BLESSED ARE THE FLEXIBLE
How God uses teamwork to build
summer camp cabins
By Burl Brown
A team from First Baptist Church of Canton, Texas made its first trip to Latvia with Bridge Builders International in 2002. We met Pastor Petr Samoylich and the congregation of Grace Community Church in Riga and together, we agreed to begin a sister church partnership. Our team was impressed with the vision of Pastor Petr and his church to introduce Christ to the underprivileged. Pastor Petr and our pastor at the time, Tim Watson, were very much alike.
As soon as we returned home, we began planning our trip for May 2003. This time we would go to build cabins at a camp facility owned by the Latvian Christian Mission, a ministry with a close association with Petr's church. A second group would go to work with children and orphans in a summer camp.
When the time came, I went to Latvia a week early to help with items we needed to purchase. However, Petr had already been able to get most of the materials. We did purchase a generator, lawn mower and a couple of bow and arrows sets for the camp. The generator came in handy right away. The first day of the building project, the electricity went out for about three hours. Two days later, it was out for about half a day.
There were other challenges as well. We had plans from Pastor Petr that showed a 16' x 20' cabin, so we had all the wood planned, sized, cut for rafters, etc. Well, guess what? The cabin foundations were a different size, so our plans went out the window. We had to work with what we had. The key - BE FLEXIBLE.
The first day we were able to get one cabin's walls up, ceiling joists on and another cabin's walls built. By the end of the second day we had three buildings framed up, one with a roof, one with trusses, and the other with walls.
Harry, a missionary from England, and Nick a missionary from Lewisville, Texas worked with us. At the beginning it was difficult because of our diverse backgrounds and totally different ideas of how to reach the same end. But as time went on, everyone began to find a groove to work in. I think God graced all of us with a lot of tolerance those first few days. We learned more about each other, and in the end we were all thankful to have such brothers in Christ.
On the third day, it started raining, and we didn't make as much progress as we had hoped. But on the fourth day we made great progress. We knocked off early and Pastor Petr took us to have a shish kabob dinner. Then we went back to the dorms and had one hour for six of us to shower and shave in time to go to church. The service was at Grace Community Church's mission center, and our team shared short testimonies through an interpreter.
Friday, the fifth day, we finished drying in all five cabins and put the front window units in all five also. God gave us enough strength.
On Sunday we went to church and then back to the camp for the baptism of five new brothers and sisters in Christ. The Lord's Supper was served following the baptism.
On Monday, we went sight-seeing, including the magnificent Rundales castle near the Lithuanian border, which was built beginning in 1735.
Tuesday and Wednesday we went back to work on the cabins. God was really blessing the project.
Thursday, we went to a men's breakfast. This was a group of English speaking Christian men who meet every Thursday at 7:00 am. They shared concerns and blessings. It was a special time. We met some wonderful brothers and heard some powerful prayers. We really needed this time.
Friday, one of the men had a tooth ache so we took him to the dentist, who gave him some pain pills. At the camp, we worked on the front and back ridge soffits.
Saturday was another day to sight-see. We visited the Saslika Jewish Memorial and other awesome sites. We also went to "Old Town" for gifts for family and friends who supported the mission trip.
Sunday we went to church and then enjoyed dinner at Pastor Petr's home, and on Monday, we returned home tired and worn out, but grateful that we had the opportunity to go. It occurred to us that there had been people from six countries working on the project - Latvia (Petr & Adam), America (Nick and us), England (Harry), Germany (George), Russia (Andre) and Ukraine (Viktor). We felt that God had really blessed the project, and the fellowship was great.
July 2003
Editor's note: On August 5, 2003, Burl wrote BBI and said, "The cabins in the camp are now being used for the English speaking camp this week. They were also used by the youth group the night we left for our return trip to Texas. Isn't it great when you can see how Christ has used you!!
|
