My Buddy Bill

Every Thursday afternoon I go with a team of students to a local Alzheimer’s home. This time is consistently one of the absolute hi-lights of my week.

Earlier this year I met a possibly 4 ½ foot tall Japanese man by the name of Bill. At 84, Bill was very sharp mentally when I first met him and I wondered why he was even in the home. During that first conversation Bill and I had a quite coherent conversation as he told me all about his life. Bill had a career as an engineer and designed and manufactured toys for childrenJ

I told Bill about Jesus and how I’d given the rest of my life to Him. Bill listened, but when I invited him to encounter Jesus for himself, he was hesitant and told me, “I’m a Buddhist, and I really don’t want any BS. I’ve had a lot of people give me religious BS during my lifetime.” I laughed, grateful for his honesty. Instantly I knew that Bill and I were going to get along great.

Over the next few weeks every Thursday afternoon I looked forward to seeing my new friend. I learned that Bill had never married during his lifetime and had no family—it broke my heart to think that he had nobody close to him during this vulnerable season of his life. As I hung out with Bill and just loved on him I kept telling him about Jesus and his love. He listened.

Finally, after maybe a month of visits, one Thursday afternoon, I approached Bill in the home hallway. “Bill!” I said. “Bill! Today is your day!” “Give your heart to Jesus today Bill!” “There’s no better day than today!” I kept patting him on the shoulder and laughing as he smiled.

“I’m a Buddhist.” He said with a smile.

“That doesn’t matter Bill! Jesus loves Buddhist!!” “Today’s your day!”

I continued to petition him with love to be reconciled to God.

"OK. I’m ready.” He said abruptly.

I was shocked. “Really?”

“Yep.”

"You’re not BS’n me are you Bill?” I said with a laugh.

“No, I’m ready.”

I was beside myself! Surprised by his sudden change of heart, I led Bill in a simple prayer to give his heart to Jesus.

After praying with him I began to encourage him by declaring to him what I believed God was going to do in his future! “Bill” I said, “Jesus is going to visit you at night and he’s going to speak to you and you’re going to know his love. You’ll never be the same after today Bill! Jesus is alive in your heart now and He’s going to change everything!”

I then asked Bill to pray for me and asked him if he would pray for me every night. I believe that the elderly, particularly people in their twilight years, have a treasure in them that is hidden behind their frailties. If we have eyes to see this treasure we can gain a spiritual inheritance from those that have gone before us. This is something I’ve been learning on this outreach. When I meet new people in the home and I ask them if they want me to pray for them, I will often also ask them if they could pray for me. I’ve found that many of my elderly friends are very honored by this request.

I told Bill that I’d be back soon and that I couldn’t wait to hear about his encounters with Jesus!

The next week I found Bill in the same hall way. “Bill!” I said as I gave him a big hug. “Has Jesus talked to you yet?”

“He talked to me last night,” he said.

“Really?? What’d he say?!”

“He told me ‘everything’s going to be OK,’” he said with a twinkle in his eye.

I continued to visit Bill every Thursday. Soon I realized that Bill was getting weaker. Week by week he became less and less responsive. I learned that he had lung cancer and I think his medication was affecting his responsiveness. It was really surprising how quickly his health deteriorated. After just a few weeks I would simply sit with him and hold his hand as even talking became a struggle for him. I prayed for his healing, but mostly I would just sit with him and tell him how awesome he was and how much God loved him.

During these times, Bill had moments of clarity. One day as I was sitting with him in the dining room of the home telling him how wonderful Jesus is, suddenly he responded, “You’re right… You’re right” he said, “you believe in something so amazing” “God is real. I know now that everything is going to be OK.” Bill would infrequently say things like this in between long periods of silence… Usually just saying, “Everything’s going to be OK.”

The last time I saw Bill I had a feeling I wouldn’t see him again. He wasn’t able to respond and didn’t have enough strength even to lift a cup of water to his face.

Sure enough the next week Bill was gone… Though I missed my friend I was so happy to have the privilege of loving him. And I had so much peace that everything was OK.

God is teaching me to take initiative with love. Sometimes love makes people uncomfortable, but people are desperately hungry for the real thing. We have to persevere with love! I felt the Lord speak to my heart a few months ago that if there’s anything in me that isn’t comfortable with love it isn’t worth holding onto.

