Hi everyone,
We're in Ladybrand again this week. Steph's at school. I've been
running Daddy's Daycare, writing a newsletter, working on a prayer card, etc. For the moment Kaitlyn is happily playing on the floor, so I'll try to write you a few lines (oops! she just took her diaper off.) Ok, try again.
Last week Steph only helped at the school Monday and Tuesday because I had a TEE meeting in Lesotho Wednesday morning. The TEE project is going well, but needs funding. We have all of the books translated now, five are ready to be published as soon as money is available, and another seven or eight are within a few weeks of being ready to publish. If you think of it, please pray for God to provide money for this important project! Our weekend Bible School students are ready for another book!
Wednesday morning before the meeting I helped Nt. Kali's father-in-law start digging the foundation for a pig pen down at the bottom of the property. We are going to start raising pigs to help orphans in the church. The plan is to make this a pilot project to learn the twists of the trade and then help each congregation or maybe individual orphans start similar projects. Thursday we poured the foundation, and Friday started building the low block walls. We got rained out by lunch time on Friday, but Nt. Kali and his father-in-law worked again on Monday and yesterday while we were here in Ladybrand. I'll see to night how far they got, but I'm guessing they probably finished the walls. We need to level and pour the floor and build some gates, and put a roof on that covers the back half of the pen still. Nt. Pheko has located someone with some nice Landrance piglets for sale. I think we'll start with these. We still haven't decided whether to raise them for meat or for breeding. Eventually we want to get to good quality females and one good male, but raising pigs for breeding takes longer to turn a profit and is probably a more risky investment.
I can't remember which day, but Steph got out the suitcases sometime during the week and started helping me sort and pack a few things. She's also been doing some baking and extra cooking to use up things out of the freezer since we'll be turning it off while we're gone. She made some awesome brownies with macadamia nuts.
Kaitlyn is finally down for her nap, so I'll try to finish this up.
Friday night was the Bible School. Me Mapheko led a very interesting discussion about prophecy. (She is starting to lecture through the O.T. books of prophecy.) God has given her a lot of wisdom and the ability to work well with youth, and help them learn to think for themselves. As usual we got home late. Nt. Pheko and Me Mapheko stayed all night for the monthly ladies' prayer meeting.
Saturday I had to go back to Ha Matala to hold a meeting with the Sunday School teachers of all the congregations. I was the only pastor there. All the others had either gone to funerals or to a wedding of a friend of the church. The meeting went fairly well. The purpose was to choose a committee that will promote the interests of child evangelism and children's ministry in the church as a whole. The committee has been asked to plan a children's conference that will be during the same time as the youth conference over the Christmas holidays. Saturday night we made a quick trip to Ladybrand. We had been invited to the choir concert of the Ladybird Music Academy. I kept Kaitlyn, but Steph went and REALLY enjoyed it.
This past Sunday was the most relaxing Lord's Day we've had in a long time. Nt. Pheko preached at Matukeng. He arrived just in time for the service, and left immediately afterwards. Steph had prepared a meal for him, but he couldn't stay because he had to preach again at Mazenod at 3:00 in the afternoon. The chief of the village had asked him to preach at a village meeting. He is very well respected in his village and throughout Lesotho because of his ministry and preaching on the radio. After a quick lunch, we packed up and came to Ladybrand.
Since we've been here in Ladybrand, Steph has been wanting to have some of the other missionaries over for supper, so Monday night Philip, Steve, Gwen, & family, and Sis. Carol Witter came for supper. Steph made yummy peanut curry. We really enjoyed the evening visiting.
Tuesday morning I planned to leave soon after breakfast to go to Lesotho to try to get Steph's residence permit transfered to her new passport. On the way out of Ladybrand I stopped to put air in one of the car tires. I noticed that the car was leaking oil, so I checked it out. The oil pressure sending unit had gone bad and was leaking pretty bad. I drove to the nearest parts store and fortunately they had one in stock. I put it in quickly and headed out of town again. At the edge of town the oil pressure light came on and a buzzer sounded. I switched off the engine immediately and coasted into a gas station at the bottom of the hill. I added a pint of oil, which seemed to solve the problem. I started off again, but almost immediately the buzzer and light came on again. I coasted off the road and checked the oil again. The oil was fine, and eventually I determined that the problem was the sending
unit. I bought the wrong one. For some reason only a German could explain, VWs have to sending units that work together. I finally got to Maseru, got the residence permit put in the new passport after a long wait.
Well, that's the news of our lives. Hope you all have a good week!
