Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Prayer Request from Lesotho

Greetings from Lesotho!  It definitely feels like fall here.  It's cloudy again, and that adds to the chill.

First of all we want to share several answers to prayer:

Praise:
  • The Easter conference was a great blessing.  Many people found spiritual help. 
  • The last time we asked you to pray for a young mother who was in physical danger.  We praise the Lord that He has protected her, and the man who was stalking her has been banned from the village by the chief.  She has stood strong spiritually and told the truth through the whole situation.  It has been an excellent witness in the village where she lives.  Thank you so much for praying!
  • Last weekend we had a much needed rain.  It has been dry again since January, and we had thought the dry season had already started.  This fall rain will help people's gardens grow well until the frost comes and contribute to good nutrition throughout the winter.  Praise the Lord!
  • Stephanie got a good report from her doctor last week.  Both she and the baby are doing fine!  Thanks again for praying for us!
Prayer:
  • PLEASE intercede for the pastors here in Lesotho.  Several of them are going through difficult trials right now that could seriously affect God's Kingdom.  We need your prayers in a special way right now!
  • Pray for us and the rest of the missionaries on the Southern Africa team.  We need God's constant grace to maintain good spiritual and physical health.  We also need divine wisdom for the many decisions we face.
News:
  • We are looking forward to hosting a Touching Lives For Christ (TLC) mission team in June.  We will be working together with youth from the church in Lesotho to hold a VBS and have outreaches in several villages.  I'm sure they will also help with some "hands-on" projects--painting, maintenance, and maybe making some church benches. 
We appreciate your prayers!  God is at work!

Glenn, Stephanie, and Kaitlyn Gault
Hope International Missions

Monday, April 13, 2009

Easter Conference

Rev. Thabang Khasipe from Ladybrand was the special speaker.

Kaitlyn enjoyed the children's services

It was a time to get re-acquainted with old friends. This is Ntate Mokoena with Poloko and Kaitlyn

Of course there were LOTS of choirs and the services were long. Sunday the service started at 9:30 and ran until 2:45!!!

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Lesotho Update

Dear Praying Friends,

Thank you so much for your consistent prayer.  The month of March was very busy, and so far it looks like April will be no different.  Here's a little prayer request update so that you can support us more effectively in this spiritual war.

Praise:
  • The last time we wrote, we asked for you to pray as we held the funeral of a converted witchdoctor.  God answered prayer, and several people have responded to the Gospel in that village.  Most of the family did stand against all forms of ancestor worship.  Praise the Lord for this!  This past weekend, the extended family came to conduct the final ceremony for the ancestors in connection with the funeral.  Bro. Mahlomola went there to preach on Sunday and assist the family through this difficult time.  When he arrived, he found a drunken celebration going on in one room of the house.  In the other room the converted members of the family were fasting and praying for protection and the salvation of the rest of the family. 
  • We also asked you to pray especially for an HIV positive orphan that Rev. Pheko is carrying for.  God is answering prayer for her!  Monday I saw her, and she looks so much better.  Praise God for His physical touch, and keep praying for her.  Except for a miracle, there is no cure for AIDS.
Prayer:
  • Please keep on praying for the weekend Bible School.  We are so encouraged with the new group of students who are attending!  Pray that they will be able to apply the lessons they are learning to daily life and ministry.  Pray that God will call some of them to be full-time pastors!  Also pray for us teachers.
  • Our annual Easter conference starts tomorrow (Thursday) and runs through Sunday afternoon.  Please pray that God will graciously pour out His Holy Spirit on us. 
  • Please pray for a young mother from the Matukeng congregation that is in physical danger at the moment.  The details are complex and personal, so please just breathe a prayer that God will keep her safe and help her stand strong spiritually during this difficult time.
News:
  • Probably all of you have heard through our newsletters or blog, but we are expecting another child in September.  We are excited, but please pray for Stephanie and the baby's health!
Thank you for your faith-filled prayers.  God is at work!

Glenn, Stephanie, and Kaitlyn Gault
Hope International Missions

Sunday, April 5, 2009

We're Expecting!


You can check out the pregnancy ticker at the bottom of our blog!

