Our mini plane ride to the island.. behind the pilot seats!
The view from our porch!
This is pretty much how Samuel looked the entire time...
Our wooden sailboat ride to the coral reef where we snorkeled!
Sunrise
Random steps on the beach..
Now we're in Stockholm! I feel like I'm having culture shock.. buying coffee at a gas station, fikas with the best of friends, walking through a grocery store full of EVERYthing, hot showers and Swedish frukost... mmm.. thanks God for all your blessings! SOS church Stockholm soon...
… they came with their vibrant and multi-colored cotton, scarf-wrapped dresses and head coverings, with their enormous ear lobes sagging to their shoulders, lined with earrings and beads of all sorts and the blackest skin I’ve ever seen. Some came drunk, some came hungry, some came just to hear the music and others came with a desire to have an encounter with the living God. The unreached people of the earth are truly breathtaking.
Last week teams from Mission SOS in Sweden, America and [we] Ethiopians.. gathered together for a Signs & Wonders Festival among the unreached deep within the mountains of Tanzania. What a stunning land. The sky is deep blue, the dirt bright red, the mountains shine vibrant greens below the lining of clouds that hide each peak and the atmosphere is purely tropical. What a contrast to my home of desserts and dust in Ethiopia. It’s always effortless to fall madly in love with Africa. And that I did… yet again…
The Festival grounds!
I spent each festival night in the “demon clinic”. Deliverance is the best thing I know! First it boasts of the power of the name and blood of Jesus, plus it brings the greatest gifts of salvation and Holy Spirit fire afterward. Hallelujah!
The first young woman to enter our tent this festival had short shaved hair like all the other Tanzanians, and a long skirt. She was flailing frantically and screaming with the most piercing of wails. The demon asked, “who are you?”.. that’s my favorite question.. “I COME IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST, the name above every name, the risen, victorious name that came from the grave!” Then I spoke the BLOOD OF JESUS over the girl, binding the demons and commanding them to go with authority! Then Jesus’ sweet surpassing peace flooded us, she was free. What a beautiful moment. These kinds of stories followed each night...
“He will beautify the afflicted ones with salvation.” Psalm 149:4
During the entire week of outreaches and gatherings, about 3000 people received Jesus as their savior and 1000 were filled up in the baptism of Holy Spirit! YAY GOD! We also had some powerful healing testimonies… several young people who had been mute were speaking on our stage and a woman who was battling cancer was prayed for in faith, visited her doctor the next day and returned to us declaring that she was healed 100%! Praise Jesus!
Mohammed and Ashagre, our Ethiopian pastors, were with us too. It’s so fun to stand together in ministry with them! Last Saturday we led a pastor’s seminar for all of the local leaders in Same… Samuel started the meeting speaking about radical faith in church planting and pioneering, Ashagre followed with a Holy Spirit word about always staying humble and then Mohammed shocked the audience with the fiery testimony of his transformation as a muslim to a follower of Jesus! At first they didn’t believe it.. but before long they were screaming and jumping from their pews! Filip (one of our Ethiopian team members) and I sat back laughing and crying at the same time! We were so proud!
On Saturday night just 5 minutes before Johannes was to go up on the stage for another powerful night of preaching, he asked Samuel to do it! My hero preached his first festival!! This is our dream.. to give Jesus to the people who don't know him! Samuel, you are my pride and joy..
Samuel preaching with Pastor Abraham as his translator!
MISSION SOS is remarkable. What an honor it is to serve the world's heroes! Thanks Johannes and Maria for spending so much time with us in Africa.. you are such examples and parents for us!
The adventure continues... more blogs to come! Directly after the festival in Same, Sam and I were off to Zanzibar and now I sit typing in Stockholm... So much to fill you in on...
O we're so sad! Or should I say I'M so sad and Samuel is just.. laughing.. you know the flowerbox we built for our window to grow the seeds my mama sent us??? Well green stuff was definitely coming up the last few weeks.. we almost thought they weren't gonna make it a few times.. It was definitely an emotional battle. BUT the other day I was reading outside and I noticed that the same things growing in our box are growing in the dirt OUTside! WE'RE GROWING WEEDS!!! No not weed... WEEDS! Ugh.. I'm a failure at gardening. We dumped the box. Sorry Mom :(
Well.. the bags are packed. Tomorrow morning after our Sunday gathering at Harar Church of Joy, me, my Samuel, Filip, Ashagre and Mohammed will pile into our baby blue '75 Peugout for a (hopefully) 8-10 hours drive to Addis Ababa. Then on Monday morning we'll fly together to Tanzania for a Signs and Wonders Festivalamount the unreached Pare people in SAME region! My heart is simply bursting. Together with the teams from USA and Sweden, we will see crazy supernatural signs and miracles, salvations, deliverances and radical freedom in the Holy Spirit.. I love this life! We Ethiopians will be in the "demon clinic" each festival night, simply ushering in the kingdom of God to the lives of so many spiritually bound Africans... transforming lives from the power of satan to GOD!
