Poland, Czech and Auschwitz

“In four years the subsidy we receive from Campus Crusade will have been phased out and we will be responsible for 100% of our own funding. This is putting much fear into us; we must act now so we don’t lose our staff.”



Here I am with our ministry's Polish director Mariusz who oversees 100 Polish staff sharing Christ in a country about the size of Texas. Those are 3 of Mariusz's kids, all of whom are growing up speaking both English and Polish.

Above the photo are the words said to me by Mariusz Kwapisz, the new country director of Poland. Unfortunately it is a scenario repeated many times in our ministries throughout Eastern Europe. EB and I spent a week with our Polish staff at their annual conference and I met with Mariusz and other Polish leadership to put together a plan to help our staff there. It was good to be with our Polish staff and get to know them and worship together.

Auschwitz: EB and I spent a day at this tragic place, not far from the location of the Campus Crusade Polish staff conference. To see one location where over a million were murdered was overwhelming. Emotionally I was doing okay until I saw the displays with the personal items of those murdered. Seeing the actual clothing taken from children before they were executed made me both curse the Nazis and cry.

I was also particularly moved when I visited the cell where Father Maximilian Kolbe died. Another prisoner received the sentence of death by starvation and Kolbe, himself already a prisoner at Auschwitz, volunteered to take his place in the starvation cell. The Nazis allowed this substitutionary death as a fulfillment of their law while obviously missing (and rejecting) the Truth to which Kolbe’s sacrifice pointed. No man would have done what Father Kolbe did unless they not only understood but greatly treasured what Christ did for us on the cross. May Father Kolbe’s faith and pain be a witness to us all!



At first, Auschwitz was used by the Nazis to murder Polish and Soviet prisoners of war as well as those of other nationalities and Gypsys. Yet when the Nazi plan was put into effect to exterminate all European Jews, Auschwitz became the setting for the most massive murder campaign in history. No one knows with certainty how many died at Auschwitz; the best guesses range from 1.1 million to 1.4 million.



A display of many of the shoes taken from prisoners at Auschwitz.



The entrance to the gas chambers and ovens.

Czech: We dropped our kids off at a camp for missionary kids in the Czech Republic on our way to Poland. While traveling between the two locations, EB and I visited the small Czech village of Olomouc. Today it has cobble stone streets, a village square, churches centuries old and a rich history. We discovered that Olomouc has a dark side as well.

Jon Hus was a Czech Christian who in the days before Luther and the Reformation, called attention to the abuses of the Catholic church. Hus was eventually burned at the stake in Prague. Two of Hus’s followers were burned at the stake in Olomouc in 1415. The city then rebelled against the Czech king (who was pro-Hus) and gave its allegiance to the Catholic king of the then Hungarian empire, Matthias Corvinus. Ironically, today in Budapest the evangelical church we attend meets in a building name after King Corvinus.

EB and I are learning how much suffering this part of the world has had. Both the Polish people and the Hungarian people (and other peoples of Europe as well) have long, tragic histories of oppression and war. Christians likewise have suffered greatly in Central Europe. Yet today the enemy both within and without for Christians is not persecution but indifference.

Elizabeth's life changing summer in Uganda

My eyes get big as we step off the bus into the Ugandan slums, the community where the poorest people live. I look around me and feel like I am in a dump.

Essentially, I was in a dump. There is garbage and human waste everywhere. The smell is almost unbearable. Rags cover the tiny, skinny black bodies of the little children. They are running and playing around the shacks they live in, pieced together with cardboard, cloth, and anything else they could find. Tears come to my eyes as I try to take it all in and ask myself, “How could anyone live like this? Why, God, do they have to suffer like this?” I have never seen a place so poor in my life. We play with the kids, and feed them their one meal of the day: beans and mush.

The kids smile and laugh as we lead them in duck duck goose and red light green light. We sing songs and their little hands clap along. They grab our hands and the little ones all want to be held. As the boys start a game of soccer, we girls go talk to the other teenage girls living there. They are very eager to talk to us, and we get to share the gospel with them, and many of them come to Christ. As the bus comes back to pick us up, they cling to us, and beg for us to return soon. I hug them and tell them I will pray for them. As we drive away, I watch all the kids running after us, and my heart breaks for them. I know that my life will never be the same again.

The slum outreach was part of the work our team of 90 did in Uganda. We also worked in high schools and in orphanages. I got to work in hospitals and with AIDS patients.