'Mesa


In Sesotho, the name of the month that corresponds with April is 'Mesa. It is derived from "ho besa" which means to roast. It is the month when the corn is ripe enough to roast and eat. Since God graciously gave us rain this summer, we have a nice crop of field corn in the clinic garden. Towards evening some nights we light a fire and start roasting corn for supper. It's yummy! We wish you could join us around the fire under the stars to talk for an hour or two while we roast and eat fresh corn!

Sunday Afternoon

Hi everyone,

It's been a very long time since I wrote e-mail. I guess things have
been going a little crazy around here and probably won't stop until
after Easter. I'll try to remember a few things of interest from the
recent past to give you an idea of what we've been up to.

Probably the big thing lately was that Nt. Kali and I made a trip to KwaSizabantu over near Durban to pick up a motorcycle that was given to him. The cycle is a bit of a project, but may still have some potential. It is a Yamaha the same as mine but styled more as a dirt bike. They are a popular bike in South Africa, and have been used by the police a lot. It has three major problems: The exhaust system is completely rusted out. Supposedly there is something wrong with the transmission (I doubt this is serious.) And it doesn't have a title. Since 1994 it has been used to get around the KwaSizabantu campus the owner never licensed it. Now we have no idea how to go about getting a license for it. The man who gave it to Nt. Kali also gave him $200 to help get it fixed up, so maybe we can find a used exhaust for it and put it back together. The motor was rebuilt, but never used and the bike was completely put back together after that. It sat outside more than a year, hence the exhaust and a few other parts were rusted out. I'm fairly sure the transmission problem is just from sitting. I think I'll start by draining the oil out of it, rinsing it good with diesel, then refilling it with new oil. I suspect that will solve the problem. That of course is when I get some free time!

We left about 6:00am Monday morning with the Golf and trailer. We met Nt. Matsaba at the border and had an uneventful trip. It is a beautiful time of year in the Free State because the cosmos are blooming all along the road until we dropped down into the more subtropical area towards the coast. The road we traveled crosses the Drakensberg or Maluti mountains just to the north of Lesotho. We drove through a beautiful
national park called Golden Gate National Park where we crossed the highest passes. We really enjoyed the mountains and also saw a lot of antelope--blesbok, zebra, and another one that I don't know the name of. The baboons were also interesting.

The time at KwaSizabantu was very nice. Their large auditorium which was capable of seating 10,000 people burned to the ground last year. This was very discouraging to them since it was the heart of their ministry. (They don't plant churches as much as we do. Instead they hold conferences and people come to them for spiritual help instead of them going out to plant churches in villages. God has blessed their ministry and they have done a LOT for God in Southern Africa.) From what I understand, they cleared the rubble and then around the beginning of
February started rebuilding. The main structure of the new auditorium is made from laminated wood beams. This structure and the roof system were completely prefabricated in Austria. It was then shipped to Durban and trucked to the mission and then assembled there. They were putting the finishing touches on the building when were there, and plan to use it for the first time on Easter Sunday. To rebuild this massive a structure in two months is quite a miracle in Africa! If you check our blog, I'll post some pictures.

The main reason I'm so busy at the moment is that I'm taking another class from Liberty University. Actually this is the second one this year. They are only 8 weeks long, but there's quite a bit to do during those eight weeks. I thought this one was going to be easier because it
only has two short textbooks, but I misjudged it. There not a lot of assigned reading, but every week there are two writing assignments that require some research. The name of the class is Biblical Foundation of Leadership. I'm really enjoying it and finding it especially applicable to life.

Yesterday I worked with volunteers at Ha Matala on the tabernacle there. We want to close in the open pole barn to make a nice conference facility. Several months ago we dug the foundations, and piled the dirt inside the tabernacle. I had really hoped to get the foundations poured and the the walls up to floor level before the Easter conference, but we had so much rain that we could not work on it. When we get a lot rain, that area turns into a marsh even though it's on the side of a hill.
The foundation trenches that we dug were brim full of water for several weeks. It has finally almost dried up, but there is just not enough time to pour the foundations and build the walls before the conference begins next Thursday. We spread the dirt from the foundation holes out and packed it with a compactor. Maybe later this month we can get the foundation poured.

Well, I guess that's my news. Blessings from God to all of you!

Glenn