I hope this story encourages you to reach out today and show someone some love! Everyone needs love and we have the ultimate source in Jesus living inside of us. Sometimes all it takes is taking some time to make someone feel specialJ

My Favorite Song Ever

THE LOVE OF GOD

Frederick M. Lehman - 1917. (Inspired by Jew­ish poem Had­da­mut, writ­ten in Ara­ma­ic in 1050 by Meir Ben Isaac Ne­hor­ai)

The love of God is greater far

than tongue or pen could ever tell

it goes beyond the highest star

and reaches to the lowest hell

The guilty pair bowed down with care, God gave his Son to win

His erring child he reconciled, and pardoned from his sin

Oh Love of God, how rich and pure

how measureless and strong

it shall forevermore endure

the saints' and angels' song

Could we with ink the ocean fill

and were the skies of parchment made

were every stalk on earth a quill

and every man a scribe by trade

To write the love of God above

would drain the ocean dry

nor could the scroll contain the whole

though stretched from sky to sky

Oh Love of God, how rich and pure

how measureless and strong

it shall forevermore endure

the saints' and angels' song

FINAL POST FROM AFRICA (TESTIMONIES!!)

(GOD IS AWESOME!!)

(journal entries from Mozambican village outreach and Kenya)

12/21/2008 - Sunday
During our time in Niuthi, Pastor Jose worked a lot behind the scenes setting things up to establish a local church in the village. On Saturday afternoon Pastor Jose did meetings outside our camp with new believers. A couple of the pastors with us came from the previous village we visited, including one of Pastor Jose’s cousins. These village pastors were getting set to oversee the new work in Niuthi.

On Saturday night we invited all the new believers from our two nights of JESUS Film showings to come in the morning for Niuthi. first Christian church service--under some near-by trees! Probably 250+ people showed up for the service! The day before, one of the Mozambican pastors with us, Pastor Anselmo, met the chief of the village who served as a sort of governor over Niuthi and some other surrounding villages as well. Anselmo led this elderly man to Jesus!! Our new brother in Christ was a former general from the country’s long and bloody civil war. He came to church elaborately dressed in his official military attire. He was hilarious!! He testified how Jesus had just saved him the day before and how he now had new joy in his heart. It was as if he started preaching even though he had only known the Lord for a day! He told the people how thankful he was for the missionaries coming to Niuthi and teaching his village about the Living God!! He kept going on for maybe 15 minutes about how everyone needed to know this Jesus he had encountered!! Then he invited his wife to come forward because she had some kind of physical problem in her leg; it hurt to move it. He wanted our team to pray for her; so, a couple of us gathered around her and said a simple prayer for her healing. At this point some worshipers had started singing songs and leading the people in dance. We had her test her leg by bending down and kicking and then we all started dancing!! Then the General joined in!! It was awesome!

Later in the service Pastor Jose invited everyone to bring forward any objects or fetishes which had ties to witchcraft to be destroyed. People responded by taking off bracelets, anklets, and necklaces which had been devoted for demonic purposes and bringing them forward. We worshiped singing, dancing and laughing. Then one of the mission students, Joe, preached a short sermon which was amazing. Then we prayed for the sick. I prayed for maybe a couple dozen people. Most indicated feeling better afterwards. Then when the prayer time started to draw to a close, I found a little boy who was clearly very sick. His father had motioned for me to pray for him. I soon realized that the father was mostly deaf, but he didn't want prayer; he wanted his son to be healed; it was his only concern. His son had the most horrible cough I've ever heard. Around his neck was a huge fetish, which I immediately asked if we could remove. After trying to communicate with the deaf father through hand signals, he finally understood and complied. I prayed. The boy began to cough up flem and soon he was caught in a fit of uncontrollable hacking and heaving, tears running down his face the whole time. The cough sounded like death itself. It was a challenging moment. I just began to cry out to God. That’s all I could do. I knelt down with the little boy and just called on Jesus. I think I felt just a sliver of the father’s pain. It was horrible. But, I believe God heard my prayers. Sadly, we didn't see an instant miracle, but I'm believing that a healing was set in motion.

