Once again, I’m delighted to have someone else write something to post on here! This is another post from my good friend Kyle Hooker. Enjoy!
“Oh Captain! My Captain!”
Hi folks. Kyle Hooker here with some words and reflections about our 2019 Nape Na Si Mission trip out to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota.
Last year was my first year with them and was such a moving experience, that I longed to bring my family back out with me this year. These mission trips are an incredible way to meet new people, serve each other, as well as the Natives and to experience the culture and ways of those people.
You will really find a lot of likenesses towards your own lives from being with them. This year, we experienced a lot! A lot of frustrations (the cold, the rain, the flat tires, miscalculations, misunderstandings, poor decisions, exhaustion, etc), but in the meantime, we found joy in being with each other and with our friends, and just experiencing life together by spending time with the kids on the playground, and the adults, too!
Spencer did a wonderful job as always presenting them with the word of God in a way that relates to them, (well, all of us really!) during the VBS portion of our day. Several of the men and young men would go to remote locations and perform work too.
Every day, we would wake up and begin our days with chores that needed to be done to prepare us for leaving for the village to be with the people, and every night, clean up and prepare for the next day. Everyday chores and responsibility are essential towards making this mission successful because it is an effort to really be the “hands and feet” of Jesus to these people.
It truly takes the entire team’s willingness and devotion to make it successful. Everyone one of us that went out there had an exhausting trip but, everyone of us became more aware of our dependency on God, and each other.
This year, there were kids and family members that remembered me from last year, and that was really cool. If you’re searching for a purpose, this trip is for you . If you’re looking for a way to help others, it’s for you! If you’re looking for an adventure, this trip is for you. If you’re looking for an experience, this trip is for you. Are you willing? Because God is waiting on someone just like you, to answer the call!
Contact Lloyd Mullins for more details!
Hi Kyle,
Thanks for sharing. I so agree with you. For me it was a trip of a lifetime and I enjoyed meeting everyone including you and your very sweet family. I miss everyone as it was a great group of people to hang out with for a week. That is what I liked about it, it wasn’t a “church oriented mission trip” (I’ve been on too many of those) where one feels they have to perform a certain way. No it was just a bunch of kind, down to earth folk who had a common goal of helping eachother serve and try to demonstrate to the best of our ability God’s love, kindness and compassion to other folk less fortunate than us. Plus I always like people from the mid-west as I’m a foreigner from way out west here. Spencer kept teasing me about being a Starbucks’s snob, but I’m not, as I don’t live in Seattle but Spokane.
What a beautiful picture too, that is so cool how you overlapped it with the image of Crazy Horse. I think I’m correct in saying that?
I hope to make it out again next year as I would love to see everyone again. I’m at the moment looking for another job, so not sure what I will be doing next June, but do any of us? No…all we have is the gift of today.
God Bless and say hi to Stacy, Kyle and Tyler for me.
woops I forgot to add this to the above comment. If anyone is interested in going, I’d encouraged you to. Another thing I really liked about it was having the tangible experience with helping the Indians. You know how you send money to missions and you kind of wonder where your money is going, or is it really helping in the way you want it to? Well, with this trip you get to see with your own eyes and actually live the experience where every penny of your money goes.
That I find quite cool.
Ellen, You were correct! Take care and be blessed! Kyle