Dear Friends,
We made it back to South Africa and Lesotho safely. Thank you for all your prayers! All of our luggage arrived on time and undisturbed.
Jeremy Howard picked us up in Bloemfontein Wednesday night and took us to Uncle Johan and Aunt Hessie's home. We stayed with them until Monday morning. It was relaxing to be able to sleep in as late as we wanted and visit with our friends. Thursday night we went to Uncle Piet and Aunt Hester's to visit with them. It was great to see them!
Friday Glenn took our Toyota to Matukeng so Ntate Kali could use it. He was able to catch up with news in Lesotho. That afternoon we went to Ladybrand to do a bit of shopping and stopped by Miss Carol's place and Michelle's to say hi to them.
Sunday we went to Uncle Piet's place for their service. It turned out to just be a children's service. The rest of the people were going to Hobhouse for a special service (Uncle Johan and Aunt Hessie are helping the church there.) We thought we might need to help take people too but we weren't needed. To save fuel, we stayed for the children's service at Uncle Piet's.
Monday we went to Ladybrand again to get groceries to take back to Matukeng. It was good to be back in our house! Since then I've been getting our house back to normal (things on the walls, etc.) , unpacking our suitcases, figuring out where things will go, and trying to get back to normal.
Glenn has been working on our temporary residence permits, doing some odd jobs around our house, going to meetings and the Bible school, preaching, and butchering one of our pigs. The day we arrived, one pig tried to jump out of the pen, severing her tendon and breaking her foot. So the next day, Glenn, Ntate Kali, and some other men killed the pig. The next day, Glenn took it to a butcher who cut it all up for us. I think between us missionaries, we will buy almost all of it.
Today is Tuesday and we're in Ladybrand doing errands. Glenn has a meeting tomorrow. Thursday and Friday are holidays in South Africa (only Thursday in Lesotho) so we're doing our errands today.
Please continue to pray for us. We're still in a little reverse/reverse culture shock. Satan would love to discourage us.
1) Rats got into our new storeroom and chewed through boxes of juice which in turn ruined things in the cupboard, including child evangelism material. 2) Prices have gone up again while we've been in America--diesel is now $5+ a gallon, all food prices have gone way up, and we now pay R20 per time through the border (instead of R5).
3) Our Lesotho temporary residence permits and 6 month South African border passes expired while we were in America. Everything in Africa takes a long time, especially standing in long lines.
4) Kaitlyn was very sick this last week with a high fever. We think it was related to teething. She's doing better now but still fussy and teething. She's kept us up at night for most of a week.
But there have been encouraging news since we came back--another preaching point has been started, several good outreaches were held, and new people have been saved--all while we were gone. Praise God!
Thank you for your prayers and interest. We will try to send out a newsletter soon. Sorry no pictures this time. We'll try to get some ready for next week!
Bye for now!
Stephanie
