First full day here, Saturday

May 31

We went into the boma (town) this morning to get me and melissa some clothes made. That was amazing! The children just crowded around us. They are so beautiful! I can't post any more pics until i get home, The missionaries are only allowed a certain # of downloads with their Internet. Bryan and I went with a translator to Puma, a little hut village just down the path from here. We were walking and praying today for our future teaching times (which will start on Monday). Our translator, Ba (MR.) Chamba, introduced us to many people. Even the adults asked for us to take their pictures and show them. They have never seen cameras. They laugh and laugh. One woman said we were taking her to America through the camera and laughed. They live so simply. Their main food is nshima. It is basically dried corn beaten down into a powder that they mix into a thick paste. We are told it has no nutritional value. They call everything else relish, which is what we would call a side. One little boy today was dipping his nshima into a little bowl of fish water. Ba Chamba said many of the people don't know about salvation through faith. He was saved when James and Mary Margaret came. He lets them hold Bible Study in his home now, which by the way I got to go in today!!! The children here use condoms as toys. The government gives them out everywhere to fight against aids. They make balloons and play with them and some lucky ones blow them up and wrap string around them until they have a ball to play with. Melissa got dehydrated today and we were only out 3 hrs. She was dizzy and throwing up. She's doing better now. Matthew (from Fl.) and James are trying to see if the new equipment they just got so we can show the Jesus Film on Friday. They have never shown it here before. I hope it works. While i was taking a nap today, Bryan and Justin (the journeyman here) rode bikes to visit the chief. We will go to his home tomorrow after church. Monday we start teaching in villages. Please pray that God will make us as bold as lions and that He will open their hearts to receive the truth. I am so excited to have this experience and especially that my son is here also. I know God is going to do amazing things in his life because of this.
Bryan kept getting separated from the group because the kids would crowd him and he is too nice to just walk away. I had to keep calling him and we had to learn how to say no in Bemba. Ba Chamba tried an M&M, he hated it!!!

I love you all and will update you soon.

We're Here!!! Finally

We made it to Kaputa! The flight was soooo long! The 2 day drive was long, but amazing! I called it a people safari! Thousands of little villages with little huts.

We stopped on the side of the road one time to fix some bags and the people all came out waving, and some grabbed their younger siblings and ran.




I don't think they'd seen many white people before. The power goes out in 15 minutes so I have to go. I can't wait to tell you more.

Ken, Deven, Nathan, and Ayden... We love and miss you. We are having a blast!!! Have fun at grandmas!

Heading to the airport...

We're about to head out the door. People have been asking us if we're nervous about the trip. We're not at all nervous. Maybe we're naive, I don't know. I am confident God has prepared me for this ahead of time and I am supposed to go. This is my dream! But saying goodbye stinks! AHHHH! Loving so much is hard because you have so much to loose. Ken is my rock, my prince, my all time best friend! He gets me! Deven, Nathan, and Ayden are my heart! Thankfully I will have Bryan with me! All of you in Mobile...Please take care of them. I would NOT be doing this, and Ken wouldn't let me, if we we're confident that this was God's idea! How did the great missionaries do it? They went months and even years with no contact with their families. Some even lost their children and wives on the mission field. Many of them only to say, "I Never Made A Sacrifice." Not that they didn't go with out things they were accustomed to, and that they didn't suffer dysentery and other illnesses, and that their hearts weren't longing for their family, or even that being on the mission field didn't cost them their families lives and their own. No, they did sacrifice. But when compared to what they gained, their sacrifice was nothing! There is a God! If you know His grace and His love you can't stay the same! And you can't be OK that there are people in this world who have never heard the name of Jesus. The name that changed my life. So if this is the most I "sacrifice", a few weeks away from my family, then I am fortunate to be a part of spreading His fame and to know God more for it!

Ken, Deven, Nathan, Ayden, Mom ...I LOVE YOU!

Time to go!

It's finally here! We leave Mobile @ 11:40 Tuesday morning and change planes in Atlanta. Then straight to Johannesburg, Africa where we change planes again for a short flight to arrive in Lusaka, Zambia at 8:50 pm on Wednesday!! That night we stay in a missionary guest house and then wake up and drive north for 2 days on rough roads at best. Sounds like plans have changed and we will stay at the missionaries house every night, with a shower and toilet! Don't ask me what we do during the day for a bathroom while we are with the villages!? I'll let you know. The missionaries said we are going to 5 different villages who have hardly ever seen white people! Bryan and I each have 4 Bible lessons we will be teaching through a translator. The people are illiterate and we are told they will have the stories memorized by the time we finish telling them and will pass the stories down. Pray that we say all God wants us to say and that the lessons will be more than just stories to them. Pray for Bryan, this will be his first experience teaching the Bible. Pray for good health. More importantly pray that people will find peace and hope in Jesus Christ. I'll write as soon as I can!

