Shelbyville Times-Gazette: News : Foreign missions

Foreign missions

T-G City Editor John I. Carney travelled to Kenya in 2004, 2005 and 2006 on short-term mission trips with a group from LEAMIS International Ministries.

City residents to vote by wards this year (10/07/08)
To avoid confusion at the polls, city and county officials want to remind Shelbyville voters about an important change in the City Council election next month. Only city residents in Wards 1, 3 and 5 will be voting for council positions on Tuesday, Nov. 4...

Fountains of hope well up in Kenya (07/31/08)
After returning from his first African mission trip last year, Lee Adcock felt compelled to do more to provide the people of Homa Bay with clean water ... so he shipped a compressor and jackhammer to his friends in Kenya. "I went to Kenya last August for my first time and couldn't believe they were digging wells by hand," said Adcock, owner of Lee Adcock Construction in Shelbyville...

Soap plans washed out, but mission still a success (07/24/08)
SAN ISIDRO, Heredia, Costa Rica -- When Carolyn Schussler first taught me to make soap, in preparation for my 2005 mission trip to Kenya, pure lye was widely available in U.S. grocery stores under the "Red Devil" brand, located on the aisle with the drain cleaners...

Crocodiles join the crowd for fun in sun (07/23/08)
LA FORTUNA, Costa Rica -- One day of our work week in Heredia province, the pastors with whom we were working -- Marlon and his father-in-law Eduardo -- decided to give us the day off and drive us to the Pacific coast, three hours away, for fun at the beach...

Costa Rica menus eye-opening, mouth-watering (07/22/08)
SAN JOSECITO, Costa Rica -- Each member of our LEAMIS International Ministries team to Costa Rica stayed with a different family. Frank Schroer, our team leader, lived with welder Gerardo and his wife, Abigail, in San Isidro. Both Abigail and Gerardo are extroverts. ...

'Oogley' helps explain leadership training (07/21/08)
SAN ISIDRO, Heredia, Costa Rica -- Gail Drake and Debra Snellen, the founders of LEAMIS International Ministries, developed a leadership training curriculum designed for pastors from Third World countries. Many such pastors, especially those at remote, rural churches, have had very little training and have responded enthusiastically to the leadership principles contained in the LEAMIS training. ...

'Pure life' abounds in Costa Rica (07/20/08)
SAN JOSECITO, Costa Rica -- According to the Lonely Planet phrasebook Costa Rican Spanish, the phrase ·ura vida! "embodies Costa Rican life. Meaning literally 'pure life,' it is really a more profound concept encompassing well being, positivity and harmony. It can variously be translated as 'great,' 'cool,' 'right on,' etc."...

Kenya water project is community effort (07/06/08)
What started out as a mission trip by a couple of men from Fair Haven Baptist Church has turned into a Bedford County community effort to provide the people of Nairobi and Homa Bay, Kenya, with clean water. "We have bottled water and throw half of it away, and they drink out of a dirty pond," said Charles Williams, the pastor at Fair Haven Baptist. "We are so blessed here and we don't recognize it."...

Life Path class challenges 20-somethings' faith (05/24/08)
"Twenty-somethings are searching for truth," said the Rev. Trevin Wax, associate pastor at First Baptist Church. "They want to know why Christianity is true, why it matters, and whether it's really good." Wax believes that church should be a place where people can ask questions. Since he started his twenty-somethings Life Path Class in February 2007 he's tried to answer life questions for the folks to which he ministers...

Korean GSE team arrives in Shelbyville (04/10/08)
Five young professional men and women from South Korea arrived in Shelbyville Tuesday afternoon for a group study cultural exchange program sponsored by The Rotary Foundation. The group is in Tennessee touring Rotary District 6780, which includes Shelbyville and parts of Middle and East Tennessee, to share their Korean culture with Tennesseans...

Shelbyville-based Desana aids children worldwide (01/10/08)
Kathy Houk of Shelbyville spent a lot of time watching the Travel Channel when she had cancer; she was undergoing chemotherapy and was too sick to do much of anything else. While it was a difficult time in her life, she felt the need to travel as a result of watching the network's various shows and booked a trip to Peru that would ultimately change her life forever...

My heart is in troubled Kenya (01/09/08)
Several people have asked me about the recent turmoil in Kenya, and it indeed is in some of the very areas where I worked on short-term mission trips in 2004, 2005 and 2006. There has been violence in the Kibera slums outside Nairobi, which is where I was in 2004, and in the western part of Kenya, which is where I was the other two years. ...

Corker returns to Haiti (10/30/07)
U.S. Sen. Bob Corker credits a church mission trip to Haiti a quarter of a century ago with leading him towards public service, and so he says his return trip there last week was not only informative but meaningful. Corker, a Republican and former mayor of Chattanooga, was involved in the real estate and construction businesses before entering politics. ...

