Today’s post will be fairly short…because we spent all day playing at the beach! It was a great day. We got up early and hopped on a bus with the rest of the camp to drive to a beach that’s about 40 minutes away. It was pretty crazy to take 50-60 people to the beach, but we had a great time. It was just another way that we could love on the Albanian people.

It was so cool to see the different people from our team loving on the people from Albania. One person in particular that I want to pat on the back is Taylor Grant. He found this little Albanian boy, and he has just been the love of Christ to him. You can so tell that the boy feels so loved by Taylor, its amazing.

Then tonight our team had the highly anticipated “handshake-off.” I guess I should explain a little bit of what that means…basically here is how things happened. Taylor and Jabril like to think that they have the most amazing handshake since…well forever. So, after much trash-talking (by them), we decided that our group would have a handshake-off to see which 2 people could actually come up with the best handshake.  Wow, it was hilarious. The winners were….Paige and Tesney! I will try my hardest to post the video of their “handshake routine” sometime tomorrow. All you need to know is that it was amazing. The prize for the winner’s was Gelato, so we went and enjoyed some deliciousness.

Please pray for tomorrow. It is the Thursday of camp, and that is usually a day that is pretty tiring. Pray for good rest tonight, and a good day tomorrow. Thanks!

-Geoffrey

Hola!! Jabril Jackson here.Woahh.. Albania has been amazing to say the least. When we first got here it was kinda weird with all the awkward stares we got…well just mainly I got haha. I was asked several times by random people to take pictures with them and their kids,that showed me just how friendly and laid back they are here.

We settled in and in the next couple of days camp began, which was kinda crazy at first! Our whole team handled everything pretty well, which made things run smoother. 

Today has been a very long and tiring day! We woke up early this morning, ate and headed straight to the beach. I was able to spend a enjoyable day with my fellow team and campers. They have shown us so much love since we’ve been here. They are just so easy to love on and that is one of the best ways we have gotten to communicate God’s love. After we got back we had dinner and the long awaited handshake competition( Me and Taylor lost..horribly) but it was still fun!!Then we went for a walk in the park and got Gelato for Kaci’s birthday!

Well I’m off to bed now,nighty night. See you next week!!

Love you all

- Jabril Jackson

Albania Day #6 (and some other various pictures) 

Hello from Tirana again! The title of this post says it all…it is HOT! It was in the high 90’s today, with probably 80-90% humidity. Lets just say this, it felt like a really hot day in Houston. Needless to say, camp was a huge success!

Today we had sports (outside..whew), and in sports we did kickball, wiffleball, and soccer in the morning.  In the evening we played  wiffleball, ultimate Frisbee, and soccer. It is so fun to see our students ministering to these young people on their level. Our students are gutting out the heat, and putting a smile on their face all the time.

Some other activities that we had today are photography, music, dance, and arts and crafts. In arts and crafts we made sharpie tshirts. It was awesome. There will be some pictures on the slideshow of the shirts.

But, probably the coolest thing we did today is we got to do our camp with the gypsies. What an experience for our students. The gypsie community is so incredibly poor, and it is amazing how our students shared the love of Christ with them. There are tons of pictures in the slideshow of our time with the gypsies.

Lastly, tonight we had our “Texas Night.” We taught them the Two-step, Cotton-eyed Joe, Electric Slide, amazing terms like “ya’ll” and  “fixin to”. It was probably the most fun that we have had with the Albanian team.

Please continue to be in prayer for rest for our team. Last night was a really late night, and today was an early morning. Also, pray for tomorrow, because we are taking our entire camp to the beach! That is a little bit of a daunting task. So, pray for safety, and FUN. 

Thanks for continuing to pray for our team, and for checking out the blog. Have a blessed day.

-Geoffrey

Hello from Albania! Today was our second day of camp and it was just as amazing as the first and even more! We had a Texas themed night and it was definitely the most fun I have had on this whole trip. We taught them different dances and games like mad cow and the cotton eyed joe. When I saw their faces light up when they saw these I could see that God was already working in little things such as laughter. I m so thankful that Gad has allowed the team and myself to come here and touch the lives of the Albanian people! We are developing more and more relationships each day and I can just see how much the kids are enjoying us being here. Last night God showed himself to us in a whole new way and so many of the youth were touched by what he did and will be doing! I cant thank you enough for all the prayers that you are sending our way! I am so excited to see what God has in store for us and also the nation of Albania throughout the rest of this week!

Love and miss you all,

Rachel Stovall

What’s up USA!!! Hmm… where do I start!? Well first off I just wanted to personally thank everyone for your prayers! The difference that it has made here amongst us is incredible and though you may not know or feel it, you are as much apart of this mission as we are! The things God is doing here are just indescribable. The best way to put it is like this, God has released a radical fire here amongst everyone in this city and He is burning down all the old ways of thinking, making way for fertile soil for His word to take root. I feel we are in this very process right now. As we go throughout our days ministering at this camp, God is just drawing all of these amazing kids to us. These youth are truly the new face of Albania’s government, economy, etc. The fire He is setting in us and the youth is so powerful. Personally, I can say God is showing His powerful, crazy, magnificent love every second of the day. He is showing each of us so many different levels of His love that none of us have experienced! Haha but now back to our little analogy, God has definitely revealed that the roots He is creating in these people will grow into a beautiful display of His crazy Love. He is fulfilling His word by fulfilling all the promises He has made. I could definitely go on and make a book of all the things He has done here, but I’ll leave with one last thing. Thank you all for your support, encouragement, dedication, and prayer for us. The battle is won because our God died on the cross displaying His consuming love!! I believe, however, that He is about to even blow everything He has already done out of the water with, again, a whole entire new level of His love! Love you Mom, Dad, and Jillian!!!

