THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, June 9, 1995 TAG: 9506090044
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E11 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH OXHORN, HIGH SCHOOL CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Long : 111 lines
VERY FEW EVENTS can be labeled as ``life changing.''
``Challenge '95,'' a mission trip for 17 local teens, was one.
Challenge '95 is a Greenbrier Christian Academy program that sends high school students to Venezuela to perform service projects and evangelistic puppet shows for children.
The trips began in 1993 when Joy Fagan, then a Spanish teacher at Greenbrier, asked school officials about starting a service trip. They agreed.
``We needed an outreach outside our immediate area and wanted to give students interested in missions a chance to get involved,'' said H. Ron White, Greenbrier Christian's administrator.
Terri Lynn Van Bevren, then an elementary Spanish teacher at Greenbrier, was recruited because of her fluency in Spanish and her experience in mission work.
This year's was the third challenge trip, but there was a big change. Van Bevren had moved on to teach at Norfolk Christian High School. She suggested to White that the trip be a joint effort between the two schools.
``Because our schools compete in so many areas, we felt a missions trip would give us some common ground,'' White said.
Students were selected for the trip in December. Through many meetings, members gradually got to know each other. During this time, they were also busy raising money. Each was responsible for raising $700, mostly through donations from friends and family.
``I raised $100 but the rest came from my bank account, but there will be eternal benefits,'' said Lewis Pulley, a Greenbrier senior. ``It was worth it.''
Here is a chronology of what the students experienced during the mission trip:
April 13 - Seventeen students and five adult leaders fly out of Norfolk International Airport prepared for the trip of a lifetime.
During a layover in Miami, students start collecting plastic ``wings'' from different airlines. Eventually they realize that the true purpose of the trip is to share their faith. So they do.
Team members boldly approach random people, ask if they can talk to them about something, and share their beliefs. The excitement about their purpose builds.
April 15 - Matt Ritchie, a Greenbrier sophomore, remembers the bus ride from the Caracas airport into the heart of the city this day: ``It was very poor, even worse than the low-income housing we have here. It was really sad. Even if I don't have as much as some people, I have a lot compared to those people.''
April 16 - The team arrives in Rubio, a small town in Venezuela. They will stay at Christiansen Academy, a school for the children of missionaries.
April 17 - When the team members realize that it's Easter, some experience a moment of homesickness, but it is short-lived. There is so much to do. At 5 a.m., they attend a lakeside sunrise service with the Christiansen kids. As they reflect on the meaning of Easter, the sun rises behind the mountains covered with green coffee bean bushes and the light reflects off of the gray-blue lake.
April 18 - This is the day of the team's retreat before beginning their ministry. Unfortunately, the group in one of the vans gets lost in the mountains on the twisting and bumpy roads. After many cries of ``I remember that'' and ``This is the right way, I promise,'' the group turns back. They eventually find their way. Through trials like this, members are becoming a team.
April 19 - Half of the team sets to work pouring concrete for a sidewalk around the boys dorm at Christiansen, while the rest of the team sets out to begin the puppet ministry. The two groups will switch jobs the next day.
The puppet ministry, which was the purpose of the trip, had the most effect on the teens. They drive to various destinations outside Rubio and set up the puppet stage. The dialogue is recorded in Spanish, and the puppets' mouths must be moved in time with the words.
This is not an easy thing to do - especially for those who don't know Spanish. A lot of the time it looks like an old movie, but it doesn't matter to the Venezuelan children.
``They hung on every word,'' said Peter Nichols, a Norfolk Christian junior said.
``They all had the hugest smiles and brightest eyes. They all had a hunger for something, whether they knew it was God or not,'' said Martha Duffy, also a junior at Norfolk Christian. ``I will always remember teaching a little girl to say `Jesus loves you' in English and having it come out like `Jesus ru roo'.''
April 23 - The team's final puppet show is in a prison.
Originally, the puppet show was to be for children who were imprisoned with their mothers but, as usual, plans change. Instead the team performs a puppet show for 18- to 21-year-old men in the prison. When the puppets peer over the curtain for the first number, there are a few snickers, but by the end of the puppet show, the room is nearly silent. They are listening.
After the show, the teens have time to talk with the prisoners, who thank them profusely for telling them about Jesus. The language barrier makes communication with the men tough, but some of the guys find a way to cross it: by shooting hoops with the inmates. They learn that there are real people behind prison walls.
April 22 - The trip is coming to a close. At the nightly sharing time, members form a circle, overlapping their hands and praying. They join hands and sing. They are no longer a group of individuals from two different schools. They are a team in the truest sense of the word.
April 24 - The students board a plane for the United States in the wee hours of the morning. New friends are left behind in Venezuela, but the team carries home journals, diaries, several rolls of film and many lessons in life. They know they have experienced something life changing.
``I really value taking a shower and drinking the water now,'' said Caranie Sigmon, a Greenbrier freshman. ``I look at things with so much appreciation - just going to the faucet to get a glass of water. Not all people can do that. God has blessed us.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Elizabeth Oxhorn is a junior at Greenbrier Christian.
by CNB