Brrrr!

Last night it snowed quite a bit in Lesotho.  At Matukeng where we live, most of it melted as fast as it fell, but some stuck.  Here's a picture from the village where we held an outreach today.  The sun shined all day, but the wind was bitter cold!

TLC Lesotho 2009

We've been having a great time with the TLC team that came to Lesotho.  They have been a HUGE blessing!

The TLC team helped us with an outreach where we're planting a church at Mphatane.  We passed out tracts, the girls held a short children's service, and we held an open are service.

Matt, Joe, and John played Candy Land with Kaitlyn.  She loves the team!

TLC has been a huge help with several projects that we just haven't had time to get to.  They painted the carport, ran a water line to the pig pen and we're still trying to get the leaks in the plumbing to the apartment sink to dry up.

The 4-day VBS was a great success here at Matukeng.  They also helped with a children's service at Ha Motheho.

Here's the team that did the children's ministry.

Kymberly really enjoyed her "Super Bowl Sundae!"  She LOVES sprinkles and ice cream!

Today we climbed to the top of the plateau behind our house.  Yes, that is snow on the mountains in the distance!

The looooooong lost group e-mail

Hi everybody,

From the frequency of our communication with you, you probably already guessed that life has been a bit hectic for lately. I suppose it's more a problem of priorities so I won't make any more excuses.

Tuesday I left Matukeng about 3:00am to go to the airport to pick up Joe (Steph's youngest brother) and the TLC team. I was a little late arriving for Joe because of construction and traffic jams in Johannesburg, but he said he had only been waiting five minutes for me.

From the airport we went to a mall to kill the day until the TLC team came in in the evening. Neither Joe or I are shoppers so we bought a packet of french fries and sat at a restaurant for several hours talking. Then around 1:00 in the afternoon we went to an Indian curry buffet for lunch. We both really enjoyed the food and had a nice time talking there too. After lunch we checked into the Baptist mission guest house where we were to spend the night. We both slept for about an hour there before leaving for the airport again to pick up the TLC team

The TLC team leaders are Matthew Thompson and Angela Haynes, both from Hobe Sound. We've known them both since college, so it's really nice to
be with them. The rest of the team members are John Miller, Rachel Grate, Kayla Shannon, Kimberly Rynearson, Jennifer Worrell. They are a great team and we are really enjoying being with them.

Yesterday we went to Mphatane (one of the newest church plants) for an outreach with youth from the church here. God really helped as we passed out tracts and held a short open air service. All the TLC team testified and I preached a short message. The TLC team also spend time with the village kids, taught them some songs, loved them, etc. A lot of the people responded to the Gospel invitation. I felt like it was very profitable outreach. The chief of the village was drunk but very supportive. He didn't go forward at the invitation, but I heard him praying the simple sinners' prayer that Nt. Kali led the people in. He said he would help us find an empty house to hold services in. The deceased witch doctor's family lets us hold services in their house, but they live in the edge of the next village which is much smaller. It would be better if we had a house specifically for the church and in
this larger village.

Today we're going to work on some simple projects around here, get ready for the service tomorrow at Ha Thafeng, and prepare for the VBS that starts on Monday. Also Joe will be leaving with Uncle Piet for Zambia on Monday, so I need to get a few camping supplies out for him to take along.

Well, that's the news for today. I'll try to put a few pictures on our
blog to go with this if you want to look there. The address is
http://gaultsinlesotho.blogspot.com

Glenn

News from Lesotho

Hi everyone,

It's a sunny but chilly Saturday afternoon in Lesotho. I wonder if it snowed up in the mountains somewhere recently. In spite of a clear sunny day, the wind has a cold bite to it.

I finished up the class I've been taking yesterday. I enjoyed the class a lot, but I'm glad it's over! I have a to-do list as long as my arm to get done this month. When I take these classes I seem to only get the necessities done. Anything that can be put off gets put off. Now it's catch up time!

Last weekend we visited Philip and Amrie Geise. We had a really nice time with them. Since Friday was a holiday in South Africa, we went there Thursday afternoon after they got out of school. Friday we went to a farm show in Bloemfontein. We arrived there late because we slept in, so we missed some of the better shows like seeing horses, but we still had a lot of fun looking around. Besides animals, there were displays of farm equipment, motorcycles and four wheelers, art contests from area schools, and lots of flea market type stuff. Saturday Steph
and Amrie relaxed around the house while Philip and I went for a hike. We went to a farm about 8 miles from Ladybrand and hiked down into a beautiful canyon that has a waterfall at the head of it. There wasn't any water falling, but little springs were trickling out of the rocks
everywhere. It was very beautiful and therapeutic. We had planned to go back to Lesotho Saturday night even though I didn't have to preach on Sunday, but around supper time we decided to spend the night again and go with them to the church at Manyatseng Sunday.

Saturday afternoon Philip had loaned his truck to one of the pastors to move some of his things from the farm where he used to live to Ladybrand. Shortly after we made the decision to spend the night, Philip got a phone call that somebody had run into his truck and the back axle was knocked out from under the truck. We hurried off together to see what could be done. Fortunately no one was hurt seriously, but the pastor's brother's son did spend the night in the hospital. The car that hit the truck hit it right on the back wheel and drove the back
axle almost to the bumper on one side. We managed to beat it back into place and tightened up the badly mangled u-bolts again enough to get it home. The big challenge was that it didn't have any brakes and the drive shaft was also pulled out. Eventually we used our Golf and a tow
rope to pull it a few miles back to Steve and Gwen's house very slowly. The last four blocks to their house is down hill, so we hitched a "whoa rope" from the front of Steve Geise's Mercedes to the back of Philip's truck to be the brakes to go down the hill. By then it was getting late and we were all pretty tired. We got a good laugh out of our tow train.

Monday morning I took our truck back to Ladybrand for them to use, then Wednesday we worked on his truck. We replaced the spring center bolts, u-bolts and all the bushings on both sides. We also had to repair the parking brake cable, the brakes, and a few other things. Amazingly there was very little sheet metal damage on the vehicle. The man who
hit him supposedly deposited money into Philip's bank account today to cover the damage. I suspect that the wheel bearing and the u-joints will eventually have to be replaced, and we wonder if the frame wasn't tweaked out of shape a little somewhere since the truck sits a little
higher on one side than the other. Fortunately the amount the man paid will cover those repairs and paint that side of the truck.

Today Steve and Gwen were planning to visit, but their whole family is down with a nasty stomach flu. Instead of visiting with them, I ended up going to a funeral here in the village. It was a strange funeral to say the least. It seemed that the young man who died was estranged from his family here. I don't really know what the problem was, but between the drunkenness and family problems the funeral was a little tense. The father of the man who died left the funeral midway to go get some more alcohol in the village. He came back at the end of the service so drunk he could hardly stand up. Ntate Pheko preached the funeral, and the people of the village listened very attentively. The hunger for the Gospel in Lesotho is very encouraging.

Friday night Nt. Kali took a group of ladies to Mapoteng to encourage the ladies of that congregation. They held an all night prayer meeting there and came back real early this morning. Nt. Kali turned the truck around in a spot that turned out to be a marsh. The truck was starting to get stuck so he backed up into some bushes to get to solid ground. Unfortunately, the bushes had been cut down and had grown out again. The branches looked very soft and harmless, but unfortunately there was a big limb hidden by the new growth. This nasty snag broke out the back window of the topper of the truck. I'm not sure where I'll find a replacement for that! Maybe I'll have to just find some plexi-glass and cut a custom one.

Well, I'm rambling so I'll close.

Love to all. Thanks for your prayers!
Glenn

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