Jay Swanson is currently serving aboard the Africa Mercy as the Audio Visual Technician. They are docked in Freetown, Sierra Leone where they will stay until December serving the people of Sierra Leone and the surrounding area. The Africa Mercy is Mercy Ships’ flag hospital ship dedicated to alleviating the suffering of Africa’s poor by providing medical aid and long-term preventative measures.

The Africa Mercy has 6 operating theaters where they work tirelessly to heal everything from cataracts to tumors and cleft pallets. All for free. The mission is to express Jesus’ love by following him into serving the world’s poor.

I (Jay) am currently working as the AV Tech on board as a part of the Information Systems department. Basically that means I’m a resident nerd, responsible for all of the audio/visual equipment on the ship and training volunteers to run that equipment during meetings and training.

There’s a lot of training and large meetings that happen on board the Africa Mercy, I’m one of the behind-the-scenes guys making sure it goes smoothly.

A little about Mercy Ships, from Mercy Ships’ website on their values:

“OUR VALUES
Around the world today, billions of people live in fear and desperation, with impure water, inadequate food, and little or no access to health care. Behind every statistic is a person waiting for hope and healing. Utilizing hospital ships, Mercy Ships delivers medical excellence with integrity and compassion to the world’s forgotten poor by mobilizing people and resources worldwide. Mercy Ships serves all people without regard for race, gender, or religion.

MISSION
We follow the 2000-year-old example of Jesus, bringing hope and healing to the forgotten poor.

VISION
Mercy Ships seeks to become the face of love in action, bringing hope and healing to the poor.

VALUES
Desiring to follow the example of Jesus, we seek to:

Love God
Love and serve others
Be people of integrity
Be people of excellence in all we say and do”