So many people are already on sight, planning, digging wells, praying and taking care of all the logistics that are a part of any huge festival. Our focus is reaching the remote unreached villages in the mountains of Tanzania.. by helicopter, radio and flyers.. inviting EVERYONE to come to our festival next wed-sun. We are expecting atleast 10,000 each day. The word of God IIIISSSS POWER! Like my husband says.. "The Bible isn't a story of God's power... it IS the power!" O I'm almost bursting out of myself! The Bible promises that we will do even greater things than Jesus did.. and He was walking on water, multiplying food, healing lepers, raising the dead... just imagine what we will do. Can't wait to see blind eyes opened, deaf ears hearing, cripples walking, limbless bodies suddenly growing their legs and arms back again, AIDS melting away, the demon possessed being radically and fully freed in Jesus' name! What an adventure it is to colabor with God. To be a follower of Jesus. These signs and wonders will be the keys to unlock revival in the nation of Tanzania! Hallelujah!
After the festival, Sam and I will have a few days together on the island ZANZIBAR just off the coast of Africa. It's absolutely stunning... white beaches, our own bungalow, swimming with dolphins, suntanning, snorkling... oooooo I'm speechless...
.. then we're off to Stockholm and Varberg in Sweden for 3 weeks. Longing to be with the Strandbergs again and walk that stunning west coast of Europe with the man of my dreams. At this time last year I was getting ready to walk that coast with my boyfriend... crazy how much can happen in one year.
O I cry every time I have to get on a plane and leave Ethiopia.. it truly has my heart. But there is so much awaiting me just through the window of tomorrow's sunrise... don't know why I just got all poetic.. feels like I should be singing now I suppose...
Ciao all... I will update whenever internet so allows...
ps- mom and dad... skype fikas when I'm in Sweden!
I got a package in the mail yesterday.. from my Joelle!
Everyone in the team got candy.. and although Sam and I contemplated keeping it all for ourselves (come on.. they don't have Reeses or Hersheys in Ethiopia OR Sweden!).. we passed it out faithfully :)
I got cheese!! Ethiopia, well pretty much all of Africa and Asia, is without cheese.
Gah!! I'm hearing so many cheesy recipes calling me name...
(I'm so typical American right now..)
Thanks Joelle!!!
You know the feeling you get when you spread a new shade of polish across your toes and it somehow sends a smile to your heart and a swing to your hips?? Or when you smack your lips together after shining them up with a fruity gloss.. mmm so good. I guess I've kinda had some of those moments lately.. thanks to my mama and sis' packages :) When you live in Africa, it's easy to start feeling like a sweaty dust puddle at times. Come on.. my heart beats just thinking about this incredible land.. but I'm still a girl! Someone once told me.. "you're actually stylish for being a missionary.." uuhh yea..
My sweet husband took me shopping too. I got the cutest denim skirt full of pockets and buttons.. perfect for our dress code on the Horn!
On Sunday we rummaged through the second-hand market. You know all those clothes people in USA and Europe send to the poor in Africa... well most of them end up in a dark, tarp-walled market and then we buy them! Ironic I know. It's a great place though to find old things that can be destroyed out here in the desserts of dust and so much cheaper than trying to drag a bunch of stuff over from the west ourselves. We also find incredible top-name, hardly even touched, expensive brands from Sweden... Sam is the king of finding hot skinny Nudie jeans...
Here's a cute t-shirt dress with gold beading from a boutique in Italy... for 2 dollars!
.. and Sam sportin my new olive green jacket... for 2 dollars!