One cool thing happened on this day in the morning before the church service started. People started lining up outside our fenced campground for prayer. Most wanted prayer for healing. There was one lady and her son that came asking for prayer for complete freedom from demons. From my understanding this lady and her son were bound in some sort of prison (probably something similar to the man I met in another village on a previous outreach [Nov 23 blog post] who was bound to a tree trunk) because they were mentally unstable. Pastor Jose prayed for them on Saturday and told the village they were free from the demons that were making them crazy and that they could be released now. The people were hesitant to let their captives go, but I think they noticed an improvement or something because they decided to release them the next morning. Immediately after being released this women and her son walked to our campground and asked for more prayer. It was like they knew they needed more of Jesus or something. It was pretty amazing. They were very blessed and seemed quite normal while we prayed for them. God is AWESOME! Go God!!!

(my white t-shirt after outreach!)

JOURNAL ENTRIES FROM MY TIME IN KENYA:

11:36 PM 12/24/2008
I've arrived back in Mombasa and I'm now with Kipleting in Lampstone's house. I had a good journey and was able to have some good time on the bus with a young mus ** m gal named Minira (which means "light"). I'm really hoping she receives Jesus in her heart soon. She seemed to be very moved by many of the testimonies I shared with her, particularly when I talked about the extent of God's love for her displayed in the death and resurrection Jesus Christ. Also, she seemed very interested when I spoke of people going to heaven for visits. She seemed to be tearing up and quite moved by the look on her face. I had a good time of witnessing to this girl about the love and power of Jesus. I also had a good chat with the girl sitting right next to me Teresa, who was 21 years old and Catholic.

Christmas is tomorrow! I'm away from my mom and dad and brothers and sisters and I miss them all. However, I have a wonderful family here and God is good. Tonight Steven made my favorite meal—cales with ugali. mmmm. It was green (cales), red (peppers) and white (ugali), the colors of Christmas. God is so good and I am so blessed.

PREACHING AT A WITCH DOCTOR'S "INDUCTION CEREMONY!!"

12:07 AM 12/28/2008

I am in Lampstone's house. Today has been an amazing day. Last night Lampstone took me to his "valley" to pray. It was fun. I fell asleep at about two in the morning while the others prayed clear through the night. On the way, Lampstone showed me a tree that he used to sleep under at times, when things were rougher financially.

This morning we rested then this afternoon Lampstone and I went on a bike ride out to a rock pit. This evening Bonny (another Iris Missions student and great friend from Uganda) arrived in transit back to Uganda. He's lying beside me right now trying to sleep. He’s exhausted from his last few days of traveling by bus all the way from Pemba!

Right now there are around 50 people outside our door banging on drums and chanting in a witch doctor “induction ceremony.” I never knew there was such a thing! They are literally 10 feet from me right now, with only a cement wall separating us!! They’re trying to call up some spirits or something... When I heard there was going to be a ceremony earlier tonight I got excited and told Lampstone that this was a great opportunity to see God move. So, I went outside and started preaching the same message that I had at the last pagan festival in Niuthi and told the people that God loved them very much!! Lampstone translated into Kiswahili. I felt like God gave me the words and the presence of the Holy Spirit was very strong! The people listened. Four guys came forward in front of all their friends and gave their hearts to Jesus!! Some of the others laughed. I could tell that others wanted to come forward, but were too afraid. The lady who is getting "crowned" as a witch started to freak out a bit. We prayed for the new believers and then randomly I asked if there was anyone blind that needed healed. The lady lashed back in Kiswahili, "there are no blind people here!" At this point we sort of wore out our welcome. But, I’d say 4 out of 50 is pretty good for a witch fest!! After it was clear that we needed to leave, I just went around and hugged these precious people and then we all went back inside. This was so much fun!!!

(a pagan shrine)

I was ecstatic afterward. God really showed up. Now, however, I'm getting just slightly irritated. These people are literally a few feet outside my window in what is a sort of commons or courtyard type of area. They are relentlessly beating their drums, chanting and very drunk--they haven’t let up for the last two hours.

