After being home for four months, I have once again discovered that the restaurant business just isn't my calling. It's a comfort zone / safe haven / trip money maker, but it never takes long before the call of the mission field is deafening. I am planning on going to The International School of Kiswahili and Foreign Languages located on the island of Zanzibar off the coast of Tanzania, Africa. This trip is a pretty big stepping stone for me and the future of Island Ministries. I could continue taking youth overseas, but I'd be limited to a ministry that always involves interpreters. I can't wait to show up to various missions orgs. like Book of Hope and the new ministry my missionary friends Ron and Carl McDonald have started, and let them know I'm fluent in Swahili. By the way, If it were'nt for Ron and Carol, I would have never travelled to Africa in the first place.

I'm ready for the next level in missions. First, I went as part of a youth group beginning in the summer of '95 when I was fifteen. I went on at least one trip each summer until I graduated high school. Next, I visited Singapore and Malaysia while involved with Master's Commission (a nine month discipleship program for primarily college-aged students). We were blessed on that trip to be able to lead the first Christian youth group from Singapore across the border into the mountains of Malaysia. Then, I began travelling on my own or joining up with teams on the way, helping in any way I could to carry the Gospel message to people on foreign soil (I add the word foreign with a bit of feeling, because Americans will always question me, saying things like, "Why don't you do your missions here in the States; there are plenty who need it here"- and while I know that's true, my 'Calling' is on the 'foreign' mission field. I'm usually not very effective on my home turf, just as Jesus wasn't exactly taken seriously on his- Luke 4:24). Next, I planned and led a youth group to Romania. That has been my most fulfilling venture yet- seeing the teenaged, culture-shocked faces is simply priceless! Now I want what inevitably comes next- a complete culture immersion. I want the 'term' after 'Short-term missions'. Bill Riley, a late, great missionary from North Carolina, once had a quote about the spirital happenings that always seem to occur on the mission field when you're there "More than two weeks".