Abel

Abel is the head of the church association here in Senegal.  We have had the pleasure of getting to go out to see what he is doing twice now.  He is a very sharp fellow and it is phenomenal to see the things he is doing in his village.  He is doing amazing things here and attributes it all to God!  It is really awesome to see the Senegalese having a heart to help their own people! 

 

 

They just recently had a new church built in their village- which he is the pastor for.  He also help get 2-3 churches built in surrounding villages.  He preaches every Sunday at his own church, but he also goes into a local town each week, before his own service, to preach his message on a local radio station in hopes of allowing others to hear the good news.

 

Abel also is part of a group that runs a boutique in his village.  Boutiques are very common in larger cities like Thies, but not so much in the villages.  These little boutiques are just hole in the wall stores with flour, sugar, onions, some candy, soap, and other basic need items.  Abel first did research to see what items sell best in the boutiques and only supplies those items in the boutique in his village.  He now has something set up in Excel to help keep inventory and track of the money.  A different member of the church, manages the boutique for 3 months at a time.  Then the manages gets a certain percentage of the profits and the other percentage goes back to the church.

 
Abel also helps run a storehouse for food.  Currently there are 60 members of this program which is all they can hold right now, both Christian and non Christians.  During November (harvest time) people put food in the storehouse.  They are not allowed the get it back out until July or August sometime when they start running out of food.  If a person chooses to take out 50 pounds of food then when they bring it back after harvest time they have to bring 55 pounds.  If a person chooses to take 100 pounds, then they have to replenish it after harvest with 110 pounds of food.  At this point, 100 pounds is the most a family can take out.  This way, slowly over time it builds the amount of food they have.   

The problem here is that if people plan ahead to have food for the whole year they are still obligated to give it if a family member or friend runs out of food or wants to throw a big wedding.  Just how it works.  So this way, the food gets locked up to help prevent a shortage in the village before the next harvest comes.  They can't get to it unless it's an emergency.


They currently have 32,000 pounds of millet stored for just their village.  He says it’s good because it helps them be self-sufficient and not have to go straight to a relief group like WorldVision if famine hits.  They have a back-up plan.  He wants to be able to help surrounding villages build similar buildings. 

It is great that a national realizes they need to become more self-sufficient so they can more easily solve their own problems.  Another cool thing is that word has been travelling about their village and the storehouse.  Evens Muslims have been amazed that the system seems to really work and how the Christians have handled themselves. Many people were very hesitant to join at the beginning for fear it may be more of a loss than a gain.  However there are now Muslim families that participate, and there are even more people wanting to join.  It has been a real testament to us to watch someone who is a very smart individual who could probably move to a larger city and have a “better life” for both himself and his family.  However he has chosen to stay in the village and work with his own community where life is much harder and be Jesus’ hands and feet to them.

Life in Africa

Life here in Senegal has been very different than our lives in the United States.  We knew that our lives would change but didn’t realize necessarily how many things would be different.  In some ways, we have learned a whole new way of life here.  Most things just take longer here so patience is an absolute must.  We wanted to share some of the things that have become part of our lives since we have been here.

Water

     As you can see, the drinking water here is not clean.  Fortunately we do have a water filter.  We never drink water from the tap, but use a pitcher to put the water in the filter. 

 

     Unfortunately most people here do have to drink the water as they don’t have any other option.  Thus it allows different sorts of disease causing bacteria to get into their systems and proves to sometimes be fatal for them without money to pay for access to medical treatment.

 

Eating Senegalese Style

      In Senegal, many families eat using a bowl with about 6-8 people around it.  You are supposed to eat from the section in front of you in a pie shaped piece.  If there are things in your section that you don’t want, then you can put it in the center of the bowl where anyone can take food from.  When we have been to different villages, they have been kind enough to provide us with spoons to use to eat with but many families eat just using their hands.  Also your left hand is considered “dirty” here so we have to eat with our right hand.  Needless to say since Bekah is left handed, she doesn’t usually eat very fast or get very much to eat when we eat Senegalese style.

Meat

     When we buy meat here, we have to package it on our own.  We can’t just walk into Meijer and buy a pound of ground beef or chicken breasts.  We buy our beef from a guy in town at the main market.  He charges an extra 200  francs (about $0.40) to ground it up for us so we have opted for that option.  Meat is more expensive here by about $1.50 a pound for beef. 

