Grip,

Team Lithuania<><

The last two days

2010-06-23T16:14:00.000-07:00

Hello family and friends! It's so good to be able to share with you all about our time here in Lithuania so far. It's been a busy past two days but I'll do my best to sum it up.

We started the morning with breakfast and then worship at 8 am. We prayed using the ACTS method interspersed with lots of worship songs and it was a wonderful way to get the day started off on the right foot. For those of you unfamiliar with the ACTS method, it's basing the time of prayer around four different types of prayer. Adoration, praising God for who he is. Confession, admitting our failures to God, Thanksgiving to thank God for what he is doing in our lives, and Supplication to ask God's help in our areas of concern. We're going into this camp knowing full well God is in control and that the primary goal of the camp is that God might be glorified in what we do there. We ask that you might be praying the same and thank God to have you praying with us in this exciting time.

After morning devotions we spent some time working on Manna house, the church of the Gilliland's where we have been staying. The building is huge and beautiful and has so much potential. There is a lot of work to be done in some areas of the building including painting, insulation, windows, and other improvements and we spent our time painting three rooms and helping organize the storage room. The pastor of the church will be moving into the building and so these rooms will be used as a kitchen and bedroom for the pastor's family. Three of the young church members were kind enough to help us with these tasks. This was followed by a chance to visit Klaipeda, a chance to get out and see the town including the town square where Hitler visited during the Nazi occupation. We took pictures and Garrett and Sophi, always serving as much needed tour guides, pointed out the statue in front of where Hitler stood. They pointed out the statue was a replica because when Hitler spoke he had ordered the statue pulled down because it did not him as he spoke. This and the coins for sale in the square of Stalin and Lenin were stark reminders of Lithuania's past. We returned to organize supplies for the camp and had the chance to join the church for a Small Group meeting at night. This was a great way to meet some of the people involved in the church as well as see the way the Small Groups operated here, being a new addition to the church in January. Our team was moved by the openness and humbleness in which the church members all reported to all the members on their group’s status and I couldn't help but wish I saw more of such boldness. To share about a small group struggling not only lets the rest of the church know what to pray for, it also requires that the members of that group be honest and holds them accountable. To groups with greater success, they can share this with the rest of the group and in turn encourage others and also be held accountable to continued success. This was followed by our group debrief and Bible study time which has often went until 12 or 12:30 or night. To give you an idea of the crazy time schedule we're working on, I'm writing this at 1:30 am and have been up since 6:45am. But I love every minute of it.

This morning Nick and I (David) went for a bike ride with Sophi and Sharuna (a student of LCC International University where Garrett teaches, living at the Manna house). It was a great chance to see around the area, get some exercise and enjoy each other's company. We got back in time for another morning time of worship with our small group, Sophi and Garrett, and some of the residents of the house including Bethany, a short term missionary from Pennsylvania who is working with us on the church camp. After this we took the drive to Siauliai to see the Hill of Crosses. It was a beautiful and sobering sight, thousands upon thousands of crosses covering the hill and the surrounding area. Crosses homemade, of polished wood, sticks, of all possible shapes and sizes made for a beautiful site. We took a moment to pray and we had a chance to plant a new cross in the ground with the message we are praying for Lithuania. I hope that you might do the same.

We also visited the site where Pope John Paul II visited Lithuania. A picture of his statue is shown below. This was the first visit by a Pope to Lithuania which made for quite a momentous occasion. He visited a church where a vision of Mary with child was seen, validating the truth of the vision and praying a public blessing on the country.

We met Emus, the coordinator of the Youth Camp we will be leaving to on Friday. He debriefed us on some of the specifics of the camp over a homemade Mexican dinner by Sophi. I'm excited to see what God will be doing there as all of the supplies and the different games we will be doing are sounding like a lot of fun. We did our usual nightly debrief down at the beach on the shore of the Baltic Sea in time to catch the sunset around 10 though the sun was still up nearly till 12.

It's just one of those interesting things to adapt to in the midst of this new environment. Please continue to keep our group in your thoughts and prayers and we thank you all so much for your support. God bless!

In His Grip,

Team Lithuania<><

What Happened to Sunday?

2010-06-21T13:59:00.000-07:00

Day one was actually day two and the team is (mostly) well rested from nearly twenty-four hours of travel. Flying through Sunday and arriving early, early Monday morning, we woke up to eggs, bacon, bread, jam (Best jam ever! -Kiwi) and new Lithuania friends. The rest of the morning and into the early afternoon we were able to sit down as a group and all get to know each other, hearing about what the country was like when occupied by Russia and being able to share about ourselves as well. Then onto the language lesson in Lithuanian, which as a blast with our wonderful teacher and her handy-dandy white board. As a group, patient Lithuanians included, we learned how to say *"labas", *"labas rytas", *"kaip tau sekasi", *"nezinau", *"viso gerro" (pronounced "he's so ghetto") and other essentials and we learned how to laugh through even the most embarassing cultural and language barriers.

