Paul & Kev's Blog from Yesterday 7/29 (We had technical diffies)

Before we begin today's blog post, here are a few pics for your viewing pleasure:

My name is Kevin Mauer, and I am writing this post in collaboration with a reverend sage by the name of Paul Bunyan Staats, whom you will meet later on. Together, we will provide you, the reader, with a flavorful account of the campside happenings of the past 24 hours. Hold on to your hats.

I'm sure you're all thankful that Zach and Emily so selflessly chose to stay back from yesterday's hike in order to provide yesterday's post -- the post was, after all, a stroke of brilliance rivalling Lief's and Johnny's performance of "Too Late to Apologize" at last week's coffeehouse. Anyway, I appreciate their sacrifice all the more because it was SUCH A GREAT HIKE! We all set out after lunch, all laughing and joking together in Romanian and English. (I had a wonderful coversation with a Romanian boy my age named Manuel, about English slang and language in general. He knew way more about the history of English than I did.) We started on a gravel road lined with trees as old as Romania. Then we reached a meadow with a beautiful, rocky creek. Beside the trail were scattered old abandoned horse carts that are pretty characteristic of the Romanian countryside (and big cities too! ... when we flew into Bucharest, one of the first sights I could make out below from the plane was a peasant woman driving a horse in the middle of town -- I thought that was cool). The real hike began when Lief turned to his right and announced, "In Romania they have a different philosophy on trail-making. Mountain trails don't have switchbacks, they go straight up." Literally, straight up (but safe, of course). We made trains by holding hands and labored up the mountainside. There was a rocky summit that offered remarkable views of the entire wilderness. The best part, though, waited for us a little way down the trail. When we came back out of the trees, we came upon the most beautiful pasture I've ever seen. It was, like, straight out of "Heidi" or "The Sound of Music" or something. Far below, in the middle of the pasture, there was a tiny one-room shack, outside of which a man and a woman were chopping wood -- doing just as they have done day after day, generation after generation, living out their existence in serene seclusion (or, at least, that's the scenario I imagined as I sat fixated on the expansive landscape before me). There is so much simple beauty on God's Earth. There are so many opportunities to experience Creation in ways that demand us to respond by glorifying His name. Man, it was something. By and by, we headed down the hill, hanging around and posing with the cattle along the way. (For safety's sake, we had to check each one's underside. More than once we had to shout "Bull!" and run away.) At the bottom of the hill we found sheep and a grizzled shepherd. A few of us and some of the campers got pictures with him, too. He wore muddy shoes, muddy pants, a muddy shirt, a hat, and a pink Barbie backpack that was very small on him. Don't ask me where he found it. I bet it's quite a story. He was friendly and a little shy. He posed for a picture with April and Manu, one of our Romanian leaders, told him that she is an American. The shepherd was astonished and smiled. He said in Romanian that she is beautiful and offered her sheep cheese from his backpack. Sufficiently creeped out, April moved away from the shepherd and tried to communicate that she could do without the gift. (One of the campers took it instead.) The lives of the shepherd and the man and woman chopping wood are very different from those of all the other Romanians we've met.

In the evening Eric delivered a great message about forgiving others. He introduced to our campers the concept that we can only be truly whole when we let go of the hard feelings we have for people who have wronged us. It was an important message for them to hear, being the other side of the gospel of Grace topic that was explained by Dan the night before. Eric tied into his message a moving video interview with Valentin (one of our Romanian leaders) about how he has forgiven the older boys in his childhood orphanage for forcing him to steal and brutally beating him. For years it became custom for older boys to control the lives of the younger ones with violence. When Valentin was a teenager, however, he and his friends broke the "cycle of ungrace" by treating the younger boys with respect. He overcame the hardship in his life by loving the sinner and hating the sin. In his message, Eric articulated very well that grace sets free the forgiver and the forgiven alike. And now the moment you've all been waiting for...words coming to you directly from Dr. Love himself, Paul Staats.

Hey errrrbody...you may be wondering why Kevin called me Dr. Love......I'd ask Lief for an explanation, he is the ultimate giver of nicknames. Besides Dr. Love, he has given me ones such as Pwetty Paul, Bucket, Buckwheat, Pwince, and his personal favorite, Pwetty Pwince Paul. Sooo as you can imagine, every day I feel more and more confident in my masculinity. Thanks Lief.

Yesterday was great. The hike was awesome, Eric's talk was poetic, and for the most part, it seemed that in our small groups there was a great change of pace...I've been hearing many stories of campers opening up and reaching new depths as far as questions and conversations. It seems that many of them have a difficult time grasping the fact that God's forgiveness is all-encompassing. A camper in my small group actually stormed out in the middle of our conversation about God's forgiveness because he was so disturbed by the idea. Clearly there are many walls that need to be broken down for many of these kids, so please continue to pray for them. Tonight, Lief will be preaching about the prodigal son parable, which I can imagine will be very ground-breaking to many of the campers. So I'm expecting great things to happen tonight in our small groups.....

To all you parents out there, way to go on raising awesome kids. I am continually impressed by our team, especially the students! As I've learned from other mission trips, there is a big difference between going on a mission trip and actually doing missions work. For a mission trip to be effective, everybody on the team really needs to put themselves out there, and I think your kids have truly done so. I wish you could see firsthand the effect they have on the campers here!

Aaand here's a few shout-outs:

Amy to Mom: I am, mom.....thanks! :) Love you!

Amy to Lyss: Of course! I'll fill you in on everything when I get back. Can't wait to hear all your Iowa news! :) I have some good stories for you too! Love you!

Malachi to Will: Thanks for reading the blog see you when I get back.

Malachi to Kenzie: Hey Girrrrl miss you and I'll tell you all the stories Hunter doesn't. >-----< Here's a virtual hug till I see you :)

Malachi to Mom & Dad: Thanks! Love you! Miss you!

Megan to family: hey guess what?! sat in cow poop today.

Kati to Mom, Dad & Em: Hope you're having fun in LBI. I miss the beach! Love you all & tell everyone at the P's that I say hi.

Taylor to Colin: I miss my Collie Mon!! I love you! Kati misses you too.

Larry & Pat to Anne & Audra: We miss you and love you!

Nikki to Krissy: Glad you have been so productive! Proud of ya! :) ILY!

Tess to the Pankratz Fam: Missing you! But I am having an amazing time :) see you soon!

Jenna to Jacqueline Jacobson: You rock, girl! Missing you!

Sheri to financial & prayer supporters: This trip is amazing, its great to be a part of God's work here. Thanks for making it possible!

Sheri to Bradley: I love you, always and forever!

Pau Stau to Lau Mau: Bring it to the Tau Pau....we can't let the frogs beat us....

Zack to Tess: Hey.

Zack to the fam: Hope everything's goin good!

John to Jimmy: Word to your mother.

Hunter to Mommy: I'm feeling a lot better. Your letter said "can't wait to see you on August 20th". So I guess I'll see you in a little less than a month ;)