I have the best mama in the whole world! Even though we're living on different continents, she still has this almost magical way of taking care of me and making me feel like I can conquer ocean storms, dessert sun, cooking and spiders. My best times with her have been over breakfast at Bobevans just down the street from our old house, window shopping at Something New, well.. just shopping in general, suntanning in the backyard or beaches or parks, talking about my "future prince" and all the love we would share.. and then planning my wedding with him.. yay, hearing her car come up the drive and trying to think up some quick excuse as to why her kitchen smells like smoke and her crock pot is completely melted away.. O I could just go on and on.. I love you mama!!
Love running errands around Harar.. somehow you always seem to find some of the most interesting people along the way. Sam, Naftali and I went out to buy some fabric for my sister in Kentucky.. she's collecting pieces of fabric from friends and family all over the world to make a sweet quilt for the baby(4th baby). Then we were off to the post office.. sending cards to my family :) Next a fabulous fika with the men in my life (yea one is only 5 years old but akoona matata) and then a trip to the supermarket. Mohammed's birthday was Thursday!! We're having a celebration fika of coffee-chocolate cake at 4:30 today! Come if you're around! Love Birthdays!
Sam caught me looking quite excited about baking..
Naftali helped with everything! He's just sad that it's not his turn for a party..
Longing for women's house church tonight. We have the most incredible girls in the universe! Last night Selam(the remarkable 24 year old Bibleschool graduate and leader of our group on Saturday nights) and I had a powerful time of prayer and worship together.. she is such an anointed woman of God.. My African sister and best friend. Can't wait to chase the heart of our Jesus together with you and the other stunning girls of Harar Church of JOY tonight!
My first trip into Africa was stunning, breathtaking.It was as if I had just stepped into a dream.As the plane came near landing, I could see wild camels in the distance and almost choked myself with excitement, grasping my chest and gasping so loudly that the other passengers began laughing!That moment convinced me that this would be an adventure to change my life as well as the lives of many others.
The landscapes of Ethiopia are breathtaking and radically diverse.If you were to squeeze into a sweaty 15 passenger mini bus with 20 other Somalis, Oromo’s and Harare’s for a road trip cross-country, you would see flat, red, sandy desserts speckled with deep green bushes and tall trees with flat tops swaying ever so slightly in the breeze, mind-boggling rock formations housing baboons, volcanoes nestled in black lava from centuries of random spit fires, blue crystal lakes with hippos, crocodiles and other unmentionable ferocious beasts and mountains so vast that they take your breath away.
More than any spectacular view, the people especially capture your heart.It only takes an instant and suddenly you realize that the very core of your bosom is no longer beating in the safety of your ribs but out on the infested sidewalks, wrapped around the faces of the young and old.
Ethiopia is a place of many kisses.Women in long, vibrant dresses and headscarves greet you with “Selamno” and then kiss you on both cheeks three or four or even five times before repeating it again.The eyes of the children open with enormous anticipation at the simple sight of your white face as they shout out all the English words they know, all at once, in hopes of gaining some sort of attention from their own personal celebrities.The men can be quite diverse from people group to people group.Many are dressed in their specific religious attire, long white robes and knitted caps for the Muslims or western clothes and white scarves for the Orthodox.One of my favorites fashion trends comes from the Oromo men… they wear striped red and grey t-shirts with a variety of different rainbow colored skirts wrapped and rolled perfectly at the waist.Their accessory is always a sharp plowing sheer thrown over the shoulder.I’ve never actually figured out why they’re carrying them.Skirts are natural for men in Ethiopia.The missionary guys even wear them to breakfast.
Every person you pass holds a special key that spins continuously within the lockets of your mind until all you can do Is open doors of wonder deep within, doors that never close and make you forever abandoned to an eternal fascination of the people that are held within the very caverns and crevasses of the world.
The SOS mission base here is truly pioneer, beginning at the end of 2008.Before long though, a few adventurists were training up disciples in church meetings on Saturday and Sunday nights, leading dozens of newly saved people to baptism in water and in the Holy Spirit.The church in Ethiopia is called Church of Joy and lives up to its name.When we begin singing “Hallelujah” and clapping, you cannot find one person without a smile.The joy of the Lord is our strength and that’s why so many are able to be children of God here in Africa.
Samuel Strandberg is the extraordinary base leader from the West coast Sweden with a captivating vision for the people groups on the Horn of Africa, a heart full of evangelism and powerful passion for prayer.His heart is to seek the face of God continuously and build a Christian culture.He once told me his six foolproof, guarantee keys of being a pioneer and reaching the unreached.“Number one, pray.Number two, preach.Number three, pray.Number four, preach.Number five, pray, and number six, preach!”
