Our God is an Awesome God

Very weird night!  I finished prepping for class about 11 and was too tired to bring my mesquito net down.  it can be such a hassle if I don't feel like doing it.  I didn't see or hear any bugs any way.  However, I kept dreaming of giant bugs in my room and woke myself up a couple times through the night!  Then about 4:30 this morning we had a HUGE thunderstorm!!  The thunder was so loud and I'm almost certain I saw a shock come through my room! (I could have imagined it though, being half asleep, but I heard a pop with it!)  It scared me so much I couldn't back to sleep so Hannah and I talked for a while.  The storm had woken her up as well.  I finally went back to sleep around six until my alarm went off at 6:30, but I ignored it and dozed for another 15 min! So I am now running on about 5-6 hours of sleep right now!  Boy, that's fun!  I hope I will sleep well tonight!

It's was so amazing to watch the lighting as it was starting last night about 9pm.  It's so awesome to see how powerful God is!!  The fact that it could have gone through the ceiling down to the floor in my room is pretty cool!  I was shaking after the fact, but I know that God is in control and He is protecting me!  He even sends rain right when we need it!  Our power keeps turning off at random parts of the day. Last Tuesday we were told it was because there wasn't enough water to run the power.  We are at the end of dry season so the rivers are very low.  That night we prayed for rain, and the very next night it rained!!  It has also rained twice more since then!!!  How awesome is our God?

Camera Scare!!

      Tonight the staff decided to have a campfire on our last Sunday before the kids come back.  I really enjoyed all the hymns and songs we sang.  I am so blessed that I can praise God with all the wonderful staff at Sakeji.
      I had brought my camera to get a few shots of everyone since I don't have too many of the staff.  Unfortunately, after we had finished singing I left  my camera on the bench to go and talk to everybody.  When I came back Mr. T found my camera on the ground, on the very sandy ground!!  A flash back brought me to when I first got my camera.  The guy said to never bring your camera to the beach or sandy places.  Right from the beginning I knew that I would be, because I love getting outside pictures and just any where.  I knew why he warned me against it, but now I REALLY know why!! 

      Mr. T offered to take it home and try and clean it with a paintbrush.  I brought my paint brushes with me to Zambia so I said I would just take it home and try myself...with little success.  I was just about ready to burst into tears after hearing that terrible grainy sound every time I tried to open my lens.  The sand was in the lens!! As I usually do, I googled. I typed in "I got sand in my camera".  The results were pretty bleak! At that point I decided to take Mr. T up on his offer.  Their house is visible from ours so I made sure the lights were still on then walked down to ask for his help.

      Let me tell you it's very nerve racking watching your camera being cleaned!!  He used compressed air and a brush (which I think was a proper camera brush, not just a paint brush) to try and get the sand out.  It didn't seem to be working very well, so he went a step further and started taking it apart.  I did a LOT of praying all the while!!  I was praying for a miracle for my poor camera.  It's kind of silly, but...  I can now say I have seen the inside of a camera; I just wish it wasn't mine!  Mr. T cleaned it out even more (all the while he didn't have the use of his index finger because he had hurt it earlier).  Eventually I had to distract myself, so I helped Mrs. T with the supper dishes from earlier (our tea as the say in the UK).  So we talked and did dishes while Mr. T put my camera back together.  It's very discouraging hearing the error sound go off over and over again!

      He came into the kitchen to deliver the good news!!  It now works! The flash no longer works, but that's a small price to pay. Especially since I hardly ever use the flash any way.  It still doesn't sound quite right when turning it on, but the lens opens and my camera will work for some time longer.  I don't know how much longer, but at least I will be able to take pictures for the third term!  I thank God that He guided Mr T's hands as he worked on it!!  I am going to be soooo careful now! Lesson learned, "always be very, VERY cautious when bringing your camera near sand!!

      Thank you God for all your wonderful blessings!!

"The Source"

I have been having a great time with Hannah, Joel, and Chris this term break.  We have done quite a few things together.  On Tuesday we went to go see the "great" source of the Zambezi River.  Since it's the dry season there actually was no water to be seen, but we had fun none the less.  I guess it's not so much what you do, but who you do it with. 

Since Hannah and I had both already been there, we could go down with out a tour guide. We were able to take our time and get many silly pictures along the way. I'm including pictures of us all matching faces with the statues. We had tons of fun just being silly.

