Hi!  My name is John, and I’m very much looking forward to the upcoming trip to Bolivia in April!  This will be my 3rd GO Team with Blackhawk, the previous 2 going to Honduras being a part of helping with medical aspects of people’s lives, as well as serving in partnership with other men from Honduras to be able to encourage and support Amor Fe Esperanza which serves children and families who are living and working in or near the dump.   With this new partnership, I’m looking forward to being a part of the partnership that Blackhawk is entering with Food For the Hungry and the community of Lajastambo.

I want to first thank everyone who has helped support me through giving and through prayer, and being a part of the partnership that we are starting with Food for the Hungry, and look forward to sharing with all of you the things we are learning and growing in and with the community during and after our trip as well!

All of the travel plans and different logistics for traveling internationally often take the focus away from being able to remember that we as Christians are image bearers of God, and in truth, the people we interact with are also the image bearers of God!  It’s such an amazing thing to even begin to consider, and often I find myself thinking of people different than me as just “different” and so therefore there’s something “wrong”, but God has been truly challenging me over the past several years as I’ve gone on trips internationally, and especially here within Madison that we are all beautifully different, but made united in Christ.  In the past year especially, I’ve been asking God to keep showing our world through God’s eyes, to see what He sees, to love what He loves, and to act on what He cares about.  Little by little God shows me bits and pieces of each of these things, and every day, I find myself in awe of the beauty in all of the different cultures, peoples, and ideas that come from everywhere, each revealing the beauty of who God is.  As, this trip is coming up, I look forward to God helping me see even more of the beauty and people who live in Lajastambo in getting to know them better and form relationships with them.

In light of all of that, I ask for prayers that God would help all of us on our trip in each of the things He has for us, and that we will all have safe travels as well.  Looking forward to telling you all more as we get closer, during, and after!

Here’s a picture of myself with my wife Hailly,