This week has taken several unexpected turns. On Monday, my father
was following his usual routine of getting up at 5 AM to go to the exercise
room in their condo when a cable broke on the exercise equipment while he was
weight lifting. He`s still not quite sure what happened next but he woke up on
the floor covered in blood and realized that at five in the morning no one was
coming to look for him. He struggled back up stairs to the apartment dripping
all the way and got my mother to call an ambulance. After an extended wait the
ambulance finally arrived even though the hospital is a couple of blocks away.
The paramedics were rather apologetic saying they`d been sent four times to get
my dad but were called off for a more urgent call while en route. They think
he`ll be fine but for now he has a concussion and over a dozen stitches. Please
pray for his recovery.
Tuesday our pastor here in Niamey was informed by the UN
officials in charge of refugees that Niger had signed off on the UN protocol
ending his refugee status here. As a result he has until the end of March to
either be integrated into Niger as a citizen or be repatriated to Rwanda and
face three months military training. What will happen to the business school
that he owns and the church that is meeting on his property? He could
potentially go elsewhere if an official invitation were given from another
country. Please pray for this family and the church that God would oversee
their situation.
On a more positive note I met with a man from the church this
week who has been travelling around villages an hour or so out of town. He says that in the last couple of months he`s
baptised over a dozen people. We discussed what might be the next steps in
moving from making converts to making disciples and planting churches in
villages where there is no church. He faces real challenges in that he doesn`t
read in French, but instead has been listening to audio versions of the bible
in some of the local languages. Please pray that we would be able to find or put
together some useful tools in the Arabic script that he can read.
The roof has been put on our building (well all but the
cooling tower) and the electrician has installed some of the basic wiring. We
praise God that we have been able to come this far with that. Please pray that
we would be able to finish the rest of the building in a timely manner and that
the wiring would be done well with the appropriate types of wire (as this is a
major issue in many buildings here in Niger). Thanks so much for being there
for us in prayer, may you see God’s hand at work in your lives and ministry
this week.
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