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Author: Jon

A Bit of a Different Week

A Jon Post

Well, last week was new experience for me. Our ministry partner/leader, Jorge, spends most of his time planning and pulling off training programs for youth and children workers.

Group Activities

Group Activities

He teaches and trains people how to use sports and games as a way to introduce children and youth to Christ. Last week I was able to spend the whole week as one of his trainees, getting familiar with and learning from that side of Jorge’s ministry. It was a great week. I met some awesome Mozambican men and women of God and after 5 days (8 hours a day) of training we held a “Kids Games” event and were able to minister to 150 children from around the city through fun, games, team-building and Scripture.

Learning by Doing

Learning by Doing

I’ve wanted to experience this side of our ministry for some time now and so it was a pleasure and privilege to sit under Jorge’s leadership all week and learn from him.
I was also able to get new and unique looks into the Mozambican culture that I am still relatively new to and learning from.
Because it used all day every day last week I was only able to go to the hospital briefly a couple times and I dearly so many friends there. I am anxious to return this week and sit with them again.

Jorge in His Element

Jorge in His Element

Layne continues to grow closer to her due date (February 23rd). In these final stages we both fluctuate between eagerness/impatience and dread/”Wait-Anaya-don’t-come-yet!” feelings. We feel as ready as we can be to be her parents. Thanks for all of your prayers for her and us as we get closer and closer to her big arrival.

That’s us. There’s our week. Life keeps pressing us onward and, depending on the day, I feel like I’m in control or just swept up in it. I guess it’s probably good to let go of that control more often than not.  It’s not really mine to control anyway.

Soccer/Life Coaches

Soccer/Life Coaches

January 31, 2011
Mozambique
3 comments

Little Victories and Miracles of 2010

A Jon Post

Welcome to 2011. Sorry this post didn’t make it up on the weekend. Hopefully our loyal readership doesn’t abandon us for our lateness.
So 2010, huh? What a year! And 2011? Lots coming our way I think!
In 2010 we moved into Mozambique with bright eyes, hopeful hearts and a lot of determination. We wanted to see the Kingdom of God brought here to Maputo and to the hospital. We set our hearts on being a hand to hold in last days, and being a smiling face in painful ones.
In 2010 our daughter started her journey into our lives.
There were a lot of bold, fearless moments, many successes.
And there were failures, broken hearts, breathless lungs, and tear-streaked faces.
In 2010 we’ve learned to find and see the Lord in the little victories and miracles along the way.

(January) Layne’s time with Emilia right up until and through her passing.

(January) My time with Joaquim, the first good friend I made here who died in the hospital.

(January-June) God’s providence in moving us to Angola, then His peace and voice in our move back to Mozambique.

(June) Our daughter.

(July) Reading the Bible with José Manuel the day before his death

(July) Sharing Christ with many by bringing the World Cup to the big screen in small villages

(August) Precious Sandra, being able to be with her daughter in northern Mozambique in her last days instead of a hospital bed.

(October) Dear friend Sabu, going home to his family.

(November) 13-year-old Marcelino who loved our daughter so much, prayed for her, asked how she was every time he saw us. Even up until the day he died.

(December) A hug from Tomé and a kiss from Lúcia

A Kiss from Lúcia

A Kiss from Lúcia

A Huge from Tomé

A Hug from Tomé

These are just a few of the little victories and miracles we’ve seen this year. They have often been surrounded by pain, but that’s our ministry.
We kinda like it.
Happy New Year!

January 3, 2011
Angola, Hospital Ministry, JonandLayne.com, Mozambique, Travel
4 comments

Merry Christmas

A Jon Post

I know it’s “that time of year” again. To be honest, I haven’t felt it so much. I don’t want this to be one of those depressing or move-everyone-to-pity-the-poor-African posts or anything… I just want to ask you all to pray with me.
This is my prayer.

O come… O come… Immanuel.

That’s a Christmas song and I find myself praying it often recently.

…From depths of Hell Thy people save
And give them victory o’er the grave…

…Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death’s dark shadows put to flight…

…And open wide our heavenly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high,
And close the path to misery…

Rejoice! Rejoice! Immanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.

I sat with my wife with a man who just had surgery on his tumor and who lay in agony in the recovery room hundreds of miles from his family. He looked into my eyes and said “Thank you so much for visiting me. Yesterday, I saw some people in here who had family visiting them and I just looked at my empty corner of the room and cried. I knew I had no one to visit me. But you… you are my family. You came to visit me. Thank you.”

O come… O come…
Immanuel

My wife knelt next to a girl who shares her age. She is dying. She has no family except a sister who is very poor and cannot come to visit her. She cannot sit up by herself so whenever Layne comes her contagious smile lights up the room because Layne is the only one who will put her arms around her and help her sit up, if only for an hour.

O come… O come…
Immanuel

I often hold a specific little boy in my arms. He does his best to look healthy and strong but he limps, ever so slightly as he walks. He has deep black marks on his legs and his little body has wasted away from repeated yet futile chemotherapy treatments for his Sarcoma. He’s got one chemotherapy treatment left and then the doctors will send him home. They’ll send him home to die.

O come… O come…
Immanuel

See, there’s a beauty in all of this. All of these stories have a beauty. It’s told in the end of that song.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Immanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Immanuel will come. He will come. I know it’s trite and easy to say but when we live here in a reality that is so encompassed in pain, this is our hope.
Immanuel will come.
So yes, to me, to my wife, this is a very merry Christmas. It’s a merry Christmas because we know… we know that we can follow the plea of the title of that song
O come… O come… Immanuel
With the action at the end
Rejoice! Rejoice!

Merry, Merry, Merry Christmas.

Family Card

Merrry Christmas From the Hellers

December 19, 2010
Hospital Ministry, Mozambique
5 comments

What It’s Like

A Jon Post

I asked Javan today what he thinks of our lives here in Maputo. I am always little anxious to hear thoughts and get reactions to how my wife and I live our lives. Maybe there’s something in me looking for the validation that we’re doing something right. Maybe there’s something in me looking for a fellow American to tell me that life is pretty challenging here and all the effort I put into just living is worth it.

Maybe it’s all a reflection in my heart of a deeper desire.

Maybe… I just want to rest a weary head on my Father’s shoulder and here a soft “Well done, good and faithful servant. Come and share your Master’s happiness!” (Matthew 25:23). I really, really want to share my Master’s happiness.

Javan got the opportunity to share from the Bible at a men’s Bible study that I lead on a weekly basis at the hospital with some men who live there as patients. He spoke of perfect and complete joy. I think that scene in Matthew, where the Master says “Well done, come and share in my happiness” is one that describes what I think perfect and complete joy is.

Maybe that’s what it’s like.

I see so much that is broken and incomplete all around me. I see a broken joy in the patient Jonathan at the hospital (he and I smiled and spoke at length at how happy we were to share a name), whose tumor above his right shoulder looms over him like a death sentence. I see incomplete joy in David, a soft-spoken man whose chemo-therapy treatments sap every bit of strength he has, to where his shell of a body simply breathes and waits for it to pass.

Maybe Jonathan, David and countless others here and scattered throughout the world are all just waiting for that moment.

We’re waiting for our Master to invite us to share in His happiness.

Maybe that’s what it’s like.

So Javan, try as he might to share what he sees in our lives here in Maputo, didn’t fulfill that longing in me. That longing that I have for the Master to smile… look into my eyes and say… “Well done. Come and share my happiness!”

Perfect… Complete… Joy

I think that’s what it’s like.

December 4, 2010
Hospital Ministry, Mozambique, Personal
7 comments
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