 

Once we get the meet home, Bekah weighs it out and packages it to put in the freezer.  When we buy chickens, we have to buy them whole and de-gut them ourselves.  Then we divide the chicken into meal size portions to freeze.  Fortunately probably for your sake, we seem to have lost the pictures of Lucas de-gutting the chicken. 

 

Traffic

Traffic here is a difficult one to explain. The best way to describe it comes from Captain Jack Sparrow, "They are more like guidelines than rules."  People here don’t follow the rules, and they basically look out for themselves and don’t worry about other people.  At times, people here can drive very aggressively.  On the other hand, other times if there are two lanes on the road, they manage to take up both and seem to not have a care in the world. 

 

Movie Stars

 

Many times we feel like movie stars here.  We get stared at pretty much everywhere we go because we are "toubabs" or white person.  Most of the time when there is a group of kids, they yell toubab at us as we walk by.  It sometimes is a disrespectful thing for the kids to do, depending on their attitude when they say it.  However on the other hand, some kids are just really excited to see a white person.  Especially when we are in villages, the kids get so excited to see a toubab.   

 

Our favorite time when we have gotten called a toubab was when we were walking home from the John Huffman School one day.  There was a little boy standing at the community water well in our neighborhood, and he was screaming and crying at the top of his lungs.  As soon as he saw us, his crying took a screeching halt and he gasped and said in a faint whisper, "toubab."  And he just watched in amazement as we walked by.

 

 

What is Success?

We had the privilege of going to our organizations retreat this week.  It was about an hour from Thies.  A team from Northstar Church came from a suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio to serve the WorldVenture Senegal Team.  It was very nice to just get away for a few days with no cooking, no ministry, no cleaning, as well as being able to hang out with other Americans.  It is the first English teaching we have had since we left the states so that in and of itself was a huge blessing.  The team from Northstar brought a pastor, worship leader, children’s leaders, and a cook to help at the retreat.   

We had the pleasure of getting taught by a pastor named David.  He really challenged us in his teaching to ponder the question, what is success?  So many of us get caught up with being concerned with how much money we have or climbing the corporate ladder.  For us the questions we often challenge ourselves with are: how effective is our ministry?  Does it really even matter if we are here?  How many people have accepted Christ because of us? 

Ephesians 6:12

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

David really challenged us that Satan often feeds us lies.  Often times we face the daily challenges, and we have a tendency to ask ourselves what we have accomplished today? We need to take a step back to realize that we are fighting a battle that has already been won.  Christ did that 2000+ years ago when he gave his life for all of us. 

 

We as Christians, no matter what “mission field” you live on, are called by God to be just a piece of the puzzle in His story, not to try to create your own story by yourself.  Being successful isn’t how many digits you bring home in your paycheck this week, what promotion you are up for, or what kind of car you drive.  However, success is defined by obedience to God in whatever realm he has called you.  As long as you are being faithful, that is all God has called you to do as a follower.

Joshua 24:14a

Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. 

 

Job 36:11

If they listen and serve him, they complete their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasantness.

The John Huffman School

We have been going over to the John Huffman School a couple of times a week.  The school is pre-K through middle school.  It has been good to put the skills God has given us to use and to be able plant seeds to ultimately further His kingdom.  We are still in the process of meeting a few more people in hopes of getting some more sports activities going as well.   

The John Huffman School is run by the local church.  There are some Christian staff and students who do work at and attend the school, however the majority of the students are Muslim which is no surprise since 95% of the population in Senegal is Muslim.  It has been a pleasure to come alongside fellow Senegalese believers to use sports to get kids to come to the afterschool program.

We have started going earlier to the school because we have found if we are there playing, the kids will come.  We aren’t exactly sure how much of it is because they like us or we have a ball.  We will just keep telling ourselves it’s because they like us J.  But this has been a great way for us to actually get to build relationships with the kids and learn more about them. 

The afterschool program begins with an opening prayer and followed by a warm up which is usually done to Christian music.  Then we split up into two groups: soccer and basketball.  Usually there are about 60-70 kids that come some of which don’t attend the John Huffman School but just live in the neighborhood.  At some point during the program, we have a “moral” lesson for the kids which is usually Biblical without mentioning the Bible. Being subtle here is key since the majority of the kids that come are Muslim. If we just started preaching about Jesus each time then many of the kids would not be allowed to come back.  It is a matter of being patient and trusting that we are able to show Christ’s love through our actions.  After all, actions speak louder than words, right? 