Lampstone, who’s staying at the church tonight, has never had this happen before. It’s funny that they should show up while I just happen to be visiting!! I think God just saw how blessed I was in Niuthi at that other pagan fest that He let me do it again!!! God you’re so cool!! Despite the screaming and noise, I have this amazing sense of peace and I just feel God’s presence so strong … this is amazing; there’s no where else I’d rather be.

Afterword: The drumming went all night, from 10 at night to 8 the next morning, When the drums stopped in the morning I heard a gagging goat – their sacrifice for the demons they called up. They skinned it and hung it on the fence for "the spirits to consume." Yeah, it was weird. But, I felt an incredible peace through the whole night, especially after coming to terms with the fact that sleep wasn not an option. God was close beside me as I prayed and worshiped and Bonny tried his best at sleeping.

THE REST OF THE STORY:

The rest of my time in Kenya continued to rock as God did many wonderful things. I was able to share with Lampstone's church and get to know some different individuals there. Then one of the days we did a small evangelistic outreach in a nearby village which was way fun. Lampstone borrowed a little beat up truck which I affectionately named "Lazarus" and we packed up a generator and the church’s sound system. It was classic. The hi-light, however, of my time in Kenya was simply spending time with Lampstone and getting to know him better. He’s an amazing person and has become a close friend.

I left Mombasa on December 31st and celebrated the New Year on a flight from Nairobi to Amsterdam. God did some cool stuff on the airplane rides as on that particular flight I sat next to a really neat couple from Italy that I was able to minister to just by telling them stories of my trip and sharing about Jesus. We celebrated the New Year together as the flight attendants passed out champagne.

God is SO GOOD!!!

Once again,
THANK YOU TO ALL WHO PRAYED FOR ME WHILE I WAS IN AFRICA AND TO ALL WHO HELPED ME FINANCIALLY!!!

I am so BLESSED to have family and friends like YOU.

Love,

Levi

Back Home (part 2)

(my house... brr)

Greetings Family and Friends,

It's been just over a week since I returned home from Africa. And it's still cold here in Eastern Oregon. :-) Although, it's been warming up the last few days. This past week has been filled with good times hanging out, catching up, resting, and snowboarding (woohoo!). I didn't finish blogging on some of the most impacting events from my trip, so I'm going to finish here from home. I'll start where I left off on the last post.

12/20/2008
I bedded down in my tent Friday night (12/19) thankful for all God had done, but tired. Soon I was fast asleep. I can't remember what time, but somewhere in the night I was methodically awakened by the sounds of deep booming drums accompanied by the cracking of lightning quick higher-toned rhythms. My first thought was the witch doctor was at it again. (drums are often used in these parts to call up or invite spirits). Settling back into sleep world, I began to pray half-consciously for God to bless the witch doctor and set him free; and mostly I just loved on God and tried to focus on how wonderful He is. This process repeated itself clear through the night, as I faded in and out, the drums going almost the whole time. Eventually, I awoke from a deep sleep to the sound of familiar voices outside my tent. Breakfast was ready.

Outreach breakfasts were always the same. One or two rolls, a cup of coffee or tea, and fixings of sugar, condensed milk, and margarine. If there was an ample supply of condensed milk some of us (including me) would put it in our buttered rolls and maybe even sprinkle some instant coffee in there as well. It was surprisingly good in an African “bush” sort of way.

While eating in our compound, which was something like a backyard to our host family, a crowd of curious villagers peered over the fence into our fascinating affairs by standing on a near-by mound of dirt. From young to old, it seemed everyone wanted to know what this group of “Hakunas” was doing way out in their little, unheard-of village. As our audience looked on, our team gathered in one big circle and began our daily routine of prayer, calling on Jesus to bless our day and to bless our new friends in this small community. After prayer, I made some inquiries and one of the other students informed me that the village was in the middle of some kind of pagan ritual that involved ancestral observance; this explained the all-night drum-athon.

(our camp)

Finishing breakfast and prayer, we all headed outside our fenced-in compound. Our new “fan club” followed close behind with others joining in. We walked a few hundred yards away into what seemed to be the heart of the village where there was a huge field. This is where we had shown the JESUS Film the night before. By the time we reached the field our entourage had grown to possibly two hundred.

