I think it’s time to tell all of you the story of my calling to Zambia.
One way I experience God and his love is serving. Every time we had a youth mission trip at my church I just really enjoyed serving. People encouraged me in missions. I really enjoyed it! I always played with the thought of being a missionary over seas for a long period of time.
As I continued with my high school education I started becoming very into music and leading worship. And also with Middle School youth ministry. Before I got to grade 12 I had this want to know what I should do after high school. I thought a lot about calling. I wanted to attend a private christian college and study in Youth Ministry and minor in Worship Arts. As I was working on what I wanted to do with my life, I forgot about asking God what I should do. I started trying to serve God in the ways I wanted to serve instead of how HE wanted me to serve him. Which is pretty humorous if you think about it. But honestly I knew that I should do mission work, but its frightening! Going far away from home, eating strange foods, trying to communicate with people with different backgrounds and lives. It’s not easy.
Towards the end of high school I would much rather play music and stay in America. Because its safe and all that jazz. I looked at a number of different colleges, even looking into going to big music schools. Or just doing something like moving to Nashville to pursue a music career. But nothing was feeling right. I did not do well in school and I just didn’t enjoy it. The thought of throwing myself into college and not being able to handle the classes and work was a big fear of mine. Because no matter how hard I tried or how long I studied I never did well.
I was not having a good prayer life. I was constantly in sin. I would lead worship at my school and lead at middle school youth group and always feel like the biggest hypocrite. It was really hard on my soul. It was honestly torture in a lot of ways. Because I was not happy, I didn’t think God would love me after what I had done. After choosing to do bad things over and over. Everyone I knew thought I was this “outstanding christian man” but on the inside I hated myself. I was doing wrong, knowing what I should do but just to burdened that I couldn’t escape. I was becoming so selfish, angry, impatient, and there was also a part of me fearing that God was going to punish me or never except me back. I was like the older brother in the story prodigal son. I did all the work, I looked like a good person, but all I had was works and looks but not true faith.
I had been to Zambia for the first time in July of 2009 through the church partnership of Central Pres. and Chawama CCAP and it was crazy for me. The poverty level didn’t make any sense. I didn’t know what to even think. It was strange to see a 3rd world country with my own eyes. To breath the air. To smell the smells. To see anger and frustration. Prostitution. Drunkards. And everything else that poverty brings. Before I left I prayed to God and said something like this ” God thank you so much for bringing me here, it was a great experience, but I don’t ever want to come back.” Pretty funny right?
I had this thought durning senior year that if I let God take me over seas and to places of poverty I was going to loose opportunities in music. I thought he was going to curse me over seas and I would have a terrible life. I didn’t want that! It sounds terrible to me! I realize now that the enemy was getting to me. He was confusing me. But somehow I would always go back to God, it was like no matter what I did. I couldn’t forget about him. I couldn’t do my own thing. He just kept on drawing myself to him to ask for forgiveness.
I was frustrated with my calling. Trying my own thing was not working out like I wanted it to. No school felt right for me. College didn’t sound fun at all. So early February of 2011 I wanted answers.
I got in my nice blue van and went to Ziggies Coffee House. I was hoping I could find someone to meet there to talk with, but all my friends were busy. So I sat down, I opened up my Bible, and a few minutes later I closed it. I knew I just needed to ask God what HE wanted me to do after high school. So I told him that I was sick of being unhappy, I’m tired of not having peace. Just tell me what you want me to do and all do it. Just tell me. And before I asked God at my school people were coming to LCS chapels and speaking about missions. So I asked God if it was a sign. It was like he was poking my side hoping I would get the hint.
And of course God was faithful. He answered me. It was not an angry voice. God didn’t want to punish me. He said this,
“Drew, I want you to go back to Zambia. Not for yourself. But for this partnership. To build this relationship. I am not taking from your life. I am not going to punish you for what you have done. I want to give you life like never before. You will live how your brothers and sisters live. Eat what they eat. Struggle how they struggle. Feel what they feel.”
Ya crazy right. I’ve never been so sure about anything in my life. So I literally got my phone, walked outside and called Bob Snyder.(A man from my church who was a missionary for a long time. Someone I really looked up to) I left a message telling him I wanted to meet and talk with him. The next day we met. I told him. And we stared planning and preparing just like that. It was crazy. I knew if I would have “thought it over” I would have talked myself out of it. I was tired of my ideas and plans and I didn’t want to get “swallowed by a whale” I didn’t even tell my parents until I knew it was a for sure thing. And thats how it happened!
A couple weeks ago I was at a church called St. Columbus Pres. It’s in downtown Lusaka. It’s not CCAP. It’s a south African branch of the presbyterian church. It was a little bit more of a middle to high class congregation. After church this old white South African woman approached me. She wanted to know who I was, and all that. I told her what I was doing. She had been living in Lusaka all of her married life of about 30 years. She was very familiar with the area and knew of the Chawama compound were I am staying. Her honest response to what I told her was “oh lots of challenges there, lots of trouble” I told its more of a blessing than anything else. Everyday I am so thankful to be living in the ghetto, if thats weird.
Normally Missionaries have a main area where they work. But they live in a nice area far away. But I work and live right in the same place. The place where most Americans would end there life before having to live here. Ya it is un safe at times. I eat really strange things. I am a big target to get mugged for sure. There is a lot of insane people, drunk people, lots of darkness. People think it is so strange that I live in Chawama. People don’t understand. But now they are getting used to me and they enjoy me around.
The coolest thing I have ever been apart of is teaching at the school and telling these kids about Jesus. Kids that have lost parents. Have hungered, and are the poorest of the poor.
Last week I told them my testimony. They deserve to know my story. So they know I am for real. But the greatest thing is I live like them. I watch what they watch on tv. I eat what they eat. Instead of just going there and telling them about Jesus and living in a nice part of Lusaka, I tell them about Jesus and live right next door. Which means a lot to them! Because I don’t know if you know this but people in 3rd world countries are tired of being looked down on. They are tired of being looked at as un-educated. Lazy, and poor. They are tired of whites telling them what they need or what they should do. How they should live. Because whites show up, for a few days, They give there money and help in little ways. And then leave and never come back. They don’t even stay in contact. I hear a lot of stories about how Zambians will write letters to their friends in the US. Even people at my Church and they don’t write them back. You have any idea how that makes them feel? Most whites act friendly in person, they have good times with the people here and then they don’t even bother to keep the relationship going after they leave.
I can tell you Africans feel forgotten, they don’t feel loved. Because very few people actually make the sacrifice to have a relationship with them. I know it’s not easy but it’s worth it. To be able to know what to pray for in their lives. It seriously means the world to them. Relationships is better than money. Its better than building or projects.
Let me tell you something. People don’t choose to live in poverty. People don’t choose hard circumstances. People don’t choose to not have enough money to eat or become educated. So what are we going to do about it?
My role model is Jesus. Not because he loves me, and died for me. But I respect the choices he made. I respect that a king would humble himself to live like a normal human. Because I have been convicted before. God was convicted about saving us. He didn’t have to, he wanted to. He was convicted and instead of forgetting about it, he did it. He did the only thing he could do to save us from death. He died the death of a murderer. Or a robber. He was tortured as if he was the most wicked of all.
“You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through or Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.” Romans 5:6-11
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 2 Corinthians 5:21
