UniShow Christmas Circus 2017

Early December, we flew back to Washington DC from Brazil and a few short days later began a crazy and amazing week with McLean Bible Church.

Look up! The UniShow is that-a way!

First, we had 3 outreaches scheduled at local schools where MBC is building relationships with families. On Friday night, 8 December, students came to Hutchinson Elementary for a UniShow where they heard the Gospel. They also had fun with bouncy castles, dodge-ball, making gingerbread house, then they received gifts of hats and gloves before heading home. This event was scheduled to repeat at two different schools on Saturday, but due to a snow storm forecast, the school district closed their facilities which meant our events were cancelled. 

Our assistants, David and Misun arrived Friday night. They are workers in Turkey whom we’ve performed with countless times in numerous countries for the past 9 years. They were on home assignment in the States during this time so we were able to recruit them to join us for these events. None of us had any idea the fun that was in store this week as we joined forces to create the UniShow Christmas Circus for McLean’s 2nd annual Christmas Village Outreach. We surprised even ourselves with a show that packed a Christmas punch with purpose.

We spent the Saturday snow day prepping ourselves and the stage for 22 shows in the next 7 days in one great location. We hung giant stars, banners, and bungees; assembled and decorated silver and lime green Christmas trees; lined the stage and props with bright green rope lights; put a candy cane twist on the white 10 ft. unicycle; marked prop and equipment locations; and ran through transitions for our 30 minute show.

Come Sunday, we were ready to go for our first 3 UniShow Christmas Circus shows of MBC’s Christmas Village 2017. Misun started the show rocking her violin to some Christmas Dubstep. David soon appeared on stage to hype the crowd with his hip hop moves. Then Dustin rolled out on his electric unicycle as the crowd couldn’t help but smile and cheer, even if they didn’t quite know why yet. Welcome to the UniShow Christmas Circus! 

For 7 nights straight, we presented 22 shows for 8,000 of the 20,000 people that came to the Christmas Village. Two of those shows were translated into Spanish for Latino night, two had sign language interpretation and one was sensory friendly for guests with special needs where we toned down the music and eliminated juggling fire.

The purpose of the entire Christmas Village was to share the Gospel. Guests heard the Gospel loud and clear at each UniShow, as well as in a crazy light show in a different auditorium and outside at the live nativity scene. A team of roaming evangelists engaged one on one with people around the campus to pray with them and introduce them to the Jesus of Christmas. Other festivities included the packing of 5,454 Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes, a carousal, live music, train ride, collection of 1,807 toys for at-risk children, an International bazaar and light displays. It was quite an event and such a privilege to be part of.  In all, 294 spiritual decisions were recorded and each one was followed up on within 24 hours.

We heard many stories of lives changed through this event. One guy was approached on Wednesday by a roamer and asked if he knew Jesus. He said enthusiastically, “Yah man I gave my life to Jesus at the UniShow on Monday! I’m in!” A lady came to Dustin after one show with tears in her eyes and said that her granddaughter had just prayed the prayer with him to ask Jesus into her life!

We praise God for how He used our crazy Christmas Circus to touch lives with the true meaning of Christmas. It was awesome and refreshing to partner with a church who has the Gospel as their focus and will go to great lengths to get the Word out.

How beautiful are the feet of those who bring Good News!

Amazing team, including room leader and sound tech!

Thanks to the amazing officers who kept Christmas Village safe!

First Time in the Philippines!

From Switzerland we continued heading east to the Philippines on July 17. We flew from Geneva to Amsterdam to Taipei, where we were supposed to have a 30 minute layover then board the same plane and head to Manila. However, just before we reboarded, they announced that the Manila airport was closed because loose pavement from the runway had gone through a plane's wing. So, KLM cancelled our flight and put us all in a hotel overnight. We'd never been to Taiwan before and were in need of rest so this delay was actually a blessing to us. The hotel was very nice, as was the plentiful buffet with octopus, shark and a huge assortment of other delicacies.

By the next morning the Manila runway had been fixed and we were rebooked on China airlines with a first class upgrade, allowing us to continue resting between busy weeks. After a 4 hour delay in Manila, we finally flew to the Island of Negros Occidental to meet students and leaders totaling nearly 100 from McLean Bible Church in Virginia.

A rare way for us to fly!

For the next week we did outreaches in Bacolod City and Sipalay City, partnering with International Care Ministries who's slogan is "Reaching the Poor".

Homes we visited made mostly out of bamboo on stilts over water near the ocean.

  

In Bacolod we went into different neighborhoods with students who did health and wellness crafts, teachings and gardening in kindergartens, building projects for churches, and house visits. We presented the UniShow in outdoor basketball courts for the communities they were serving in.

The 4 hour drive from Bacolod to Sipalay was a great cultural experience viewing kilometers of lush palm trees, rice and sugar cane fields with resident water buffalo, multitudes of public tricycle transportation and the beautiful ocean along the way. Our competent driver also happened to be an avid cyclist so he and Dustin "talked shop". He was a God send and used his local family connections to help us in multiple ways, including asking police to provide security for our evening event.

In Sipalay we presented the UniShow at an all day sports camp for students. Mid-show however the rains came and put a quick stop to the unicycling. Though the Filipinos quickly took cover and looked on, the McLean students turned the event into a puddle splashing dance party and we cranked the tunes while they went crazy in the rain. It was a memorable time for all and thankfully, Dustin and another leader had shared the Gospel before it rained.

We visited the local Sipalay high school to invite students to an evening outreach.

The promo worked and around 700 people showed up for our spontaneous event in Sipalay.

Just before the rain came!

Final outreach in Bacolod.

In all, we had 7 UniShow presentations for 2,800 people. Dustin shared the Gospel in each event and we saw many responded to the invitation to surrender to Jesus!

We were so impressed with the friendliness, kindness, humility and helpfulness of the Filipino people. We pray those impacted through our events will continue to grow in their understanding of God's love for them.