Pray for the Nations. Pray for Taiwan.

Reflection: Sharon Lin-STM

After five days of camp I’ve definitely learned a lot about God’s movement in His people, through His people.

The first few days I was going crazy-my kids were wild and completely out of control. Every class was a battle. The kids made fun of each other, and all the teachers. I went to into each class excited to teach and was defeated within minutes of stepping into the classroom by the kids’ vicious words. So many times I felt like I wanted to give up; But each time God provided a TA, STM, SGL, or co-worker to help me. As I hit brick walls, God crumbled them for me. Through this, I began to understand the truth behind Matthew 6:33, But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. When I chose to serve Him, the Lord provided. Furthermore I was able to truly experience 1 Peter 5:7, “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

Through something as basic as learning the camp dances, God also worked to increase my faith in Him and my understanding of his love. Let me start with a fact; I cannot dance and I have terrible memory for choreography. Through this, however,God used my weaknesses to reveal Himself to me. It was through my weakness that I was able to see His great strength overcome my humanity. I had joyfully thought that God provided for my weakness when I assumed I had song 8 (flag dance, no dancing) in the beginning of camp, but after we reselected songs I was ironically stuck with song 7, which was rumored to be the most difficult dance out of all the songs. I was in despair. I knew that on my own I’d never be able to learn the dance before I had to teach my students. However, God knew what I needed better was better than what I thought I needed. By giving me the hardest song, God humbled me and then proceeded to show me love beyond anything I’ve ever experienced in a church body before. My teaching group patiently worked with me for hours for the two remaining days, and showed me 1 Corinthians 13 love. What humbled me the most was that my team consisted of sisters and a brother that was younger than me. In my mind, I should have been the one taking care of and showing love to them, but instead they cared for me and showed me what love from God truly looked like. He humbled me to allow my group to really bond and create a better teaching team for the students that He would transform. Aside from my teaching team, I was also extremely humbled by the unconditional and unending love from the other STMs, co-workers, worship team, and DV team. It was encouraging to see everyone working to be the hands and feet of Christ, loving our students, the TAs, and each other.

The heart and passion for worship and praise to the Lord in each person overflowed into the camp and was infectious. Seeing the passion that the Christians in Taiwan have for evangelism and the gospel leaves me with great hope that Taiwan is beginning to see a revolution for Christ. As AEF continues, year after year, to plant seeds in the hearts of more and more youth in Taiwan, I am eager to see the fruit that is bore when the youth step up and lead, and through leadership, bring about the next generation. Looking at AEF from previous years and seeing the leadership in AEF now, it is evident that God word has really been moving through AEF, and it’scrazy exciting!!

Reflection: Tiffany Tam-STM

How I’ve changed at AEF camp? I have been reassured of God’s presence during this camp. I went into this missions trip not really knowing what to expect at all and I was especially nervous since my Mandarin skills are very much less than proficient. The strange thing is that when it came time for meeting the other Taiwanese peoples and campers, everything just felt right.

I realized that when you rely on God, like really depend and lift everything up to Him…He will provide and He’s got our back. He provided a group with more than helpful TAs, and supportive helpers that comforted me and helped me get through the week in a place where I only understood 5% of what was going on.

It was really great seeing everyone working together from such diverse backgrounds. I really enjoyed building relationships with the TAs, the other STMers and the Taiwanese Aborigines. The friendships I made inTaiwanfelt so real because we all struggled and worked hard together for a common mission, to spread the love of God to others.

The week went by a lot faster than expected and I wasn’t sure if I made enough of an impact on the kids. I connected a lot more with the girls in my class so I tried talking to them more about the gospel and sharing my testimony before I put them to bed. Being 9 and 10 years old and extremely giddy, I’m not sure if any of it got through to them… but on the last day of the last large group gathering, they played “He Knows My Name” and something unexpected happened. The girls whom I spent most of my time with came toward to hug me with tears in their eyes, and of course tears down my face followed quickly after. That moment made my week more than worth it.

I felt such joy when I saw the happiness in the kids, I love everyone in my group. But I especially hope that the kids and the TAs were touched by God’s presence during the camp. I pray that they will become more curious about his works and may want to accept the great gift. I learned that God is truly great, dependable, powerful, and most of all…LOVING!

I missTaiwanand AEF a lot and hope to better my Mandarin skills so that I can potentially go back in the future. I also hope to maintain and continue my relationships with the people I met this summer. It was definitely a record-breaking awesome summer. I LOVE AEF!

Reflection: Jeff Chang-STM

I am gracious that I came to AEF camp. What I really felt through this camp was God’s love. God’s love breaks barriers of language, culture, and age difference. When I first saw my kids, even though I did not know Chinese, I knew if I just loved them, God’s love would shine. Working with [Shirley], [Nathan] [Esther] [Tiffany] and [Carrie], I learned how humor can bond a group. I also loved that each of us was different and brought a unique quality to the group.

I loved the kids the most. Even though they laughed at me for my bad Chinese, I really saw how love can impact a kids actions and thoughts. My kids were wonderful. They listened, played games, and joked around with me. I hope God can continue to impact their lives and AEF camp is just the beginning of their long journey in Christ. One last thing I hope my little sister Carrie was impacted to get to know Christ. She is awesome and I want her to know the power of God’s love. I will pray for her.