On Location in Zambia: Victoria Falls Rope Swing

The bungee jumping at Victoria Falls in Zambia is world-famous. I decided to seize the day while filming for the 2010 MOVE documentary in Zambia and do it. The bungee jump was pretty much what I expected. You can see footage of the bungee jump on my personal blog (http://ericepperson.blogspot.com). This rope swing on steroids, that became part of the package deal, was surprisingly more intense.

On Location in Zambia: Extras

While filming a story about the water crisis in Zambia last month, we spent a lot of time with a young girl named Abigail and her family. Josh Hall got to know her younger siblings while shooting a scene outside her house. He even gave them some tips on lighting.

On Location in Zambia:  Lunchtime at the Mackenzie school

Early this fall, a small film crew went to Zambia in Africa to uncover the story of hope that is currently emerging from the midst of the water crisis. What we saw blew our minds. It wasn’t just the fact that there was a huge need in Zambia. What really impressed us was the number of people and programs that were stepping up to make a difference. One of these programs was the feeding program at a little school in the Mackenzie neighborhood, a slum outside the city of Ndola. Only some of the kids in Ndola go to school. Many don’t because they lack the resources, or sometimes adult encouragement, to make it to the classroom everyday. The feeding program at Mackenzie goes above and beyond the norm. The people there work to serve lunch to as many kids, students or not, as possible everyday.

This past summer at MOVE, all attendees was given a “Kingdom Worker” challenge. It was presented in a sealed envelope and there were approx 50-75 different challenges that the students could get. Two of the challenges read, “1000 4 H20: Raise $1000 (at a job, doing chores, selling your stuff) and donate it to Blood Water Mission.“ and “26.2: Commit to being healthier. Train and run a marathon before next summer. Get started at www.activewater.org.”

Since then we have seen and heard of some incredible stories of students who have taken the cards and “ran” with them. There was a student who rode his bike across Indiana to raise money and awareness. Below you will see an awesome story about a student named Ian from Kansas who took the task to another level…by adding a couple of zeros to the end.

At Christ in Youth, we have decided to take it a step further and all programs will address the water crisis in the world next year. Next year, with MOVE specifically, we will try to raise enough offering next summer to build 5 wells in Zambia, Africa. Tomorrow, our MOVE programming staff will be in Nashville meeting with Blood:Water and Active:Water about a partnership for next summer. We are looking at possibly creating a film similar to “BAHT” but raising awareness for the water crisis.

I would ask that you would pray for the meeting tomorrow, that the Lord will lead us in the correct direction about this partnership. Also, pray for Ian that the Lord would continue to give him strength and perseverance over the next year.

Here is Ian’s story (email from Ian to Daren of Active:Water):

Hey Daren,

It’s nice to hear from you. I actually heard your story at a CIY MOVE conference. On the last night CIY handed out envelopes to each student. Inside the envelopes were cards describing a different task for the individual to do. But we were only to open them if we were serious about doing it. Now, I’m not going to lie, when I opened mine, my first thought was, “Wow. How am I supposed to run a marathon?” But the more I thought about it, it fits. Now, I’m not much of a runner, but one of my teammates had been training already for a marathon and the other is pretty athletic (and I’m not so bad myself). The more we began to think and dream of what God can do and what God wants to do through us, we’ve decided to raise $100,000 between the three of us. Along with raising $100,000, we also look to travel to Africa to give the people not only physical water, but the everlasting water of Jesus Christ. The race we are now looking at racing in is the Lynn Electric Kansas Marathon in Lawrence, Kansas (they have added a marathon for the April 2010 race).

That’s our story (as it’s developing). Here’s a little bit about me:

I’m 17 years old (18 in a few days) and I’m a Senior in High School in Wichita, Kansas. I had known that there was a water crisis, but never really grasped the depth of it until viewing your site. I’m heavily involved in church and I love being there. The church has become my second home. In fact, I work there everyday at a daycare. After my senior year, I plan on going up to Ozark Christian College to become a pastor. I’m really passionate about people and showing Christ to the world (although I fail at it everyday), so my desire to “deliver” the water myself is pretty strong. If there’s anyway you could help us do that, please do. We would love to run with you.

Thank you for your help.

Ian