Elev8 Video

Headed back to Texas!

What an amazing journey.  Learned alot about teamwork over the course of the past 6 days that we have been together.  We now know what it means to serve the Least of These.  Our lives will never look the same.  There has been growth beyond measure.  Someone in our group summed it up best by saying that, "many of the things that we complain about doing in our everyday lives have been the exact things that we have been asked to do on this trip."
God stretches us to do and go beyond what we ever imagined we could do on our own.  He used us for his glory and he has big plans for our future.  He is preparing us to do great things right here in our own neighborhoods, schools and community.

Parents, your children are going to have some awesome stories to share with you when they get home.

A special thanks goes out to Rawd, Justin and the folks at Wonder Voyage for helping us create an unforgettable experience and encounter with God.  Thank you to YWAM for the Pink House and John for the Katrina devastation tour.  To our new friends at the ReNew School, Vosey, Harold and Joey, we can't wait to hear all the success stories with your students.  Our painter buddies, AJ and Carlos, thanks for helping us get things done.  Johnny and Sissy, thank you for your example of love, faith, and generosity that reaches all over the world.  For all of us in the Elev8 group, thanks for all the prayers and support from family and friends.  We could not have done this without you.

Elev8 Summer 2011

YWAM Pink House

Plans are already in motion for our Summer 2012 mission trip!!!

Final Day - New Orleans

Today, Elev8 went on a swamp tour and saw many different animals from alligators to snapping turtles. Our tour guide Captain Joey, did an awesome job explaining to us all of the life forms. We learned about the life style of the alligators that live there, and the Spanish moss. When we started to go down the swamp, we found out that it was a man made canal created to carry oil drilling equipment. The canal joined into a bayou where we saw different types of vegetation.When we started to head back, captain Joey brought out a baby alligator and passed it around to everyone.

Swamp Tour
'You are now entering gator country'

An American gator, who likes American food, cool ranch Doritos's!

 After the swamp tour, we had a little time to go shopping! We went down to the French Quarter, the famous shopping market. We got there and we had a plan to all walk down there and end up at the end all together but knowing our group we went different ways. By the end of the day we had purchased lots of treasures to bring back to Texas. We had the pleasure of  visiting the the Saint Louis Cathedral. And on the way out we stopped and watched a live jazz band comprised of several young men not much older than us.

French Quarter

Silver man in the street playing it up, with a trumpet.

 Although separated at the beginning, we all found each other at the cafe' Du Monde enjoying the delicious beignets.

Heading back home on the ferry, we caught a glimpse of the China shipping line.

A painting on the ceiling from the Saint Louis Cathedral.




When we arrived back home from our dinner, we all gathered in the kitchen for one more talk. The leaders put together individual awards for every one of us. Rawd, Justin and Pastor Jon also received their own individual prizes. After the awards the mood in the room changed immediately. We did one last exercise called 'pass the candle'. We all shared our, what we called an 'ah ha' moment that we experienced on the trip. We also passed the candle to a friend who we saw grow over the Mission trip and we pointed out how they contributed to the work we did through Jesus Christ. We all saw with our own eyes, and felt with our hearts, the love and the light of Christ. All of the individual moments were special and changed lives forever. We all came here blind, and now we see. All the glory to God.

Please see more photos at www.lifechurchdfw.com/no/missions

Contributing writers:
Cori
MK
&
Kori

Day 4 - New Orleans

So today was very exciting. Although everyone seemed alittle more tired today despite having a little extra rest. Today we helped out at Fair Haven Orphanage with some real hardcore manual labor. To say that we're tired would be an understatement. The ladies and some of the leaders put support letters into envelopes, they folded nearly 3000.

Here's the team hard at work

Jonathan also had the labor workers finish up the work for the school, so we're very excited to see the completed project.  We will go back by ReNew School tomorrow to check it out!

This orphanage is very important for these children, it shows kids that God does answer prayer and they have all seen it first hand on more than one occasion. The Director of the orphanage Johnny Huffman is also the father of the home. He teaches the kids that God doesn't use what we don't have, he uses what we do have.

 and what we do have is strength, we we're definitely pushed to our limits physically today. We mowed, weed eated, cleaned, picked up trash, did lots of laundry, and got stung by lots and lots of hornets. We were also blessed as Johnny would come by each of our work projects and tell us personal stories of how God has provided in every circumstance over the course of the 40 plus years this ministry has been caring for children not only here in New Orleans, but their generosity stretches all over the world.  Christmas Joy Boxes are sent to over 2000 children every Christmas to Romania.  There are no words to describe how Johnny and his wife Sissy have been true examples of faith, believing that prayer works and always giving the praise and glory to Jesus Christ for making all things possible.

