Week two has ended. What a week!

Week two has ended. What a week!

Our goal for enrollment was three groups of twelve – two men’s groups and one ladies’ group. As the applications came in we began to realize that our former learners were busy telling others about the training we offer. Wow! Paul has fifteen on Tuesdays and sixteen on Fridays. Patty has thirteen ladies! This does not include the two ACTION missionaries who are also attending!

There are already 29 on waiting lists for next June. This work is much bigger than we are. We could sure use another couple to come and duplicate what we are doing now.

Thursday, Marife arrived with Glenda in tow. “I am a pastor’s wife. Fe told me about the training and shared what she is learning and I really need this training too!” How do you say “no”? She is already there.

Our plans were to move to another area at the end of this session and train pastors there. Hmmm. It looks like we will be here for a while longer. We just desire to be where God wants us to be at any given time.

We were planning to teach just the first two weeks of December as Christmas is such a big celebration here. The pastors have requested we teach until the 19th of December! We will, and we will serve special meals to celebrate the birth of our Lord with them. That is great timing as it will allow us to complete the first section of the training material.

(Some pastors are missing in this photo)

Wednesday November 5, 2008

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

It is election day still in the US. We have had a terrible time getting our ballots to the ballot boxes, but it looks like we finally succeeded. It would help if the Registrar would put them in the mail a few days sooner! We have prayed. Some have fasted. Now we remember that God is sovereign and He is the One who sets men on the thrones and takes them down. Voters are merely His means of doing that in a democratic setting. I keep remembering that the Great Commission clearly tells us that God is with us “even to the end of the age.” No matter how ungodly any country is, God is with those who follow after Him. What a promise!

Paul has not been able to get back to the doctor yet. We are still trusting in the Lord for healing, trusting that He is leading us as we seek to do what we need to be doing. He has completed all the tests ordered so far. The next step will be to see the doctor and get the orders for the sputum cultures. Those can take quite a while “as the [germs] are slow-growing”. In the meantime we are optimizing our nutrition, making sure we don’t work until we drop into bed at night, and pressing on.

Please pray for Pastor Dande, (Dahn-day). He is an older pastor who fell while making a purchase and is currently in the hospital under observation for his head injury and a huge gash from breaking glass. He lost 2 units of blood before they got him “fixed-up”. He missed class yesterday so Paul and two pastors from the Tuesday group went over to visit and pray with him.

Our camera broke last time we met, but it is now fixed. We’ll get pictures up soon. In the meantime, how would you like to be shopping for a piece of luggage in this store?