Dear Prayer Partners,
~Jeff and I are safely home today after our trip to electric-less Togo. Saturday, July 7th, we’re heading to Ghana.
~The seminary council meeting went well. The seminary is progressing although it has been difficult this year with the great lack of electricity. Graduation has been suspended for a time for the students cannot complete their work. The school has a good vision for the future.
~We had an excellent time with Togo volunteers Larry Bailey, Tracy and Archie. God is doing powerful things through them.
I had an incredible experience last week before leaving for Togo. Besides two of Kari’s basketball friends and one girlfriend showing up just to hang out with us, two university students showed up at our door. Years ago, when we first came to Benin, we lived in Cotonou. Ryan and Kevin made friends with the kids “on the block”—(along our muddy dirt road), played with them by doing what boys do. We had some special events with their friends to help them understand Christmas and Christ’s coming. But that was a long time ago. It’s been 11 years since we left Cotonou to move among the Ayizo people, then subsequently to move here to Calavi. These two university students, Urbain and Gilles, were some of Ryan and Kevin’s former playmates. Urbain has kept in touch with us from time to time, but Gilles I’d not seen since forever. As I sat down to talk with them they opened the conversation with these words, “We want to get out of the darkness and know Christ.”
That was astounding. Neither attends church. Their knowledge of Christ’s purpose here on earth was limited.
The other night on CNN we caught a special about some strange carp in the Mississippi that were purposely imported to the region to take care of an ecological problem. As a result the fish created another. These 5-10 lb carp jump out of the water at noise and are injuring skiers and fishermen—broken noses and bones! It seemed humorous until I saw the reporter get clobbered by two. The fish were actually propelling themselves into the boat! That’s what happened to me. I asked these two young men, after presenting them the entire story of Christ, if they were ready, right now, to surrender their lives to Christ. Both said, “That’s why we came here today.” They left transformed by Jesus Christ. Fish that jumped into the boat.
Keep praying! May God give us many, many more jumping fish!
Barbara and Jeff
Author of Beyond Surrender
Serving the Peoples of Benin, Burkina Faso, Togo and Cote d'Ivoire
bsingerman@gowestafrica.org