Heather (our team leader) organized a massive game of “duck duck goose” with maybe 100 kids in a huge circle. It was a blast. Even the witch doctor was affected; I think he even wanted to play; there was something about all the joy and laughter that almost seemed to soothe him. He looked a lot lighter as the game progressed.

Finally, after maybe an hour of fun, it was apparent that the game could go all day if carried through to the end. So, we moved to some nearby trees and David (Heather’s husband) shared about Jesus in Portuguese as one of our Mozambican friends translated into Makua. After David's teaching, we split all the kids into groups of maybe 15 to 20. All the mission students took one group apiece and we prayed for each of the kids individually. I had a group of 15 and I found this one-on-one time to be quite effective. Even though I didn’t know their language, other than a few simple phrases, they all seemed to respond to simple expressions of love.


PREACHING AT A PAGAN FESTIVAL
The rest of the morning and early afternoon was quite uneventful as we all rested or just hung out. Wanting to venture out, I asked David if he was interested in a walk. The two of us began wandering, observing the exotic environment around us. After walking maybe 10 minutes, we heard drums. Curious we sought out their source. Soon, we arrived and found a large group of people in the midst of some sort of pagan ritual. There was a man playing a huge drum. This massive drum kept booming as smaller rhythmic instruments including cans and random trinkets accompanied. All together these musicians produced an orchestra of rhythm only found in Africa.

There were grown men dressed as women dancing—some looked like they were going in and out of trances. It was quite apparent that we had stumbled into some serious demonic activity. Something in me got really excited. I sort of felt like I did the day before when the witch doctor was trying to put curses on us. There was something about the fact that these beautiful people were blatantly worshipping demons that made a surge of faith rise up in me. I knew that my God was superior and I knew that these people needed to know His love.

David and I watched this dance for a few minutes and then realized that our camiao driver was there as well watching. After the dance was finished some of the spectators dispersed, but most of the crowd just stood there and stared at the new attraction—the white guys. I told David I wanted to preach!

Since our driver just happened to be there as well (he often showed up in random places—it was like God had led him there or something) he translated from Portuguese to Makua, while David translated from English to Portuguese.

Shouting out an invite I called everyone in the area to come and hear a “story.” After greeting the people and thanking them for their tremendous hospitality, I told them that it was evident to us that they believed in spirits and spiritual things. But, I said there was one Spirit that was greater than every other spirit and this Spirit had created the entire earth and universe. I told them that this Spirit was God and He loved them so much that He sent His only son into this world as a man and He suffered and died for them to show them the extent of His love. I told them that we had encountered and known this Spirit and how He now lives inside of us and had given us power over sicknesses and diseases. He could protect them from every bad spirit and He would give them abundant life for eternity. They didn't have to be tormented by evil spirits any longer, but they only needed one Spirit and they could have this Spirit living inside them by committing their lives to Jesus Christ.

During the entire encounter (maybe 30 minutes) the people were glued to every word I said. Even though there were two translators and lots of time between statements, it was like I had no idea what I was going to say until the last moment and then bam, the words would just come. It seemed like it was more than just words I was saying, God was there and it was awesome!

Finally, I told them if they wanted to receive Jesus to join me by bowing down in the dirt and praying. The majority of the people bowed down and we all called on Jesus together. Then I asked them to agree to pray every day for a greater awareness of God’s Spirit now living inside of them. We asked them to pray every day that God would open the eyes of their hearts to see His face and open their spiritual ears to hear His voice. Again, most all agreed by raising their hands. :-)

Afterwards, one of the men who had received Jesus adamantly expressed gratitude to us for telling his village about God. From his head dress it looked like he was of another prominent religion in the country, although it might just be fashionable; not sure. But, he prayed to receive Jesus and wanted to know more about Him. He told us that his people desperately needed to learn more about God. He asked us to keep coming and telling him and his friends about God because sometimes he said it takes them “three or four times of hearing a story before it really sinks in!” The people’s reception to the gospel seemed to be very sincere. We left encouraged and invited them all to join us for our evening service in the field where we would show the JESUS Film again.

