From August 24th through September 3rd, members of The Salvation Army’s Texas Music and Arts Department traveled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to serve as special guests for an impactful gathering. For more than a week, approximately 500 delegates and staff from the Democratic Republic of Congo came together for a comprehensive music institute.

Each day’s schedule at the camp was jam-packed, beginning with morning devotions. The camp’s five bands performed in a rotation each morning, and then classes proceeded for upwards of five hours broken up by lunch.

For the majority of the week, the delegates and staff worked at a camp in the small village of Kavwaya, which includes a church along with a Salvation Army run hospital, boarding school, and vocational training center.

By the time the Texas team prepared to return home, it was clear that each member enjoyed a tremendous experience. The impact was not only musical and artistic but also spiritual and cultural, with lifelong friendships established in the process.