Kickstart weekend

- The Kickstart group -

Last weekend was what we call a "Kickstart" weekend for the youth activities in Belgium and the Netherlands. After the summer camps and school starting, the young people look forward to seeing their friends again. This past weekend was organized by the church in Maastricht - our congregation. But since we don't have a building that can really be used for something like this we used our homes - it was kind of scary, but great!

Our house and the Kok family's house are on the same street in the little village in Belgium where we live. So we planned to have the girls down at the Kok's while the boys would stay with us. No problem as long as we were counting on 20 young people at the most. When more than 30 showed up, we wondered how everything would work out. But everyone was very flexible and it all worked out great.

On Saturday we headed out to an open air museum where we learned about how life was 100 years ago - from actors who played the part in villages set up in that time period. It was great to see and hear what it must have been like. And it got us all thinking - our theme for the weekend was: "Jesus: Now!?" We wanted to look at what Jesus would look like today. Can we still follow his ideas and teachings? Or is it all just out of date?

- Going to school -

Besides the teaching and thinking it was just great to be able to see friends again from the summer. As some of the young people put it, "I don't know what I would do if we didn't have these weekends! Chatting just isn't enough. It is so good to be able to see each other again." We have already had several questions about when the next weekend is planned. What a great opportuntiy to see how important we are to one another.

- fun!-

Summer fun

We did all sorts of things this summer. One of them was when we visited friends in Aarschot for an annual light festival. Check out these dancing lights.

July-August Newsletter

LIGHT in the Lowlands
Reaching out to the people of Belgium and the Netherlands

July-August 2006


I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:3-6

Dear brothers and sisters, family and friends,
It has been a while since we have written. That usually means we have been too swamped to get on the computer. Let me update you on what God has been doing in our lives the past two months.
Summer Camp
Those two things always go together in our work here. As you have been able to follow through the years, we are always involved in at least one camp week in the summer. It is great how God is using this small place to touch so many lives! This year, once again, we have had four weeks of camp with over 150 people in total taking advantage of the opportunity to learn more about God in a beautiful place.



Shirley and Scott worked this year on Benjamin Camp - the camp for young people from 8-11 years old. As a matter of fact, Stephan and Sean were helping out as well - Stephan as a counselor and Sean in the kitchen. This year we had a special group. One of Scott’s colleagues from Listen Up! works with children who are trying to integrate in the country. He was able to send five of these children to camp. Where we usually have kids from church families, these kids not only had never been to camp, two of them were moslim. We had some wonderful conversations and they asked some good questions. It was great to see that our theme this week - Finding Jesus - was just what was needed, for all the kids.



In August we also took part in Family Camp. The last few years this camp has been a little less stressful than the others we work with. Scott usually presents several of the lessons, but otherwise, we are there as campers. And it is great to see God working with the idea of ‘family’. At the end of Family Camp the church in Maastricht organized the yearly ‘Family Day’. We had a beautifully sunshiny day sandwiched between two weeks of rain - one day to get together and not only learn about praising the Lord, but take part as a family. It was great!


In between these two camps Scott and Shirley also were blessed to attend the Pan European Lectureships (PEL) for the first time. This year it was held in Brussels - our backyard, you could say. Scott presented one of the lessons on ‘Reenewal’ and both he and Shirley were blessed by the people they were able to meet and talk to. We have said it before and we say it again - whenever you have the chance, take the opportunity to meet your brothers and sisters from other places! God is so good to have placed us in HIS family and wants us to see how good it is.
Family News
In June I mentioned that Willemien would be operated on her knee. In the meantime she has recovered and is already back to normal (or better than normal). The doctors were completely amazed at her recovery. We had rented some crutches, according to instructions, and a rollator as well, according to instructions, but the doctors never let her use the crutches. She progressed too quickly for them. The rollator was used the first two weeks of recovery and has now been retired. Thank you for your prayers!
Planning ahead

We have painted the building together and are looking forward to the activities planned for the coming months as we reach out to the neighborhood. In September we will host a youth weekend in Maastricht and we are expecting quite a few young people. We also hope several visitors come. Later in the year we will be talking to our neighbors directly, looking for those who are looking for God.
Keep your family here in your prayers and praise your Father for His mighty work in all of us!

