May 2, 2023
Happy 75th birthday to my step-dad, Bob Lange!
Woke up thinking we were going to Nasedegu to hand out tracts and visit hut to hut, but, as is very common here and in serving the Lord, plans changed! Janine is still down with malaria and Ovi just tested positive as well. This is his 10th time having it! They are both taking medicine and when we got back to the house this afternoon she woke and got up about for a little bit. Said the headache is mostly gone, so hopefully she’s well on the mend.
Anyway, about the plan changes. Ovi got a call this morning from his friend with the police. He wanted us to take more Bibles to the hospital staff (a shift we didn’t get to last week) as well as the secondary school at the police college. So it worked out well to do that today and let Janine & Ovi rest. Samuel took us along with Misozi. We picked up Anderson and another officer with the investigations unit, Ridson. We went to the police college first. This place is nearly a city to itself. They have their own school, tailor, communications, etc. Marc shared a few words with many of the secondary students about the importance of God’s Word and we gave out New Testaments and copies of John & Romans. We went to have lunch where we met another missionary team from Ireland. Then on to the hospital where we expected to had out about 200 more Bibles. The room filled up and Ed shared a challenge from James about having both faith and works. We gave Bibles and John & Romans to each person then when they left the room filled again, Ed preached again and we gave out Bibles again! All together, I believe we gave out about 300 Bibles to the hospital staff. (Good thing we brought extras!) As we tried to get into the van to leave, though, the men putting the boxed into the back were swamped with other people wanting Bibles. We really didn’t know if we’d have enough for everyone and we needed to leave so had to get a little forceful to get them to back off. The men kind of made a tunnel for we ladies to get to the van. I hated driving off and seeing all those disappointed (and some accusatory) faces, but I realize there is a limit to what we can do. We promised to come back and I know Ovi will follow through on that.
At this point tomorrow will be our last day of full ministering. The plan is to go to Nasedegu. We will go hut to hut in the morning, have lunch there with the people of the village, then hopefully split up into men’s & women’s Bible studies. Please pray that Janine is feeling better and has the strength to get to this. Her heart is overflowing with love for this village and especially teaching the women. If she cannot, Leah and I will do our very best to fill in for her, but I know she’ll be disappointed. We know that God has a plan through all of this, though, and I know Janine knows this, too.
Thursday will be filled with all the preparation to leave. This is a little sad. The 2 weeks have truly flown by! We will head to the airport Friday morning (here) and arrive in Chicago Saturday morning. We will then drive home to Louisville. (Leah flies from Chicago to Ohio.) I am looking forward to seeing my family and church family and telling all about the trip and all God has done. I pray I can do some justice to the need and all the work that God is doing here.
This afternoon we hung out and had some good conversations. Janine was able to come out and sit and talk with us for a little while before she tired and went back to bed. Leah and I let the girls, Jessica and Aimee, beat us at pool tonight so we could go set up for dinner. 😉 Dinner was fabulous, as usual from Lita. I’m pretty sure I’m gonna have to start from scratch on my weight loss. Conversation was all good and fun, if a little dulled tonight. The two main lives of the party having malaria and all of our tiredness definitely dampened the volume of our talks anyway. Leah and I got to sit and talk with Janine for a few more minutes after dinner while she tried to eat a little bit so she could take her meds. She’s definitely feeling/acting better, but far from her usual bubbly self still. I will go now to study for tomorrow. We hope to get a good amount of time to teach and talk with the women of Nasedegu, a blossoming church that has been through a difficult time this last year but walked through it Biblically and are truly flourishing now. We hope to encourage these women to keep serving the Lord with everything they have and continue to learn and teach His Word as they have been. I’m excited to spend this time with them! Please pray for us to bridge the communication and cultural gaps as we share with these sweet sisters!
I read in 2 Corinthians 5 today and the beginning of verse 11 stuck out to me. “Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others.” May I continue to persuade others to know Christ—His goodness and love for us, but also His holiness and righteous judgments.