St. Vincent

We've been in the Caribbean almost two weeks. God has blessed us with beautiful weather, a beautiful island and lots of beautiful people. My new role is working with the volunteers who come to work along side our crew members while we visit their city. It's been a blessing and encouragement to meet local believers and see how eager they are to pursue God's plan for their lives.


We had a ship outing last week, 160 people in 7 mini-buses. We toured around the island, hiked in the jungle, went to the beach and visited one of the sites where Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed. It was such a great day!

Work Experience

Everyone on board has a job. A way for them to contribute to the community, a way to support the ministry through responsibility of the day to day chores that need to be done on the ship. Traditionally a new recruit starts in a service type job (cleaning, cooking, engine room, ect..) and after 6 months to a year, they are moved on to a more specific job, (such as events, port preparation, service desk, ect..) So on average a 2-year G.A. (Global Action-er) would have 2-4 jobs during their 25 months with the ship.

I'm above average! Here are the jobs I've had...

1. Laundry Queen: 15 to 20 loads of laundry a day, for the 200 people on board the Logos II. Duration: Sept 07 - Nov 07
2. Kid's Camp Director: Implement and plan a two week Kid's camp for 17 ship kids age 4 to 15. Duration: Nov 07 - Dec 07
3. K2 Teacher: Taught 7 students in grades 3-5. Duration: Dec 07- Feb 08
4. Angel: Worked in the accommodations department, known as Angels. They clean the public spaces and prepare guest cabins. Duration: Feb 08
5.Line-Up: Completed Orientation on how to do port preparation for the ship's visit to future cities. Never went on assignment, the ship was never ready. Duration March 08 - April 08
6. Events: While waiting for a line-up destination, I helped to plan onboard events, including being in charge of HopeFest in Kiel; a weekend long international bizzare on our public deck 4. Duration: April 08 - June 08
7. Project Team: Still waiting for a line-up assignment, helped with wire-brushing, painting, chipping, sanding, and all kinds of other methods of cleaning rust and welding slag in the book hold, Charlie and baggage locker. Duration: June 08 - Sept 08
8. Angel (again): Left Line-up because there was no idea when I would be sent out, so I spent so humbling time back on the Angels team. Duration: Sept 08
9. Community Ministries: Worked with outside Librarians to set up the LH Crew Library. Planned the holiday calendar, Christmas, New Years and a Fun Night. Duration Sept 08 - Jan 09
10. Assistant Creative Manager for the temporary Journey of Life/Port Side display: Helped to create and resource supplies for the port side project, which evolved into a photo gallery, theater, kid's area and prayer room. Duration: Jan 09 - March 09
11. Visitor Experience Shift Leader: Over saw the day to day operations on Deck 4. Ensuring all positions where covered by e-day people. Duration: March 09 - July 09
12. Visitor Experience Team Leader: Oversaw the deck 4 shift leaders. Duration July 09
13. Volunteer Coordinator: Working with the local volunteers, who come to serve while the ship is in their port. Duration July 09 - present

Farewell to Europe

After 11 ports and 5 months of ministry we left Europe. I'm so proud to say that I was able to be part of the Visitor Experience team welcoming 140,000 people onto deck 4! God was with us everystep of the way. And it was only through Him that we not only survived being severly under-manned on the deck, but more importantly, we were able to show Christ's love and His free gift of salvation to each of people that visited the ship.
Now we are following the sun and heading to the warm sunny climate of the Caribbean. I'm most excited about being able to wear shorts, packing away all the winter clothes and having to use sunscreen everyday.
I can't wait to see what God has in store for all of us in the islands. Please pray that as we journey across the Atlantic, that God will use this time to teach, train, prepare and unite us before we reach the new culture of the Caribbean.