Bedford volunteers prepare for Nepal mission (10/03/07)
A group of 11 volunteers from Bedford County met Sunday night at House of Prayer Ministries to discuss the final details of their upcoming mission trip to Nepal. Two Shelbyville-based pastors, the Rev. Bryan Nerren of House of Prayer and the Rev. Drew Hayes of The People's Church, will leave for Nepal Monday; they will be followed by nine Bedford County women on Oct. ...

Group returns from Kenya mission trip (09/25/07)
A mission team from Fair Haven Baptist Church returned Aug. 29 from a fact-finding mission trip to Kenya, where the church has been involved for some time in building wells for the people of the Homa Bay area. Lee Adcock, Jennifer Blackburn, Molly Adcock, Mike Smith and Wilbert Nelson made up the team. ...

Cristo de la Concordia: Escape from Santa Cruz (07/21/07)
SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia -- On Monday, July 9, Debra Snellen and I were scheduled to fly from Cochabamba to Santa Cruz. We were done with our work in Cochabamba and would spend a few days in Santa Cruz relaxing and debriefing the experience, and investigating whether Santa Cruz would be a pleasant place to bring future teams for debrief...

Cristo de la Concordia: A tale of two birthday parties (07/20/07)
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia -- My work week in Cochabamba was bookended by two birthday parties, each of them held on a Sunday. I attended the first party purely by accident. On our first Sunday in Cochabamba, Rudolf Band had taken Debra Snellen and me up to the Inca-Rakay ruins, high on a mountain top southwest of the city. ...

Cristo de la Concordia: Salt of the earth, water in the tank (07/19/07)
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia -- New Life International, a non-profit Christian group based in Indiana, produces a briefcase-sized device called a McGuire Water Purifier. It's a U-shaped plastic tube. In one leg of the "U," you pour salt water, and seal the top of the tube with a plug. ...

Cristo de la Concordia: The buddy system (07/18/07)
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia -- It was Gail Drake who invited me on my first LEAMIS International Ministries mission trip, a January 2003 trip to Nicaragua. I'd already known Gail for nearly a decade thanks to her work for Mountain T.O.P. (Tennessee Outreach Project), a domestic missions program which was founded by her father and which I serve as a board member....

Cristo de la Concordia: Our wired correspondent (07/17/07)
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia -- LEAMIS International Ministries likes to work closely with its hosts when planning which cottage industry or other educational workshops to include during a short-term missions trip. LEAMIS wants its program to be driven by local needs, rather than by the incoming team and its concerns....

Cristo de la Concordia: The air has abandoned me (07/16/07)
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia -- Upon this rock, the hill of Saint Peter -- Cerro de San Pedro, a ridge just east of the city -- Cristo de la Concordia keeps watch with an earnest expression over 800,000 residents of Cochabamba and 200,000 more in two adjoining cities. The view of the city from the base of the 112-foot-tall statue is simply breathtaking. But so is the altitude....

Sullivan's travels ... and mine (09/06/06)
A few random notes from here and there: Thanks to all of you for your kind words about my Kenya series last week. Every year, I worry that I'm being self-indulgent by blathering on about my trip in the newspaper, but every year I get a wonderful response...

Mwalimu Hotel: Lost and Found (09/01/06)
KEUMBU, Kenya -- "This is John," said Abel Onchari, introducing me to his congregation at New Life Restoration Centre. "He was lost in America, but now he's found." Abel almost certainly had me confused with Bob Willems. Bob, Jan Schilling and Sandy Hayostek had not been lost, but they had missed their connecting flight in Detroit and had to spend the night in Amsterdam before making the final leg of their flight to Kenya...

Mwalimu Hotel: Dancing with Granny (08/31/06)
KEUMBU, Kenya -- Claims of human longevity are sometimes difficult to verify, especially in less-developed cultures where government and medical record-keeping may not be up to par. Even so, the woman jumping up and down and singing a little song of thanksgiving as she shook my hand looked every day of the 100 years old claimed by her relatives...

Mwalimu Hotel: In it for the long bar (08/30/06)
KEUMBU, Kenya -- Take a small amount of sodium hydroxide, also called lye in the U.S. or caustic soda in the U.K., and dissolve it in water. Be careful; it's highly corrosive. Melt some basic, inexpensive fat -- let's say, beef tallow or lard -- and then take it off the heat. Carefully stir the lye solution into the melted fat...

