Wednesday, December 11, 2002

In the Beginning

Seasons Greetings everyone! This is the first official email update from the exciting lives of Danny and Alycia DeLong! Some of you are probably thinking, "Its about time those lazy snobs wrote!"; and some are thinking, "I've received mass emails before, what makes this one any different?" Still others are thinking, "How did you get my email address? Will my Block Sender option work?" Well, in response to all your thoughts:

1. Please forgive us for not doing this sooner. We did not mean to be lazy snobs.
2. Our general emails will be filled with exciting tales of adventure, inspirational testimonies, but mostly embarassing mishaps. That is not an empty promise.
3. We have our ways of sending you our updates, whether you like it or not. There is no escape. So you might as well enjoy!

So without further delay, here is the premier segment of the "DeLong Adventures" (though I'll try to make DeLong story short...ha ha ha!) (Please don't stop reading already)
We have officially passed the half-way point of bootcamp here at LifeForce, which means everyone is pretty drained from the intense classes and relentless practises. The Malta team has been doing great! There are 11 of us on the team (there was 10 until a couple of weeks ago when the England team was dissolved due to lack of missions and team members). We have split our 6-guy-5-girl group into 2 sections; one drama and one music. The play we are taking to Malta is a sort of musical mockery of the recently popular programs "Teen Idol" and "Pop Stars". In the drama there are 5 characters competing for fame and fortune, and one janitor with her mop just doing their job. The entire play is the same scene acted out 5 times, only each is from a different character's view point. Through the different characters issues such as peer pressure, drugs, relationships, acceptance, and true happiness are portrayed. All the music is performed live by our very own actors and band, so it makes for quite the production!

The schedule for our time in Malta is quickly filling. We will be in almost every school performing our play and sharing in classes. Every Sunday we will be in a different church, as well as taking part in youth groups and Bible studies on a regular basis. In addition we are planning a small mission for the girls and guys separately. Hopefully in April the men of our team will accompany a pastor from Malta into Libya to help take supplies to the Libyan churches. Meanwhile the ladies of the team would take a short trip to Sicily to work with some churches there. We have been working on raising $5000 for this exciting opportunity!

Another exciting opportunity that will be happening is that we will be hosting another team on a short-term mission. The Regina Apostolic Church will be sending us a group of prayer warriors in Febuary/March for two weeks. They will be supporting the team in prayer as well as ministering in churches and taking part in outreaches.

This is about all I have for right now. It could have been much longer but I left out all of the everyday details concerning classes and practises (which are going great by the way). I will work on sending some team photos and such with our next email. Until then, have a wonderful holiday season and God Bless!

Sincerely,
~Danny & Alycia DeLong

P.S.- Oh yeah, as for non-LifeForce stuff, we are doing great - loving Calgary, LifeForce and the Lord! Also both of us are doing well healthwise, though we would like a little more sleep!