Below are some pictures of the program at the John Huffman School.

Bonjour from Thies, Senegal

We have now been in Thies for almost two weeks!  We have been very busy meeting different people, adjusting to the culture, and learning how to do life in general here.  Daily tasks in general just take so much longer here.   

For example, we went to look at an apartment a couple days ago which in the states would take easily less than 30 minutes because most places require you to make an appointment. However here it took us closer to three hours by the time we met the person showing us the apartment, drove across town in a taxi with him to introduce us to the owner to talk about the price, and then going back and saying our goodbyes! 

Needless to say, being flexible has become a very large part of lives because if you aren’t willing to be extremely flexible here then you will probably end up feeling stressed a majority of the time.

Last week we were able to meet, George, the president of the church association in Thies to receive his blessing and permission to do ministry during our time here.  We also had a meeting with Alouise who is one of the people we will be doing ministry with while we are here.  We will be helping him with an after school program on Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays where he does a bible lesson then also works on both soccer and basketball with the kids.  He seemed very excited we are here to help!  We are hoping to help with ideas and possibly get other nationals involved so once we leave things will continue to move forward.  He also has different days that he would like to do activities and wants to work in different villages so we are hoping to be able to be extra hands in any way possible! 

Here are some pictures of Thies and some of the things we see on a daily basis. 

 

Ready for Take Off

As many of you know, we have been waiting to get the word that Bill, Lucas' dad, received permission to go back to Africa since they are in charge of short term teams in West Africa.  Bill got the go ahead on Friday from the doctor!  We are so thankful that he has been able to heal quickly and seems to be regaining his strength!

We were able to buy our tickets (again) today!  We have almost the same identical itinerary as last time.  We will fly out next Tuesday, February 4th at 10 pm from O'hare in Chicago.  We will first fly to Istanbul with about 21 hour layover.  Then we fly through Mauritania where we will briefly stop and then get to Dakar on February 6th at 8:30 pm (local time).

We are excited to get to Thies and see what God has for us there!  We hope to be able to update you with pictures and what we are doing every couple of weeks.  Thanks for all your prayers and support thus far.  Prayers especially for safe and smooth travels would be greatly appreciated as we head out next week on this new adventure God has for us!

In God's Timing

Well, we have said all along that we would get to Africa on God's timing.  In our minds, WE thought that meant if we raised our funds in time.  Sometimes God has other plans and everything is in His timing so we are trusting this too!

We came out to Maine the week before Thanksgiving to see Lucas' Grandpa and other extended family before we left.  We left on Saturday to drive back to Indiana, and our plan was to leave for Senegal in six days.  We received a phone call Sunday night that Lucas' dad (Bill) had a MILD heart attack (which basically means it was caught early and there was not much damage to his heart).  He was transferred to a different hospital on Monday morning that does more specialized heart care.  He had a heart catheterization done on Tuesday morning, and the original plan was they thought they would just put a stent in and be good to go.  However we received some unexpected results, even to the doctor.  We found out that he would be having quadruple bypass surgery done on Wednesday morning.  Needless to say, at this point we decided it would be best to stay in the states for a little longer and go back up to Maine to see Lucas' family again. 

We are very thankful for a number of things.
1) The heart attack was caught early on and not much damage was done to the actual heart.
2)The doctors' were very pleased with how the surgery went and Bill is now home recovering.
3) Bill was in the states and not in Africa when this happened so he was able to receive immediate medical care.
4) We were in the states and were able to change our plans to come back out to see Bill.

Now by this point we are sure many of you are thinking, so are you still going to Senegal??

Yes, we are!  We put our tickets on "hold" so hopefully all we will have to pay is a change fee.  At this point, OUR plan is to leave mid-January.  (Of course OUR plan was to leave in November, but God knew the whole time we would not leave then and even now knows when we will leave!)  If we tried to get tickets now, it would cost a significant amount more to buy our tickets.  So we will wait until after the Christmas and New Year "rush" when the tickets are about the same price as before.  So we will stay up in Maine with Lucas' family to help around the house some and then celebrate Christmas with them.  Then we will go back to Indiana to celebrate Christmas with Bekah's family and stay with Bekah's parents until we leave. 

Obviously we have had to stay very flexible over the past week and will need to continue to be.  We will try to keep you as up to date as possible!  We hope all of you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and will enjoy the Christmas season!