HOUSE VISITS – ARTHRITIS HEALED!
The next event of the day was house visits. One highlight was praying for an elderly lady who suffered from arthritis and pain all over her body. After beginning to pray for her, I felt a small twinge of pain in my right hand and asked about it, thinking it might have been a word of knowledge. At first we were just praying for her legs because it was obvious she had trouble walking. It turned out, however, that her right hand was of great concern to her because it hurt to pick food up and eat. She could only use her hand like a cup to scoop food into her mouth 'cause of the pain in her fingers and wrists. So we kept praying, now concentrating more on her hands, but asking God for complete healing for her entire body. She felt better and better as we prayed and her grip got stronger as we tested it by putting our fingers in her palms and having her squeeze.

After praying for awhile we asked her to stand up and surprisingly she began to walk briskly back and forth between us and her hut. As she was pacing she started saying something in Makua repeatedly in a very surprised old-ladyish tone as if to say, "I don't have pain anymore!" I didn't understand what she was saying, but it was obvious she felt much better. She even jumped once! God is amazing! :-)

At this point there was a good sized crowd around what had now turned into a neighborhood prayer meeting (maybe 100 people). Bonny (a student from Uganda) began to preach the gospel and tell the people that Jesus had just healed this lady and now He wanted to save their souls. He invited them to accept Jesus and put their faith in Him--many responded.

The rest of the day went well as we visited other people and saw God work in amazing ways. That night we showed the JESUS Film and again, the response was great.

I’ll try and post some more stories from the last day of outreach and also from my time in Kenya hopefully later this week.

Thanks again for everyone who helped me go to Africa!

Much much love and hugs,


Levi

Back Home (part 1)

Hello family and friends!

I'm home now and it's cold. I live in Eastern Oregon and this morning there was a three foot snow drift on my family's front porch.

My last two and a half weeks in Africa were jam-packed with excitement. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make any posts. However, I did keep a journal. So, I'll try to fill you in. Two days after my last post I graduated with my other missions school friends on Monday the 15th. The ceremony lasted all day as the Mozambican Bible school students graduated along side us (all 100 of them). We worshipped African style and soon we were all drenched with sweat as we danced, sang, and shouted for Jesus. The graduation was followed by a baptismal service in the ocean. It was an awesome day.

On Wednesday the 17th I left with 18 others on an extended "bush bush" outreach. (the extra 'bush' is just to emphasize that it was "way out there"). It was a five day outreach and we visited two different villages in the "bush bush." This outreach was like a cherry topping on the entire school, definitely one of the hi-lights for me.

12/18
One cool thing happened in the first village we visited when a couple of us prayed for an older lady who had a messed up left leg. She was in pain from the hip down and wasn't able to move her entire leg without it hurting. It was so bad that she was unable to do her work in the fields. I suspected it was a hip issue.

After praying for a few minutes we had her test her leg and there was zero noticeable improvement. So, we prayed again. This time, after testing it, she felt a little improvement, but still had some pain. We prayed a third time. Before we could finish our third prayer, she interrupted us and started blurting out something in a surprised Makua tone. After translation, we learned that while we were praying the third time she felt a popping sound in her hip (this seemed to be something spiritual as well as physical--like she heard something in the spirit). After this "popping" she was completely healed and had no noticeable pain in her leg. Praise God!

The next day one of our translators told us that he was able to visit this woman earlier that morning--she was out working in the fields and feeling great! Hallelujah!!

12/19
This was an amazing day. Probably one of my top five days in Africa so far. It started out late morning when I went to the local church with David, Bonny, Joe, and Ben (other missions students) to do a men's meeting. During our men's meeting we discussed many things, primarily revolving around marriage and sexual purity. Joe felt impressed to count the men and saw that there were 12 in our circle (Africans) along with a couple looking in from outside the circle as well. Joe felt that 12 was significant and that this group of guys was like Jesus' group of disciples. At the very end of our discussion I challenged the guys to start praying every day for the Holy Spirit. I told them very briefly how I had done this with a friend and how I started having physical vibrations in my bones.

There was something about the testimony about the bones that got me really fired up. We went directly into a prayer time for the guys and I was really pumped. I was getting rocked as the guys we were praying for were getting really touched as well. It was awesome. Then I saw on one of the guy's watches right after the thought of Joe's observation crossed my mind, 12:12. Afterwards I told them that I felt that this was a small confirmation from the Lord that He wanted to use them to impact surrounding villages with the love of Jesus. I challenged them again to daily cry out for "toto nempa takatifoo" (more Holy Spirit in Makua) and to make that their life prayer, praying it a thousand times a day.