Mwalimu Hotel: Raising cain and following Abel (08/29/06)
KEUMBU, Kenya -- I first met Abel Onchari a year ago. Even though our 2005 LEAMIS International Ministries team worked in Ndonyo, the leaders of that trip -- LEAMIS co-founders Rev. Debra Snellen and Gail Drake -- had been in Keumbu for a few days before we arrived conducting a pastoral training seminar. ...

Mwalimu Hotel: Widowmaker (08/28/06)
KISII TOWN, Kenya -- I had just finished making some signs to hang around the necks of the players in a children's ministry skit: "Jesus," "Friend No. 1," "Crippled Man," and so on. I went downstairs and left the signs in Room #5, where we held our team meetings each morning...

Back to Africa, thanks to anonymous (04/12/06)
I have had numerous readers and friends in the community ask me about my next foreign mission trip. As regular readers know, I went to Nicaragua in 2003 and to Kenya in 2004 and 2005. Since I returned from Kenya last August, my stock answer has been that, although I want very much to go back to Africa, it was a little harder to raise funds in 2005 and I felt like I needed to give my friends and supporters a year off...

Kenyan pastor tells of Africa's potential (12/16/05)
Dennis Odhiambo, founder and pastor of Great Commission Fellowship and Great Commission Academy in Nairobi, Kenya, told members of Shelbyville Breakfast Rotary Club on Wednesday that if problems such as clean water and the prevalence of AIDS can be addressed, Africa has the potential to develop its economy...

A house withstands Katrina (09/07/05)
A few notes from here and there: --- If you recall the columns I wrote prior to my mission trip, you know that I spent a weekend in June practicing soap-making with my mission trip colleague Carolyn Schussler and her husband Dave at their brand new home near the bridge in Bay St. Louis, Miss. They had just moved into the house a few weeks earlier; they didn't even have all the curtains in place...

Next Door to the Orphans: A place at the table (08/26/05)
NDONYO, Kenya -- Guy McDonald had a plan. On the theory that it is easier to obtain forgiveness than consent, he told no one about his plan -- not even me, his roommate on the LEAMIS International Ministries mission trip to Kenya....

Next Door to the Orphans: What to do with your extra wife (08/25/05)
NDONYO, Kenya -- Because of some health questions which the female residents of Ndonyo had raised during the nutrition workshop, the leaders of our LEAMIS International Ministries mission trip and the leaders of New Life Church decided that it would be a good idea to conduct separate men's and women's meetings one afternoon....

Next Door to the Orphans: The hitchhiker's guide to Kenya (08/24/05)
KISII, Kenya -- Seven of us, all volunteers, had just ridden a cross-country bus eight hours from Nairobi to Kisii Town. Our team leaders, LEAMIS International Ministries founders the Rev. Debra Snellen and Gail Drake, were already in Kisii; they had been in the region for a week, leading a pastoral training program in Kegogi and making preparations for arrival....

Next Door to the Orphans: Once bitten, twice ill (08/23/05)
NDONYO, Kenya -- I awakened Wednesday morning, Aug. 10, with no particular complaints. I showered and I moved my suitcase of soapmaking supplies to its appointed location, a rough, unfinished brick building at one end of the compound. Soon after that, however, I began to feel ill -- achy, with hot breath on the back of my throat and finally with chills. ...

Next Door to the Orphans: A Tale of Two Pastors (08/22/05)
First in a series NDONYO, Kenya -- As we crested the hill in our two weather-beaten matatus (public transit vans), we could see in the distance a crowd of people jumping up and down excitedly, as if something remarkable and exciting were taking place...

Countdown to Mission: Ready for airline trials (07/30/05)
Just a few more days .... The leaders of our LEAMIS International Ministries mission team left for Kenya on Monday, to do advance work and to conduct a leadership training workshop for some pastors in the Nairobi area. Once the rest of us arrive, LEAMIS founders Gail Drake and the Rev. ...

Countdown to Mission: Someone else's sermon (07/23/05)
Just over a week to go .... I am a certified United Methodist layspeaker, and I fill the pulpit on occasion at my father's church or anywhere else that asks me. But twice during my Kenya trip, I will do something I've never done before: preach a sermon someone else has written...

Countdown to Mission: The Friendly Skies (07/18/05)
Just over two weeks to go .... I've got a million little things to worry about between now and the morning of Aug. 3. We will be flying out of Atlanta. My parents are driving myself and two of my teammates down to Atlanta. From there we fly to Detroit, then Amsterdam, then Nairobi. ...

Countdown to Mission: Defending short-term trips (07/09/05)
Just over three weeks to go .... The web site for the magazine Christianity Today published a story recently about a study of short-term mission trip participants. That study is somewhat critical of short-term mission trips, calling them poor stewardship. ...