Yours in Christ,

Joshua D.

Hey from Albania! This is Kimber Beam.  I wanted to take a second and tell you a little bit of what we have been doing and what God has done and how He has showed up.  Today was the second day of our camp with the local kids and I was assigned to the gypsy camp that was taking place in a park in the town.  I wasn’t very sure of what to expect or how any of the children were with their walk with God and if they even knew of him.  We sat at the sports school where the camp was taking place and anxiously awaited the bus of about 20-25 mothers and children to arrive.  Once they got there we went off on our 15-20 minute hike to the park and took the opportunity to become familiar with the kids and the mothers.  Once we had arrived we started a small reading of a bible story in a childrens book (with help from a interpreter of course).  After the bible story we discovers that the majority of the gypsys had at least heard of God which was very encouraging.  We played with the kids and was very blessed just to hang out with them and love on them.  As Taylor mentioned many of us had an incredible encounter with God last night.  I felt extremely overwhelmed by His unfailing love.  I have never felt the presence of God like that before.  I am extremely excited to see what God does in this city and these extremely extremely sweet hearted people of Albania! Thank you for all the prayers and we will see you soon!

-Kimber

Hello from Tirana!  This is Taylor Grant speaking.  Today is the second day of camp and we had an awesome morning!  The sports played whiffleball, kickball, and futbol(also known as soccer).  The dance class was a big hit also as well as story time with the gypsy’s.  I went with a group of people to pray over specific things in the city.  God laid on our heart the color yellow, a university here, and the leaders of this city.  We prayed that the students would grow up and be a major influence not only in the city but in God’s kingdom as well.  But most of all I want to talk about what God did last night.  After we went out for a second dinner we came back and thanked Him for a safe and awesome day.  After that was all said and done however, a group of us prayed over Brianna West to heal the pain in her back.  But God did sooo much more!  After about 30 minutes of praying over her,  most of the kids had went inside but eventually came back out in awe of what was happening.  They saw what God was doing in Bri and they wanted some of him also!  There were 3 more kids that experienced what Bri what feeling last night.  But we all felt his presence here together.  God is doing some amazing things here and changing all of us as we speak! Get ready Abilene we are coming back as WARRIORS OF CHRIST!!!!!!!!

-Taylor 

Albania Day #5

Today was the first day of Camp! Wow, what a day. To be honest, camp is a little different than we had thought it was going to be, but the Lord is still moving! We began our morning bright and early for some time with the Lord, then we headed over to the sports complex that we are having camp at. 

I would estimate that we had between 30-40 students at camp today. This is the very first time that it has been done, so that is a pretty good amount of students. However, there were a few things that we needed to change last minute. Our team was great at adapting. They jumped right in and did whatever was needed. 

I saw so many of our students bonding with the Albanian teenagers. Whether it was over soccer (futbol), crafts, guitar, or dance, our students were building some relationships and sharing the love of Jesus to the Albanians.

We had a group of students and leaders that got the opportunity to go buy some food and candy to take to the gypsie community. I will get someone that went on that excursion to blog about it, but I can tell you this, Christ’s love was shared to that community. It is so important for the gypsies to feel loved, because here in Tirana they are outcasts. The people here have shunned them, and they live in slums with trash surrounding their lean-tos. So, we took this morning as an opportunity to practically show them love, by giving them what they needed, and some candy.

Because this country has been so un-religious, and actually pretty opposed to anything religious, the only way to share Christ with them is to show them the unconditional love that Christ showed us. They don’t fully understand their need for Christ yet, but they do understand when people love on them for no reason at all. It is incredible the power that love has on people. Love breaks down walls. We know that our job here in Albania is to be Christ’s love to them, and in that, they will see his face.

This afternoon we had a “siesta.” Some students stayed at the hotel and rested. Others, went walking around Tirana and shopped. We also got the chance to eat Gelato again. Let me just say, Gelato is amazing.

Tonight we had an “Albanian barbeque”, and the church we are partnering with brought in a Christian rapper. We played games, listened to rap, and ate some barbeque, and the entire time, our team was loving on the Albanians. Today was a great day.

Lastly, We had a prayer time over our students tonight when we got back to the hotel. Wow…Wow…Wow…Wow…There are no other words to say. The Holy Spirit moved in our youth in a way that I have never seen him move in them before. It was so incredibly powerful. Please pray for the Albanians that watched us minister to our students. It seems as if the Lord is opening doors with them. That would be incredible.  

Continue to pray for our team. We have hit the part of the trip that people get tired and sometimes that brings on frustration. Pray for unity amongst our team. Also, pray for our hearts to continue to be in tune with the heart of Jesus. We want to do what he wants us to do this week, and for us to know what that is, we have to be focused on His heart.

Thank you for your prayers, and for reading our blog! We are trying to have every student blog at least twice. So, if you haven’t seen your son/daughter/friend post yet…they will! I promise.

-Geoffrey