We were all to tall to walk under the sign.

Shikenu Mwani: Mwani is a greeting and Shikenu means "Welcome"

 

"The Source" of the Zambezi River

 

Swinging in the trees!

...and all kinds of silliness

 

Enjoy!!!

My Girls Camp Experience in Zambia

Hey Everyone!!

Girls's Camp Zambia style was a great success!!  I'm going to try and give you highlights for each day.

Monday

   Arrival day!!  Some of the girls leave from Kalene Monday morning but Carole isn't ready to leave until after lunch.  The campers also come from Ikelenge and two other villages that I can't remember the names of.  Right after Carole and I arrive the girls are organized into their teams.  Most of the girls don't having swim suits so they all choose one out of the swim suits that have been donated and then we are off to bathe.  At Joy Bible Camp the girls are required to have a shower at LEAST 2 times during the week.  Here, they want to do it every day.  It's the same at home in the villages.  Afterwards Carole and I leave for the evening, but the girls go on to have a supper of nshima. After everything is all cleaned up they have their first campfire.

Tuesday

   Every morning the whistle blows at 6 o'clock in the morning.  The girls come out of their chisolus (grass walled shelter) and dance and sing to warm up.  Breakfast is readied and they eat  around 8:00.  At 9:00 is the first message of the day.  This is generally taken by one of the mamas.  Any of the older Zambian ladies are mamas.  Anyone who is not a Zambian is a sister: Sister Alice, Sister Catherine.  Some one correct me if I'm wrong.  After the message we either played sports of did Bible drills.  For today we played netball.  I have never played before so I was a bit confused at first, but I think I got the hang of it.  Quite a few of the girls played like pros.  Thankfully are team leader(team 5) was one of them; we won out game against team 6! :)

Wednesday

   It's raining. It's pouring!! We did our best to stay warm and dry. We played sports when it wasn't raining and then lunch.  Right after it rained again.  Mel F. did her message on purity.  It got many of the girls' attention. This is something many of them struggle with in their culture.  A world wide struggle, I think.  Mel took Kinsie and I back to Kalene after her talk.  We were going to stay the night but then decided to go back to Alice's because it was too wet.

Thursday

   Alice talked about Principles of Christian Conduct: How to make choices.  She gave sixteen questions to ask before making a choice. A couple are: Is there any glory for God in it?  Would Jesus do it?  Which nature does it feed?  Alice asked me to give my testimony.  She wanted the girls to know how I was able to stay pure.  I had to write it out so I could keep my train of thought while it was being translated into Lunda.  Many of the girls gave their tesimonies that night at campfire.

Friday

   We went to the rapids and then to see the hydro with the girls.  I got many pictures, but most of them won't go up until I get back to Canada.  We watched a movie about the life of Jesus at campfire.  The twist was that it was in Lunda.

Saturday

   It was the end of a very long week out in the sun. I wasn't feeling very well so I couldn't do too much in the morning.  I had to lie down until lunch time. As the day went on I felt better.  Campfire started with dancing with the ants. Or rather trying to not step near the ants.  Ant bites are not very pleasant.  I got one bit and it stung for quite a while.   I was able to enjoy a campfire full of great Lunda songs and skits.  Most of the skits were translated for me. 

Sunday

   Alice finished her message from Thursday, and then we handed out prizes to all the girls.  We laid out all the clothes, Bibles, watches, and bags on a tarp and the girls came up one by one to choose their prize.  The truck that was going to come to pick up the girls never came so Alice's van made about 5 trips from the camp site back to Kalene. 

*Prayer requests:

-girls's salvation

-a couple girls were thinking of joining a Satanist group, but both cofessed this to the counsellors.  One has said she has repented and asked Jesus to be her Savior! Praise God!! Pray that God continues to work in these two girls's lives.

-that the girls keep their testimony as they go back to their villages. 

-that God continues to use the camp to have such a positive effect on the girls.

-the women in charge for when they get ready for next year and years to come. 

It rained Wednesday starting in the morning off and on and didn't stop until about 2:30 that afternoon.  We danced around the fire in an effort to keep warm.

It started to rain again as we were finishing lunch.  We all rushed to the tarped chisolu to try and stay dry.  We had to keep tightening the tarp because the rain kept pulling it down.  Eventually someone came with ropes to tie it down.

