Covenant News

Mission Adventure Takes Joey to Cameroon

YAOUNDE, CAMEROON (November 5, 2001) - The toy horse named Joey is now in Cameroon on the third leg of a missionary adventure that began when his youthful owner, Skylar Hunter, offered the toy as a gift to help children in other parts of the world.

The Minnesota boy placed the toy horse in an offering plate during a Vacation Bible School (VBS) event designed to support a similar program in Mexico. New Life Covenant Church (Twig Chapel) in Twig, Minnesota, was raising funds for the program in Puebla, Mexico.

As he explained later, Skylar had no money and decided to give his most prized possession - a gift from his grandmother who had died just three weeks earlier. He said he wanted the Mexican children to enjoy the horse as much as he had.

Skylar's moving story sparked the idea to send Joey on a worldwide mission adventure as one way to share with other children what it means to be generous and concerned about the well being of other children. Joey spends time in a given area and then is sent on to another area of mission work within the Evangelical Covenant Church. For a more complete story on Skylar's gift and Joey's adventures to date, visit the special link on the home page of this website.

Joey currently resides at Rain Forest International School (RFIS), an educational facility for Covenant missionary children in grades 7-12 who live in Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Central African Republic. The school hopes to increase classroom space after recently expanding its educational program to include junior high students.

He began his adventure in Puebla with missionaries Jerry and Vicky Love and many children who were participating in a VBS program for neighborhood kids in a housing development near the church. The Loves sent Skylar a note of thanks and a bookmark - they were presented to him during a recent service at the Minnesota church, according to pastor Earl Dunbar.

In October, Joey was flown to Russia, where he visited Magadan, St. Petersburg and Moscow. A Moscow radio station is trying to upgrade children's Christian programming and the Covenant church is working with radio station HCJB to aid the effort. Joey also visited an orphanage, according to Richard and Jan Epps-Dawson, regional coordinators for Europe and Russia.

Two months ago, Joey was quite warm in Mexico. A month ago, Joey was wearing a heavy red coat while traveling around frigid Russia. This month, he will be in much more moderate temperatures in the tropical rain forest of southern Cameroon while visiting the 76 children at RFIS. Africa regional coordinator Pete Ekstrand said that Joey should be more comfortable in Cameroon because RFIS is located 2,500 feet above sea level and isn't as hot and muggy as in other areas of the country.

RFIS is sponsored by the Evangelical Covenant Church, the Evangelical Free Church Mission and Wycliffe Bible Translators Overseas (known as SIL). Each entity is committed to raise $75,000 over the next three years. The school hopes to add buildings and purchase land to expand athletic facilities. For more information about Rain Forest International School, visit www.rfis.org.

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