International Travel Team 2018 - Mongolia

     After a long plane ride from Chicago 5 team members from 2 churches in America arrived in UlaanBataar,  Mongolia on Saturday night. Sunday they attended church and met to play the VBS and plan the following week. 

     Tuesday and Wednesday were spent helping with a vacation bible school just outside of Ulaanbator. On Tuesday there were 30 children between the ages of 3 and 11 from the local community that participated.  Wednesday was for children between the ages of 12 and. The local teacher was anticipating between 30 and 40 participants however only 12 showed up.  The children that came said that the local mosque had orchestrated a program for the day and encouraged the children to come to their program instead.  The travel team wrote and performed a drama depicting the story of David and Goliath for these 2 days.  (This was to fit with the theme of the camp of ____________). The travel team also help with crafts, one of which included decorating a picture frame with a picture of the student in it and John 3:16  printed on the back of the frame in their local language.

     Thursday afternoon was the start of the young adult camp in the national park Terelj.  Seventeen Participants from 4 congregations were represented.  There was one individual who traveled by bus for 26 hours from western Mongolia to participate.  This camp ended after Lunch on Saturday. The workshops included a personality study, drama instruction, Forgiveness, and a Revelations workshop. 3 different teams wrote and performed a christian drama in Mongolian. We pray that the Holy Spirit work through these topics and activities to teach the young members of the local churches how to interact with one another and how to forgive one another.  
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    There is continued need for doctrinally correct Lutheran teachings, and interaction with local people and congregations. There is interest in having another OAFC group come, but before we consider such a trip again the fundraising goals for this trip need to be met. Please consider continuing to support these ministry efforts and pray for the growth of the church here. A more complete team report will be published on the Facebook later this month.