Finsihed out the day with an awesome BBQ

But hard work does pay off, because the harder the work the sweeter the play, and even though we may have our moments, we are a band of brothers. We know we can play together, we know we can pray together, but most of all, with a day like today, we know we can do God's work anywhere.



More Pictures at www.lifechurchdfw.com/no/Missions -Contributing writer, Sean

Day 3 - New Orleans continued...

Tonight we had the pleasure of dining the fine cuisine of Team 2.  Tacos, refried beans, rice and cookies for dessert but before we supped, we got to enjoy a show....a play...a comedy of sorts about the "Stone Soup" story but relaying it to Tacos!  We all enjoyed a great meal and great company.  After dinner, the kids all gathered and played "Mafia"!  What a joy it is to see these kids all play well together!
   Our lesson that Rawd spoke to us tonight was about the living and the dead.  Tying it to how we live our lives and the death that we sometimes struggle with.  This led us to a cemetery.  Before we walked through the gates, we stopped for a moment of reflection, speaking about the "DASH". There are two dates on each tombstone, one the day a person is born and the second the day that person dies.  Our challenge was to reflect on the significance of our lives or the "dash" between the dates. We have one chance, one life to make a difference and what we do with each day signifies how we define "our dash".  We were asked to wander quietly through this cemetery, take time to reflect on peoples dates, their dashes.  Many of the grave markers were tall, stately, read words of love and respect, and others, dates worn, graves crumbled, unkempt, neglected.  After a while we were asked to meet up with each other and Rawd shared a song that reflected on how the world treats God.  When its good, it's very good and God is good and when it's bad, it's ugly and that's how the world sees our God.  But we as believers entrust our faith in a God who is good all the time, even through our pain and struggle.  We shared hurts, struggles and prayed for each other and for those who we encounter each day.  Our journal entry was: "Grave Thoughts", our reflections on our time spent in the cemetery.

   After coming back to the "Pink House" we enjoyed a rousing game of "I never".  We laughed and some of us even cried a little (from laughing so hard)!  Tomorrow, we set out to make a difference at an orphanage and look forward to sharing love, hope and His great love for all of us.

Day 3 - New Orleans



Main Hall Before

Main Hall After

 In just two days, with a little help from our new friends AJ and Carlos, this is our finished product!
Monday, August 1st will be the first day of school for the ReNew School students.  We may never meet any of the students who walk through the doors of this school on Monday morning, but we know that God is blessing each one of these young students lives. And our lives will never be the same knowing that God used us to make some positive impact in this wonderful community. For more pictures, visit our website at  www.lifechurchdfw.com/no/Missions
  

Elev8 Mission Team with Carlos and AJ

                        

Day 2 - New Orleans continued...

We finished our trip to the 9th Ward up with a challenge, derived from a story shared to us by Rawd. the story was a bout a well know man who sat at the front gate of his town with a stone and a pot. Each time village people made their way through the gate, to sell their goods in the town square, they would stop and ask the crazy old man what he was doing. Each time the answer was the same  he said, "I'm making stone soup" and each time the village people responded by saying "your crazy", but they each gave him some goods that they were going to sell. By the end of the day when everybody had sold their goods they all made their way back home, but they each managed to stop and check on the crazy old man with the stone soup. When they got there were surprised to see that he managed to make soup, using the ingredients they had each gave them. our mission was to prepare a meal for our entire mission team using 100 dollars. They had 20 minutes to figure out what they wanted to make and the purchase their items from Casey Jones grocery store, the teams were divided into two teams of 8 people, they had to prepare their food and set the the table in 1 hour, then they were graded by our judges, the leaders, in five different categories. Team 1 cooked first tonight and decided to prepare a delicious garden salad followed by garlic bread and a mean plate of Fettuccine Alfredo. Tomorrow night will be Team 2 chance to pull together as a band of brothers and create their meal. After dinner and a little bit of free time we embarked on our journey to Cafe DuMonde for their famous beignets. the travel included a ferry ride to East Bank, which for many was their first ferry ride. On our way back to our ferry a few of us were stopped by a lady named Dorothy who was just seeking prayer. Later we were stopped by a kind man who wanted to pray over our mission team, which was a huge blessing. We are looking to finish our painting project that we started today, by adding the final 2 coats of paint. For pictures check www.lifechurchdfw.com/no/Missions