This is the room I stayed in for most of the week.  Alice T. graciously put me up for the week.  If I had stayed at the camp I would have been sleeping by myself for most of the week.

Kinsie and I stayed for one night in a chisolu.  This was the day after it rained so the ground was still a little wet.  Thankfully we had a tarp to put under our sleeping bags.

Thursday night several of the girls gave their testimonies.  Most were salvation stories, but some were admitting that they were in sin and still hadn't accepted Jesus as their Savior. Please pray for these girls that the will find our prescious Savior.

This is Louie.  She is the sister of one of the grade 4 students at Sakeji.  I got to know her a little bit during the week.  I am happy to say that she knows Jesus as her personal Savior. :)  She gave her testimony on Thursday.

The girls wanted to pose for pictures when we went to see the hydro.

Thank you God that you are always there through the storms even if at times we can't seem to see you.

On Friday night we watched the "Jesus" film at the campfire, but it was in Lunda.  It was very interesting. I was able to follow most of the movie having grown up hearing about Jesus life.

Girl's Camp: Zambia style

Hey!

I had been feeling kind of down near the end of term.  I have gone to camp since I was ten and loved it!! I love the worship and the crazy camp songs.  I love that we are getting God's salvation message out to so many kids.  I love getting to know the girls a little during the week.  I love hanging out with the counsellors until Cinderella hour.  The thought came to me that this is the first year I'm going to miss it.  When kids from Amano Christian School were here we sang some of the worship songs that we sing at JBC, and that helped, but I was still missing it. 

Then I get an email from Mrs. Poidevin saying I was welcome to join the girl's camp here in Zambia!!  There will be approximately 80 high school age girls from the surrounding area.  I was so excited to here this!  The experience will be totally different but I still get to go to camp!

We'll be sleeping under the stars enclosed in grass walls.  I'll have a mesquito net hanging from a branch for protection and an extra big sweater, sleeping bag, and an extra blanket to keep me warm! I also have to bring my own water and toilet paper!! They'll be doing things like sports, swimming and, I believe, devotionals of some kind. 

I'll let you know how it all goes! Please pray that God will bless this week coming up!! Have a great long weekend everybody!!

Yolanda

All's well that ends well

END OF TERM!!!!!

The end of term is finally here.  The parents started arriving around 1pm.  They visited with the kids until 3:30 and then had the PTA meeting.  I was able to lend a hand in several areas today.  I helped in the kitchen getting the snack ready for after the end of term show.  We did many trays of cookies, dates, crackers, fruit, etc.  We then dished out the food for the kids.  The kids ate at 5pm and the adults ate at 5:30.  We then served supper for adults.  I was serving rice and corn.  The rice was very sticking, and it was very difficult to scrape it off the silly scoop. The person next to me ended up serving the corn half the time because I had to use two spoons to get the rice on to their plates.  The food was enjoyed by all, though. 

After supper Grace and I handed out the programs as the parents and other adults came into the hall.  I am so proud of our students! They did a great job with their parts.  They were showing the life of Jesus.  The program started out with a Christmas song and ended with Because He lives.  There were many songs, solos and groups, and memorized parts, verses and poems.  Thanks be to God for our wonderful night!! I pray the kids all have a safe trip home! :)

Omnipresent, Almighty, Awesome!

I'm starting to study Revelations today.  I really enjoyed verse 8 of chapter 1: "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End," says the Lord, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty."  How awesome is my God! Not only is he Omipresent, he ALMIGHTY!! 

When He rolls up His sleeves
He ain't just putting on the ritz
(Our God is an awesome God)

There's thunder in His footsteps
And lightning in His fists
(Our God is an awesome God)

And the Lord wasn't joking
When He kicked 'em out of Eden
It wasn't for no reason
That He shed His blood
His return is very close
And so you better be believing that
Our God is an awesome God

Our God is an awesome God
He reigns from heaven above
With wisdom, power, and love
Our God is an awesome God

And when the sky was starless
In the void of the night
(Our God is an awesome God)

He spoke into the darkness
And created the light
(Our God is an awesome God)

Judgement and wrath
He poured out on Sodom
Mercy and grace
He gave us at the cross
I hope that we have not
Too quickly forgotten that
Our God is an awesome God