PRAYER WARRIORS
Please keep the following in your prayers.
- Praise God for Willemien and her very quick recovery. The doctors have been surprised at how well she has done. She never even needed the crutches and barely used the rollator. Now she is once again enjoying her walks with her dog.
- We had some great visits with the people we study with. Pray for our continued contact in the coming months.
- Pray for our outreach in the coming months. We hope to meet more people in the neighborhood and have some good opportunities for Bible studies.
- Pray for the youth weekend in September here.

KID'S KORNER
First days
Everybody has to go to school - even adults did it at some time. But those first days of school are not always easy, even if you are returning to your old school. This is Sean’s second year at his school and Stephan’s sixth (this is a junior and senior high school together).
Sean dreads the beginning of school because it means the end of choosing what you want to do in the day. But he looks forward to seeing his friends who he doesn’t wlays see in the summer. Stephan takes everything in stride, although the first days can be really boring.
What do you like about the begin of school? What do you dread? What was different for you this year going to school?
e-mail Stephan at: greenleaf@tele2allin.be
e-mail Sean at: dudeis2cool4u@hotmail.com

ON THE FAMILY SIDE . . .
Summer is a great time to enjoy the out of doors. We almost always do plenty of that during our camp weeks. Stephan attended ‘Youth Camp’ (for 15+ yrs-old) as well as helping with Benjamin Camp and Family Camp (see the news side), while Sean had planned on going to Teen Camp. That didn’t work out. He was sick after Benjamin camp and tired (yeah, but not sick and tired!) before needing to come to Family Camp. Still there was plenty of time outside with friends and family. Outside of camp weeks Sean spent time at the field with his friends and Stephan would head out to the basketball court in the evening.
But outside activities and camp do not make a whole summer! Don’t know if we could make it through a whole summer of camp. This summer we were thrilled to be able to take part in several weddings. Two of our former students in the church msrried and we were pleased that they wanted us present. It was interesting to see two Germans with so many international friends! But that is what you get when you travel all around the world while studying. Scott also sang with Listen Up! at a wedding reception in Eindhoven for Paul and Iva Rambags. Iva is from Prague, where they actually married, but Paul knew that not everyone had been able to get there and planned a reception back in the Netherlands. And then there was Ken and Elizabeth Yamashita’s wedding. Ken, who had been a member here in Maastricht, was married in the Netherlands (he and Elizabeth live in Leiden) in a ceremony in English, Japanese and Dutch. Now that was something!
In between Benjamin Camp and Family Camp Shirley and Scott were able to go to the Pan European Lectureships (PEL) in Brussels. Not only was it a chance to ride a train (getting their in the car is possible, but at that time of day it’s murder), it was a great time to meet people and see old friends. We were especially glad to see Dottie Schulz while there. Shirley met some old schoolmates unexpectedly, we both met some wonderful and dedicated servants of the Lord and in all were greatly blessed by the time there. Next summer we hope to be in the States, but if God gives us another summer here in Europe, then we hope to make it to another PEL.
After camp, things take a turn towards school (Oh my!). Sean struggles greatly with what it means to follow God as soon as the new soccer season started. In Belgium, the youth clubs at his age now all play on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. This meant of course that he could not play with the club that he had planned all summer on playing with. His best friend is on the club. Sean hoped to find his way to professional soccer through being scouted at this club. If he doesn’t play, he can’t be scouted. So we talked about it, prayed about it, cried about it and looked around. Thankfully, we were able to find a Dutch club (remember, we live on the border) in Maastricht was more than willing to have him on their team. They play on Saturday mornings. So that worked out very well. For Stephan the choice is still hard, since he sometimes plays on a Sunday. He knows that he will not be able to make those games - but he has already played in one game on a Saturday.

What’s coming up?
SEPTEMBER
Listen Up! recording
Youth weekend
New outreach
OCTOBER
Youth activities
Family activities
Fall camp

THANKS!
- For your continued prayers for us and the work here. We so need God’s continued strength and your continued involvement!
- For your emails and comments on the blog.
- For your prayers for the work here

We pray that you enjoyed the crazy days of summer and are prepared for everything coming your way this month. We are so glad that God is our strength - every day! Love in Him,
Scott, Shirley,
Stephan and Sean Raab