"For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." Habakkuk 2:14

Why Africa???

This is a copy of part of the letter we gave to a few family and friends dated March 4, 2008. Hopefully this explains everything..... This is my 4th son, Ayden Chad. He is named after Africa. Ayden, from the gulf of Aden(northeast corner) and Chad, in Africa. I have always had a heart for Africa and unreached people groups. One monday night Drew and Sarah Moss were over for our Monday night ritual of breakfast for dinner. We got into a conversation about what our drem trip would be. I said, "Africa." A few seconds later I received a text message that read, "Do you want to go to Africa?". As you can imagine, chills ran down my spine! The text was from Melissa. A college student in Jacksonville, Fl. I was her Sunday School teacher when she was in 12th grade. She needed another person to go with her and her brother on the 3 week mission trip to Zambia to teach the Bible to an unreached people group. I had fears and concerns about finances and leaving the kids for three weeks. It was my husband who said, " You're going! God will work it out." I know God has been preparing me for this for years. We have also decided to ask our oldest son, Bryan (14), if he was even interested in going. We told him we did not have the money and that if he wanted to go he would have to use the money he'd been saving for his first car ( it's not much, but he's worked hard for it). We also told him this would be a sacrifice and it would probably mean he would not be getting a car right when he turned 16. The next day he came to us and said he wanted to go, fully knowing what it could cost him. As parents we are so proud of him! It is our desire for our Children to be different, and we believe it will take doing some things differently and exposing them to the world so that their eyes will be opened to what really matters in life. We love John Piper's mission statement, "We exist to spread a passion for the supremacy of God in all things for the joy of all peoples". And that is exactly what we hope to do in Africa. We will be going to Kaputa, Zambia- on the border of the Congo. We will be working with the Adair family, missionaries with the IMB. This is not a luxury trip! No sightseeing, or safari rides. We are solely going to work with the missionaries to evangelize Kaputa. We have somewhere around 24 hrs. of flying, then a 2 day 4 wheel drive on poor roads. The cost of the trip is 2,600 each. Pray for Ken, Deven, Nathan, and Ayden while we are gone. We will be gone on Deven's 11th birthday and this will be especially hard on Ayden (1yr. and pure momma's boy!).
"Go therefore and make disciples of all Nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you: and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."-Jesus Christ

Thank You

THANK YOU JESUS! I am amazed at how God had put this whole mission trip together. Thank God for people with a heart for the nations to know Him! We raised more than $6,500 in six weeks, and more keeps coming in. Many people gave, and many gave us work. The boys did landscaping, Bryan cut a lot of grass, and I even worked at Wal-Mart one weekend giving sausage samples (yes, I was wearing a hair net!!). I still can't believe what God has done. When this first came up my #1 fear was the $$$. I realized God could could write a check if He wanted. I also realized that if I knew this was God's will, I needed to go, regardless. I thought this would be a huge sacrifice on my family financially, not to mention the strain on my family with no mom in the house! It was important for us to "count the cost." I was so sure this was God's will I was willing to put it on credit and work it off over several years (not one of my best ideas, I know)!!! Boy am I glad that was not His plan. His ways are better aren't they. We should trust Him more often!By the way, when you see my husband, know that you are looking at the real deal in every way. He was the one who said right away, "Your going. You've talked the talk. Time to walk the walk. God will work it out. Your going!". I am the luckiest woman alive!!!

So to.....

• My whole community group (you made the decision to go easy!!!):

The Skipworths, The Sessions, The Locklears, The Northcutts, The Theobalds, John and Polly, The Britains

• Gay and Mike Reynolds
• The youth group on Bryan's B-day
• The Fauver's
• Don and Ruth Guidry
• Grandma and Grandpa Malone
• Michael and Jean Duncan
• Garrett and Melanie Hughes
• Teressa Rylee
• Tim and Judy Gay
• The Halls
• Josh and Jamie Duncan
• Jonnie and Robert Brown
• Richard Rhyne
• Mom
• Jan Whitton
• Martha Ferguson
• The Millers
• The Mintons
• Bill Enterkin
• The Bates
• The Hortons
• Morgan Bowman
• Robert Whitton
• The Holifields

Those who are babysitting while I'm away:

• Grandma Kaye
• Sharon Lawson
• Ainsley Northcutt
• Reesa (& Preston) Skipworth

and to the many others who gave anonymously and who gave us jobs...

THANK YOU! A million times, Thank You! God has taught me so much because of your generosity! My faith has been stretched and I haven't even left.