In the high schools, we did assemblies, and also interacted with the students through sports and sharing our faith personally. As I interacted with these students, they would often share their questions and struggles with me. They were dealing with a lot of tough issues, and so I could really feel the Holy Spirit speaking through me and giving me words to say. One girl came to me, and told me about how she was orphaned at a young age, and now she and her siblings lived with her grandma, and they had no money for school, food, or anything. As she shared this with me, she burst out into tears, and my heart ached as I listened to her story of great suffering and pain. I was able to give her a small comfort by telling her how Jesus is the father to the fatherless, and also showing her the verses in Matthew 6 that talk about how not to worry, Jesus will provide for our needs. She thanked me and hugged me, and it felt good to have been able to give her some comfort.

Another amazing experience I had in Uganda was doing a clinic for children with HIV/AIDS. A group of us went to the hospital, and sang songs and played games with these children. They seemed like completely normal children, but their lives had been affected drastically by this horrible disease. Many of them were very young, and my heart ached knowing that they will die much too early. We shared testimonies with them, and then did a gospel presentation, and the majority of them received Christ. I took comfort in the fact that God had saved the souls of these children, because there is not much other hope we can give them.

One day, we got to shadow a doctor going though his rounds in the maternity ward. Unfortunately, I was repeatedly mistaken for a medical student, and was asked to perform medical procedures such as removing catheters, removing cesarean wrappings, and sterilizing medical equipment. It was definitely an unforgettable experience.

I want to say a big thank you to everyone who gave toward my summer in Uganda and prayed for me and my team. I had an amazing time there, and God taught me wonderful things. He is awesome!

Decisions to receive Christ at a church in the slums

Face painting at a school

My ministry team

"Come over to Macedonia and help us!" Acts 16:9

Macedonia (flag pictured above) is a tiny country, about the size of Maryland, that was carved out of the former Yugoslavia after Communism fell. Macedonia was not recognized as a sovereign country by the USA until the opening days of George Bush's second term.

“This is why I am a missionary,” I remember thinking.

I was sitting with my 14 year old son Ben, on a beach on Lake Ohrid, Macedonia, witnessing to two Macedonian guys not a whole lot older than Ben, named Ottas and Vladimir. Even though they did not receive Christ with us, they were able to clearly articulate back to us the message of the gospel and why Christ had to die. They communicated in good English even with cigarettes hanging out of their mouths while they were wearing Speedos and drinking beer.

For the last two weeks of July we were at the “Lake Tahoe of the Balkans” for a classic Campus Crusade for Christ summer missions project. There were 80 American Campus Crusade staff and students along with 40 Macedonian Campus Crusade staff and students. The project had been going on for all of July but we received an invitation from the project directors, Don and Kathryn Mansfield, to jump in for the last half. For me it was refreshing to be in a similar environment that knitted my heart to missions when I was a college student. These are the reasons why our July in Macedonia was such a great missionary experience:

*faith filled environment
*international missions experience
*emphasis on initiative evangelism
*exhortation to take the gospel to the entire world
*training up of college students
*developing national (Macedonian) leadership
*(relatively speaking) family-friendly environment of Lake Ohrid
*exposing our children to all of the above!

If I had more time I would gladly tell you the story of the water pump going out in our van in the middle of nowhere where we already did not speak the language! And how we had to talk our way through 6 international border crossings (it worked 5 of the 6 times) without the correct car papers, even though we were 100% legal.

Thank you for enabling us to live and serve in Eastern Europe in doing what the Lord has called us to do! We cannot do it without your partnership in our lives!

Pictures say much more than words (and are more fun!) so here are some pictures of our time in Macedonia.



Beaches like this one along Lake Ohrid were perfect places to meet students and share our faith.



Lake Ohrid was a surprisingly clean little village with cobble-stone streets, water front coffee houses and cafes along with beauty and history.



This windswept lakeside point on Lake Ohrid with an old Christian Orthodox church was a picturesque and made a great place for a quiet time.



During one sunrise devotional time three young believers (one from Moldovia, another from Bulgaria and the third from Macedonia) came forward for baptism.



Here is EB sharing Christ with Natasha who described herself as an athiest yet attentively listened as EB explained about Jesus who is real, alive and gave Himself up for mankind. Our Lord says that His Word does not go out without accomplishing His purposes (Isaiah 55:11).



The capitol city of Macedonia is called Skopje. We drove through Skopje twice. At one stoplight our van was mobbed by begging gypsy children. Even though the city is dirty and poor, there are some faithful missionaries with Campus Crusade (and other missions agencies) in Skopje. It is also a place where Muslim and Christians live side-by-side in peace. Many mosques, like the one above that we photoed from our car, are located throughout Skopje.



And I had to end with this one. Our 14 year old son Ben has this desire to hurl his body through the air. Here he is jumping off cliffs along Lake Ohrid.