Countdown to Mission: Over the top (07/01/05)
Just over four weeks to go .... Last Sunday was a red-letter day for my trip preparations. That afternoon, my parents dropped by a check from a family friend, the Rev. Dr. Beryl West, which put me over the top in my fund-raising. I have now submitted everything I owe to LEAMIS International Ministries to cover my trip and air fare -- more than $3,500...

Countdown to Mission: Good clean fun in Mississippi (06/24/05)
Just over five weeks to go .... It took me nine hours to drive from Shelbyville to Bay St. Louis, Miss., on Friday; it only took me 8 1/2 hours to drive back, and that was even with stopping at what I now believe to be the Slowest Waffle House in North America, somewhere in Alabama...

Countdown to Mission: Have you left yet? (06/19/05)
Just over six weeks to go .... Because my upcoming mission trip has been mentioned several times in the newspaper lately, I've been getting a lot of questions about it. Of course, people can't be expected to keep up with my schedule, so the first question is usually "When do you go on your trip?" or "Have you been on your trip yet?" or even "How was your trip?"...

Back to Kenya, with a difference (05/15/05)
The past two years, I've gone on foreign mission trips with Sewanee-based LEAMIS International Ministries and then written multi-part series about them in the Times-Gazette. Every year I worry that I'm being self-indulgent by taking the space, and yet you the readers have been incredibly kind, commenting on the stories for months afterward -- and, after that, asking me if I have any trips coming up...

Part 5: Behold the Carnivore (09/10/04)
NAIROBI, Kenya -- It was Tuesday evening of our LEAMIS International Ministries work week in the Kibera slums. The normal evening services at New Life Restoration Centre had been called off so that the visiting Americans could enjoy a special treat -- a trip to the Masai market in Nairobi to buy souvenirs, followed by a special meal at the Carnivore Restaurant...

Part 4: Bwana asifiwe! ("Praise the Lord!") (09/09/04)
KIBERA, Kenya -- Each morning and evening during the working portion of our trip, the worship services at New Life Restoration Centre began with raucous praise. It was, basically, the only part of the service for which our LEAMIS International Ministries team wasn't responsible...

Part 3: The King of Copper Foiling (09/08/04)
KIBERA, Kenya -- You've heard of the blind leading the blind? Now get ready for the one about the blind leading the deaf. It was in February, I think, that I got a call from LEAMIS International Ministries telling me that during my August mission trip to Kenya, I would be leading the copper foiling workshop...

Part 2: The outhouse of friendship (09/07/04)
KIBERA, Kenya -- The outhouse at New Life Restoration Centre could have been called a "two-seater," except for one thing. Seats. The outhouse, with its two separate stalls, had only holes on the concrete floor, meant for the user to squat over. When LEAMIS International Ministries founders Gail Drake and the Rev. ...

Part 1: The view from the bluff (09/05/04)
Part 1 of a five-part series about City Editor John I. Carney's mission trip to Nairobi, Kenya.

UNO and pepper jelly (01/31/03)
EL TRIUNFO, Nicaragua -- I'm not fluent in Spanish, despite two years in high school and a low-level conversational class last fall at Motlow College. When native speakers go at their normal pace, my eyes glaze over and I can't understand anything. Even so, my mission trip roommate Frank Schroer claimed that I knew more words and phrases than he...

My new heroes (01/30/03)
EL TRIUNFO, Nicaragua -- When I was 12 years old or so, my family went to Disney World. I complained when we had to leave a 365-degree multimedia show before it started. I complained when I wasn't allowed to spend my own money on a soft drink. I complained when the family decided to leave the park early because it was hot and crowded and everyone but me was tired of it...

Building faith, and a church (01/29/03)
EL TRIUNFO, Nicaragua -- The New Jerusalem Baptist Church is painted orange. I'm not sure why, but it stands out as you approach El Triunfo, a wide spot in the road about 15 miles or so from Nueva Guinea. Luis Gutierrez is the pastor of the church. A short, wavy-haired man, he is, as best I can tell, passionate about his church and his people. ...

Culture shock (01/28/03)
MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- Nicaragua is the poorest country in Central America, and the second poorest (behind Haiti) in all of Latin America. The LEAMIS / Christ For The City mission team of which I was a part would spend most of its time and effort in a remote, very rural part of Nicaragua, but our first exposure to the country was its capital, Managua, into which we flew on the evening of Jan. 9....

Nicaragua mission brings blessings (01/27/03)
EL TRIUNFO, Nicaragua -- By all rights, I should have been hysterical. It was the afternoon of January 12, and I had just gotten my first look at my living arrangements for the next week. Frank Schroer and I would be sharing a 10-by-10 room in one end of what would, in Bedford County, be called a livestock shed...