Nathan Neighbors
Follower of Christ, Husband, Father, & Youth Pastor
Wow! What a trip so far. It is currently 3:45PM in Warsaw (9:45 AM Eastern). Our team has made is safely and we are currently on a bus to the seminary. When we arrive we are going to be getting settled in for the camp.
Thank you to all our prayer partners who are diligently praying for us. Each team members have already received 2 of the cards you sent them. We are going to have a cookout tonight and some of the Polish Baptist Team Members will be joining us. We are looking forward to getting to meet them. After the cookout we will be crashing early to get some much needed rest, seeing that we have been up for close to 20 hours.
Thank you to all who are praying for us. Please continue and ask the Lord to multipy our sleep tonight, so that we can wake up refreshed tomorrow morning! We will try to blog again really soon!!
Well, it’s finally here. For a year now we have been praying a planning for this moment. Today our mission team leaves for Poland. About a year ago I was planning a trip with seven other church members to go to Poland and lead a marriage conference. In addition, we were looking at the possibility of taking a student team in the summer of 2008. Many things have happened sense then to lead us to this day. But, it’s here now. Our team of thirty people leave from Charlotte, NC on Lufthansa Airlines at 5:20pm today to arrive in Warsaw, Poland tomorrow morning. We will spend the next few days settling in to the campus and community where we will be working. On Sunday night we will start leading a summer camp for Polish teenagers. We don’t know how many will be there (maybe 40-75 students + adult leaders), but we know that it’s going to be an amazing experience. I cannot thank Morningside Church enough for their vision for missions, for their vision for sending young people to be on mission, and for making it financially possible for any student to go. God’s at work around us here in Spartanburg and he’s at work in Poland. Years ago God made it clear to Morningside that we should partner with the churches of Poland and today is another step in that process of Kingdom work between our two church bodies. May God bless us as we travel – keeping us safe from harm – and make us bold in our witness as we go. I will try to update this blog daily if access to the internet is available. See you when we return!
After talking with the students this week at Centrifuge, it seems that an important part of our summer was left out. For the last two summers I used an African cross necklace as a symbol of group unity and encouragement. The Tuareg cross is a special cross given to me by my sister after her mission trip to Mali West Africa in the early 90’s (click here to see related blog). For the past two summers our youth at Morningside Baptist Church have passed it from one person to the next – each time giving it to someone who has been seen that week or day reflecting Christ. Originally, I decided not to pass it this summer because I thought that it might get over used and lose it’s effectiveness. I was wrong. It was the hot conversation this week at camp at church group time. They all wanted to know where it was this summer. It has become more to them that I ever imagined when I initially passed it to Nic Moore in May of 2006. So, tonight we started passing the cross around again. I gave it to Ashley Tate for her Christ-like heart and her willingness to go as a chaperon this past week to camp. My prayer is that through passing this cross necklace, the students will be more drawn to the Savior who gave His life on it over 2000 years ago.
Nathan Neighbors 