Faroe Islands

Do you know where the Faroe Islands are? Have you ever heard of the Faroe Islands before? I didn't, I hadn't. Wow. I have been blessed by the landscape of God's beauty and the generous hearts of the Faroese people.
The Faroe Islands are 18 islands that sit half way between Scotland and Iceland. There is a population of 40,000 and Denmark claims them as a territory.
My ship is registered in the Faroe Islands, and before we bought her, she was the main ferry that carried people and cars to Mainland Europe. Everyone in the Faroes has been on board her. They were excited to see how she has been transformed into "God's Ship".
As Crew members, we were never at a lost of invitation out to see the islands, or have a home-cooked meal. On our Monday off, a local guy named Jakup picked up myself and 6 of my friends for an all day adventure. The highlights were eating whale meat and rotten lamb (Both staples of the Faroese diet.) And we also climbed a mountain to take in the view of all the fjords.
Early in the visit I met a deaf couple. Mei was from the Faroe Islands and her fiance Bryan was from Malaysia. They were both deaf and met at an American Bible College in Hungry. Wow, it was there that they both developed their American Sign Language. I was able to spend a lot of time with them, and even interpreted our Sunday Service and two ship tours! I'm still in awe at how much God is using my hands to communicate. And how much He brings to memory after not really signing for almost two years.
God really used the Faroe people to bless the ship's company with a much needed break. While we were there we were able to welcome close to 15,000 people on deck 4. We were also able to visit most of the local churches. We shared a lot about world missions and acting out your faith. That Christ calls us to spread his good news.
After the sun and fun of the Faroes, we sailed on to Belfast, Northern Ireland.

SCOTLAND

It was our first UK port and had a lot of visitors. It actually took some adjustment to be in a country where everyone spoke English. God was present and lots of people came to the ship and were presented with the gospel.
Almost every day of the week we had schools coming on board to visit the ship. One school that came for a visit was a local Muslim school that was studying transportation with their kindergartners. The asked us to not share anything about our faith, but to only focus on the ship. The amazing thing is that after the tour and program, the teachers were more interested in why we do what we do, and said they would return with their families.
Another story from our International Cafe, is about a church that partnered with us. They invited a business that is near them to come and visit the ship. The employees came to the ship, bought books, and spent time in the I-Cafe talking with crew members. By the end of their visit 3 of them had asked how they could become Christians!
Let's thanks God for the three new believers and the curiosity of the teachers.

Open Ship

The ship has been open since we left Denmark in February. This means that everyday, but Monday, we allow guest and visitors to come on board. They come to visit the world's largest floating bookstore, to learn about the crew and the purpose of the ship, they can enjoy a refreshment in the International Cafe, and they have conversations with crew members. Through it all we have weaved the gospel. As they first come on deck 4, they sit in a mock-lifeboat and watch a video about life on our ship, and are asked the question: "Where do you place your hope?".
It's been encouraging to hear the stories of people lost, confused, depressed, and searching, who coming on board the ship and find a reason to live and that Jesus cares for them.



Last Saturday was our busiest day since the ship opened.... we welcomed 2,800 people in one day. And what's more amazing is that most of those people were just walking by on their way towards a beach. They have no church background and spontaneously decided to come and check out this big white ship sitting in their harbor. Altogether we have had 20,000 people visit the ship in the last 18 days while we have been in Scheveningen, Netherlands.
Tomorrow we sail to Scotland.. bright and early at 7:00 am.

SAILING!!!

Today is the day the Logos Hope sails, for the first time, a reregistered passenger ship and ready to bring knowledge, help and hope to the nations of the world. I didn't really feel the excitement of this historic event until the mooring lines where released and we heaved off the quayside. What a moment!!
On Sunday of this week we needed a miracle to be able to sail, we still had outstanding documents and insurance matters to take care of. We prayed. On Monday we were "grounded" by the Danish Authorities who would not let us leave to Sweden until we had some Danish required paperwork. We prayed. On Tuesday we resigned to the fact that we would have to wait the 2 to 6 weeks it would take for all the paperwork to come through. We prayed. On Wednesday morning, all the paperwork had gone through, we had fuel in our tanks and the Swedish port was ready for us! We Praised.
God is constantly creating miracles. He is a provider when there seems to be no way. Please join me in giving thanks to the awesome God who made all this possible.
Today we are sailing.
We are off to Sweden for the weekend. You can keep track of us and see where in the world we are with the following link:
http://www.omships.org/dashboard/