There is also a team of Ethiopian pastors working together with Samuel.Pastor Mohammed was once training in mosques across the Horn of Africa, studying Islam and planning to be a terrorist.His plans failed though when Jesus radically saved him instead!Now he is the evangelism and outreach pastor.Pastor Ashagre joined the SOS team four years ago and has completely taken the vision for the unreached as his own.He is the follow-up and discipleship pastor.
Life on the Horn of Africa is simple and completely centered around Jesus.When people want to meet God, we pray for salvation.When they want to be baptized, we build a tarp tub and then sing praises in the sunshine.When they’re sick we lay our hands on them and expect an immediate healing.Living spontaneously is the best way to find adventures.Daniel, the principle of the Bible school in Sweden told me, “If we know everything, there’s no space for faith or trust.”
Many Muslims consider the city of Harar the fourth holiest city.A heavy spirit of religion hangs in the air.In certain areas you can even feel demons starring you down.It’s exciting to be such a pioneer in new places that have never seen this light before.
As soon as you walk out of the compound, you’re bound to see women carrying enormous bundles on their heads.There are homeless people everywhere, unlike anything I have ever seen.It’s hard to hide my tears in the streets.Orphans run around and sleep in the middle of the sidewalks.Naked cripples lie everywhere and others with deformed faces just sit all day begging. Many mothers bring their children up to me asking that I take them home and give them a better life.I just kiss them, smile and try to be strong while every fiber of my being desires to grab them and run.
An enormous stronghold in Harar is kat.It’s a drug in the form of simple green leaves and can be found everywhere.Around three in the afternoon you’ll find nine out of ten people on the street chewing these tiny twigs with green saliva oozing between their teeth and staining the edges of their mouths.Ne one is excluded in this addiction.Mothers give it to their infants and toddlers to calm them down, the homeless carry it around in bundles, construction workers and storeowners chew of for hours every day rather than working and people sitting in restaurants gnaw on these leaves while sipping coke.Even the passing goats and donkeys carry this green stain on their furry lips.The Ethiopians need freedom in Jesus.They need to overcome this spirit of addiction with Holy Spirit’s power.
One night, while setting up for a movie, Mathias came running in shouting.There was a woman in the street manifesting a demon directly in front of our gate.She was rolling around in the dirt and rocks rather helplessly, a spectacle to the crowds like some sort of entertainment under the glittering stars.We came to quickly find that it was one of our disciples, Addis.We barely brought her in from the audience before she collapsed in the doorway and while holding her quivering body we began to pray in the Spirit.She didn’t want to be freed, so after a while with hair in a static fro, eyes red and empty, we helped her home.
She came back the next day and still continued to join our meetings.Something that must be learned as you begin to train disciples is that righteousness and faith are not obtained in the pay per view aisle of heaven.It takes work and time to bear fruit.The team is truly devoted to the long-term transformation of each one of their disciples.
Demonic possession and oppression is huge in Ethiopia.There is a young man who sits in a garbage-filled ditch just one minute from our home, half-naked and covered in dust.He says nothing and hides his face when we pass.He just sits.In fact, he has been just sitting for six years.It’s heart breaking but we believe that one day He’ll be saved.
When the events of your day write pages that look like the book of Acts, you’re finally living.
One year after seeing this man for the first time, I returned to find him in the same garbage pile,just a few weeks later though, we saw that he had disappeared.A Spirit filled man from a local church had together with Holy Ghost, delivered him from his demons and helped him to begin a new life!Hallelujah!Now his hair is cut, he wears clothes and is learning the day-to-day aspects of life again.God is so good!
Luke 9:23 promises, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow Me.”Deny yourself.The world’s pin needle view and God’s enormously magnanimous vision somehow seem to be in opposite realms.So in all actuality when we deny by man’s standards, we are essentially leaping up on a higher road that runs in closer proximity to the throne of God.Denying ourselves does not mean placing a flesh-imposed period in our personal novels called life but rather, it opens up fresh pages for future chapters to be written by the true author, none other than Jesus.Writing books with the pen of our lives as His co-author will bring about the greatest action/adventure novel you could ever record!
If you are beginning to feel stirred in your spirit for missions, if the pictures drawn with these words are awakening dreams and longing deep within, pray.Even when you think you know, pray.You will find God’s plan for your life in the carpet.Bury your face there.God will take care of the rest.