After the men's meeting we quickly ate lunch, loaded up our camiao, and hit the road headed to our next destined village. On the way to the next village we reached a bridge which had been washed out and was impossible to cross. After some consideration we decided to try and fill in the washed out areas with rocks and logs. We began to gather the biggest rocks we could find. Before we had the first large rock in the hole, suddenly there were at least 25 Mozambican men helping us, gathering other rocks and cutting down trees for logs! The Mozambicans took over and started constructing the bridge. I've noticed that when people talk to each other in this culture it often sounds as if they are arguing, even though I think they usually aren't. Their conversations often sound loud and abrasive, especially while building bridges. As the Mozambicans conversed we gave our input (which was usually ignored--the language barrier didn't help). Nonetheless, we were able to work together to fill in the washed out areas.

Finally, we made the move to cross the bridge and by the grace of God our truck made it! There was an outbreak of shouting and laughter as we all jumped for joy. Then, there was some more commotion. Our helpers wanted paid. Pastor Jose gave the chief 500 mets and told him to split it with all who helped.

After the bridge, the weather seemed to get increasingly worse as dark storm clouds formed and sporadic showers increased. We encountered low points in the road following the bridge with patches of mud that our truck had some trouble passing through. The road became obviously less traveled as we barrelled further into the heart of the "bush bush." We pressed on, eventually entering a village called Niuthi (Nee-oo-tee). This village wasn't our intended destination, however, we stopped here because our planned village to visit was up-hill from this point and the roads seemed to be getting worse. Upon entry, a quite uptight looking witch doctor greeted us by pacing around our truck in an anxious manner while shaking fetishes at us and speaking curses in a quiet yet determined voice. Pastor Jose (our Mozambican leader) and David and Heather were outside the truck making the decision to stay while the rest of us waited in the camiao clueless of their plans. Some on the team started to freak out in a subtle sort of way. I prayed quietly. Then David came and informed us that this village had no church and since the roads were bad, we would do ministry here.

I got really excited at this point. This village had a witch doctor with a quite colorful personality and even more intriguing, this village didn't have a church. I felt like I was on the forefront of God's Kingdom being established in the earth--this is the stuff we dream about. Some team members weren't overly optimistic at first, but we were all tired and tuna spaghetti with mayonnaise (our usual outreach dinner) sounded pretty good, even though it would be a couple hours before we would be able to eat.

When we first entered Niuthi the sky was dark and it looked like we were going to have a very wet night. However, as soon as we set up camp it seemed that the weather gradually improved. Even though it was still lightly sprinkling on and off, we decided to go ahead and show the JESUS Film that first night. The people were very responsive clear from the beginning. They were glued to the film and to every word we said before and after. Following the film Pastor Jose preached the gospel and invited people to make a commitment to Jesus Christ. It's hard to say exactly, but probably 80% of the crowd raised their hands. We then prayed for the sick. It was a special night from the beginning--I felt a lot of anticipation building from when we first entered the village. The crowd was warm and responsive and I didn't sense much mocking or detachment. On some of the other shorter outreaches I went on there were times I felt a lot of mocking from certain crowds.

Most of the sick we prayed for said they felt better immediately after we prayed for them. I saw many people healed from headaches, backaches, and stomach problems. After praying we loaded up the sound equipment. Right when we got the last piece of equipment on the truck it started to pour. This heavy rain lasted for maybe five or ten minutes and then miraculously when we got back to the camp and began to unload the equipment the rain stopped! God blessed us with great weather throughout the entire outreach even though the sky looked like it could have turned for the worst at many times. We were very thankful that the hardest rain of the first night happened while we were on the truck in transit protected by the truck's very effective tarp. The people were able to hear the word of God and we were able to sleep on dry ground! God is good.

I've got some more great stories to share about the last couple days of the outreach. I'll try to post more in the next few days!

God Bless you all and thanks to those who helped make this trip possible!

Much Love,

Levi