Well it’s been an eventful week……..

Gilai Lumbwa: A day late we arrived at Gilai Lumbwa after an arduous 8 hour trip through incredibly dusty roads. I had to use 4 wheel to get through them! Dust, not only behind as normal, but billowing up at the front. Several times we had to stop to be able to see our way to drive! I guess it would be like the bulldust we get in the north of Australia- it gets into everything.

But it was well worth it when we got there. Here are some excerpts from diary letter I wrote to the kids.........

"Stephano, the advance party, told us the witchdoctors said we will never succeed to establish a church here. Little do they know the power and love of God! They are the ones that always fail when righteousness stands up in the form of His people. "

"It has been a great day- 30 minutes ago I was about to take my bucket bath and there was crying and praying in the room next to me. I asked the cook what was happening and my feeling was right- a strong Maasai warrior with his spear was crying his way into the presence of his saviour Christ! It was a privilege to be a part of it- I preached in the morning and the afternoon on us all needing to be in Jesus’ kingdom if we wanted to be in heaven in eternity- I know it touched the peoples hearts a lot."

"Stephano was telling us, that when he walked over here before we came, he came on a mob of elephants. We are used to seeing them from the safety of the car. Bit different this way! I asked him what he does if they come for him. He said they lie down on the ground!! Then the elephants leave them alone.! We saw many animals driving in but no elephants. The other thing he told me that I didn’t know was that if you use a torch at night the elephants will run from afar off towards it and trumpet and generally carry on. Turn off the torch!!" 

"Last night I took my computer over to the film showing and showed them a slide show of all the pictures I have taken here. It was not as good as video but the people loved it. Today I had all the team peering over my shoulder as I showed them other things on the laptop. It is a totally amazing thing to them."

"It has been a good day but we are all really tired. Comes from preaching the gospel I guess. In the half hour of preaching it is amazing what goes out of you. My voice is croaking away but it was good to be able to pray with the folks needing healing and also see many saved this morning. At this stage it is mainly women that are coming due to their soft hearts, but there have been some men as well. We preached in the soko [market] today and so many people were there. The soko was smaller than I remember it though-  I assume that it is because the cars can’t get in with all the thick dust on the roads.

“Last night after I left writing to you there were many people at the film. I think tonight there will be many more because of the market today. There is a problem with water here at the moment. I think the pipes up the hill have been broken during a flood last year. Now they don’t have enough. But because we are here,( I guess the presence of an Mzungu helps), they are giving us water every afternoon.”

 

Well that might give you a bit of an idea of Gilai. On the way home we tried a new way but it turned out to be a bit of a nightmare. We were driving through riverbeds; over bushes with 2 inch thorns in places where there were no tracks. The photo on the left is when we hit the "road". The photo does not really show how bad it was it but it was a hairy place to drive with a trailer on the back.

 

Alex and the 1000:

Last week besides my team we had 2other teams in other villages. Ale, from one of these teams, came back the week before looking very sad. He was sick with amoeba from the green water they were drinking from the local water hole. We sent Moses down with the car with 400 liters for them for the 2 weeks ministry and the team of around 14 were VERY happy about it!

 But the report Alex brought back was amazing. He said there were a thousand who found Jesus as saviour! I am not sure if that is the correct figure but certainly there was a strong presence of God there. At one point Alex said His presence came so much that people cried out as the Lord delivered them on the spot and the preacher could not share! Alex said he has never seen anything like it. I am convinced it is a special time for the Maasai right now and will send you Alex's report when he gets it to us.

Prayer points:

• Thanks for car donations
  • - we have had significant offerings for our 4*4 from Australia and US- thanks so much to the donors! Pray with us for the remaining finances needed.  We think we will be able to get a  brand new one here in Tanzania because missions can buy them tax-free.  If we can do that, it will mean it will last us a long time.
    
    
• Pastors seminar 22nd-26th Sept:
  • 250 pastors coming together in Dareda this week and yours truly has the privilege of teaching them with sponsoring team from Perimeter church in US. Pray for the team led by Jerry Thames. We are looking forward to it and I know its going to be a very significant event for the area after breaking the ground there with Stephen Cullen in May. Pray for Lyndall as she teaches at the ladies  seminar about AIDS  awareness. Carolyn Bahr and two other ladies from the U.S. will also be teaching at this seminar.
    
    
• Kirsty:
  • She is studying hard but missing us. We want her to be able to come here in December for some weeks.  It is almost a year since we saw her.
    
    
• Arusha Pastors Fellowship [APF]:
  • Pray with us on the 7^th & 8^th October when I am being helped by two other missionaries to share with 50-100 pastors here in Arusha. I think it is going to be a significant event in helping the pastors work together here and establish APF.

Bless you all and thanks again for standing with us….

Mike and Lyndall & Josh