Ready to face this task with our new vocabulary and friends, we were given a tour of the chruch, which includes a pool, a sauna (neither currently functional) and one of the homest and most welcoming chapels this side of the Prime Meridian. Being able to see the building and hear about all that it represents was really eye opening and inspired us to help Garrett and his church family (ultimately our brothers and sisters) in spreading God's love in the most blessed way that He would have it be.

With some time to spare (don't worry, we'll be plenty busy later on and have plenty of exciting things to share with you) Sophi, Garret and this girl with cool glasses took us to Old Town, a city that oozed with history and culture. There we shopped strolled, eat pizza with knives and forks and bonding as a group. Upon returning from our quick little adventure we were given the opportunity to meet with and spend time with members of the church. Being able to play basketball with those much taller than you, play volleyball with little boys who enjoy watching you have to chase after a run away ball and seeing the new found pleasure of s'mores on a persons face can really break the ice as well as barriers. It was an amazing feeling, to spend time with people that we had only just met but finding ourselves being like family at this get together (because, again, ultimately, we are all family, aren't we?). Even though we were on the other side of the world with people from a completely different culture some of us were able to sit down in a sand box with the kids and make dirt cakes, just as if we were sitting down at a family event in the states!

Eventually night time came (though darkness wasn't even thinking of coming until well into eleven o'clock!) our small group regathered to look over the day and come together under God's word and guidance. And now, bodies tired but hearts inspired (heh, rhyme) and the sun finally down, we head to bed, ready for the tasks that our Lord our set before us and excited for it!

Thank you for your prayers and don't worry we will be making calls tomorrow!

In His Grip,
Team Lithuania<><

Arrival

2010-06-20T17:10:00.000-07:00

What a day! Thank you for all of your prayers, we have arrived in Lithuania safely about an hour ago (3:30 pm LA time). We got to the airport without dilemma on our Lufthansa aircraft at about 9:30. (From left to right Nick, David, Mel, and Katie; not including Kiwi who left on an earlier flight. The Flight to Munich was very long but we found many ways to pass the time from prayer all the way to watching strange films in foreign languages. Flying East was quite strange because we got to watch the sunrise about three hours after we departed (so we fast-forwarded through a day). Our route tooks us up and over the very North Eastern corner of Canada with beautiful glaciers and rugged mountains. It became less than negative 60 degrees Centigrade. Flying into Germany a blanket of clouds covered what we could possibly see of the ground. However, there were occasional breaks in the clouds were we could see the beautiful landscape of the "father land". Germany is nothing like in thing the United States; everywhere there were little groups of about twenty farmhouses connected by both dirt and paved roads. The Villages were arranged in no particular order facing directions for seemingly no particular reason. Also in the U.S. our farmland is cordoned off into neat acres whereas here there are plots of land that are whatever sizes and shapes that benefit the farmers the best. All of these together made up an interesting patchwork of wonderful hues of green almost rivaling that of Ireland without a single dry spot; rivers leisurely cutting through the landscape. We met up with Kiwi at the airport in Munich and explored the airport practicing all the languages we had previously learned in school; from French to German. From there we took connecting flights into Lithuania's international airport (it is rather small). Garrett Gilliland and his son Boaz, and two of Boaz's friends drove us to the church in Klaipeda and showed us around. We have all just eaten dinner and are setting off for bed. Thank you for following this trip and all the support you have put towards it.

In His Grip,

Team Lithuania<><

Waiting at the airport

2010-06-19T20:44:00.000-07:00

Today has been a day of anticipation for team Lithuania. We have put the final touches on our packing and have just finished checking our baggage with only minor complications. One teamate has already left for Germany and we will meet her their. We are excited to be getting under way as we will be in Munich, Germany by tomorrow morning. Right now we ate waiting in line to board the plane. As we travel I hope we will remain in your thoughts and prayers, and I would like to thank all of those who have supported our trip both spiritually and financially. I hope you continue to follow us throughout our endeavor

Last minute prep

2010-06-18T16:52:00.000-07:00

Welcome to team Lithuania's blog. I want to take a second and thank you for keeping our team in mind as we prepare for our journey. Today we are doing last minute packing for all the items we will be taking with us to enhance the camps that we will be helping run. We are all very excited to go as the last minute nerves traverse through our minds. We are going to be leaving tomorrow from LAX and be flying into Munich, Germany where we will be taking connecting flights all the way into Lithuania. The team is still very calm despite the nerves as we purchase the few remaining items that will come with us. Our hopes are that you would keep is in your prayers that our team and supplies would arrive safely, together, and on time. Also that God will prepare our hearts and the hearts of those who will be crossing our path while in Lithuania and during the rest our travels.

In His grip,
Team Lithuania<><