Some friends arrived yesterday from the States. Casey was an intern with us in 2004; Beth has been out here on mission trips for many years in a row and is joined this time by her husband Marty (his first Africa experience). We’ve been planning and looking forward to this trip since October and it’s exciting that it’s finally here. I’m especially excited for Casey to see the growth in various areas of the ministry. She will get to visit the LaunchPad classes which she taught, revisiting with students she knew and meeting the many new ones that now attend. It’s a blessing that she can see firsthand the fruit of all she did as an intern two years ago.

Casey & Co. filled every spare inch in their luggage with blessings for us. My mom sent them lots of things to bring over for us – our mail, some things we ordered online, and some nice surprises. (Mom, the Christmas wrapping paper really added to the “Christmas feeling” we had as we opened everything!) They also brought us a resource for the ministry office that their church purchased for us – a resource/tool that has been on my wish list for years (God is faithful!).

But most of their luggage space was filled with 200 copies of our new ministry DVD…

We began work on the new DVD project last July. An amazing friend and partner sponsored the entire project, including flying out a film and production crew in August to get the footage needed. It took almost 3 hours of an on-camera interview to get two finished videos of 12 minutes and 3 minutes each. It’s been a long and extensive project, with lots of work being done Stateside by the production team. As things progressed, they would upload a small size, low resolution version for us to look at, edit, and approve. Now that Casey arrived with the actual finished product, we have finally seen for the first time the completed work.

We are so excited about it. It truly captures our heart and vision and what God is doing through us here in South Africa. It is a wonderful blessing to finally see it come to fruition after having worked on it for such a long time. I can’t wait to get it in people’s hands so they can see for themselves the fruit of their giving, praying, and laboring.

Fruit. I’ve mentioned it several times here already; it’s been on my mind lately. Jesus commanded us to bear fruit. Not just any fruit, but fruit that will last. I am challenged to judge my everyday life and all that I do by the “fruit factor”: Is what I am doing going to bear lasting fruit? What kind of fruit is the attitude I am displaying going to bear in the lives of those around me?

As I go about this coming week, I am striving to remain mindful of the fruit factor. May my life bear the fruit that it should as one surrendered to God…