The remainder of the day seemed to have little to write about but yet I feel as if I have been talking all day. I spent a great deal of time discussing my work with Shadrach and Winston. They wanted the know about my life and who is my family and what my work is like. I actually was missing people at work as I talked about how things are done in the states at a truss plant. Of course, because of lack of jobs in Liberia, they wished they would be able to work at the truss plant. We had a great time comparing stories between our two countries.

Emmanuel and Wintee did not return until around 4:00 p.m. so I prepared for my lesson in the next chapters of our book while they were gone also.

Tomorrow we will have the youth program and go through The Bible Overview and continue this on Saturday morning.

The study time went well tonight lasting about 1-1/2 hours and making it through only one chapter. We ended by everyone sharing what they learned and how what they learned could be applied to their life today.

After church it is nice to sit in the cooler evening to visit (my weather app says it dropped to 81 degrees now at 9:11 p.m.).

I had the opportunity to speak to a lady tonight who had no hope in life. It was a difficult talk. Her name is Yassar and she is struggling in so many ways. Her family, (parents, siblings and her husband) were killed during the war and she has had health problems that have prevented her from selling things (the typical way Liberian people support themselves) for a few years. I’m not sure about her children. There are no economic safety nets in Liberia. It is good that she was at our study on God’s sovereignty over people so I ask that you all pray for her as her future is grim, but we serve a great God. I pray that God sustains her while giving her clear direction for the future. She tells me she will see me tomorrow. May the encouragement I could share and the small amount of help (according to James chapter 4) help her to see God at work.

I now sit inside Emmanuel’s house with the children watching a story on the television. We are able to have electricity from the hours of 7:00 p.m. through around 5-6:00 a.m. and the kids take advantage of an opportunity to see a show once in awhile. It is nice to have a fan on during the night too with the power on overnight.

I’m having problems with pictures being uploaded, especially at night here. I’ll try to upload more during the day. It takes about 5 minutes per picture to upload.

Mornings in Liberia

I have the privilege of waking up each morning to the bustle of the morning chores. In addition to sweeping the dirt to remove the previous days garbage from the compound (it does give it a fresh look), you will see children carrying water buckets on their heads to gather the household water

and some do the laundry early to avoid the heat of the day. Here is a picture of Christie doing her laundry.

I saw a gentleman walking around selling brooms specifically made to sweep the dirt. Not really a rake, but sturdier than a regular broom. If there’s a market for something there will be a product for sale. I guess you’d say this is Liberian capitalism. I won’t get into politics, but it is interesting how that concept works in Liberia. They definitely model themselves after the USA.

Earlier I decided to take a walk by myself with my camera. I don’t have access to the SD card with my phone so I cannot share those photos here. Anyway, I walked east of Emmanuel’s home this morning by myself. For Jenny’s benefit this was the direction that Jenny, Tessa and I walked in 2014 past a large church when it started to rain. Emmanuel and Wintee had left early in the morning to go somewhere and it was a nice morning to go for a walk. I was greeted by many as I walked. Some curious as to what this obvious foreigner is doing walking around their community and others greeting me as if I was one of their neighbors. The children liked to get my attention and would like to shake my hand. The handshake is a big thing in Liberian culture so the kids wanted to be able to shake with the white man. I know I am a novelty now and the longer I am around I truly will be just one of the community. I walked a long ways and was getting hot as even in the morning it is around 80 degrees. I came to a turn in the road and I stopped at a roadside market or center where an older man was sitting under the awning of the porch. He had an extra chair there and he invited me to sit and talk with him. Although most Liberians speak English it is mixed with their colloqua that make communication difficult sometimes (most times). Even though the base language is the same the differences are still great. Last night I was told that one way to say you are hungry is that ‘my teeth are sharp’, but I’ll try to represent this phonetically, they say ‘ma tee ar shop’ but you almost don’t hear the ‘p’ sound. I know that’s not easy to hear through writing, but I want to give you a sense of the difficulty in understanding especially when I don’t know the colloquial sayings.

Now back to this older man, Anthony Eke, we talked for a few minutes as I rested and many children came around to either argue with him or stare at me. After 10 minutes or so I left to head back to Emmanuel’s house. About halfway back I met 3 children from around Emmanuel’s house. Princess was worried so she sent the kids to look for me. I do appreciate the care. I teased her about worrying when I returned. I think because Emmanuel and Wintee were gone she felt responsible as she is the main person to keep the home.

When I got back Princess had ‘tea’ and breakfast ready for me. The tea is Ovaltine with powdered milk and sugar. My breakfast consisted of spaghetti with some bread.

After breakfast as I sat down to type this some

members of the church came over to wash all of the sanctuary chairs for church. They keep them stored and locked away to prevent theft. In the dust the chairs get dirty over time. Such a great way of serving that others may not recognize. All churches have faithful people serving behind the scenes and it is good to be reminded that all service to the King is needed.

I just wanted to give a little more cultural update this morning.

I had to go back and add the pictures that didn’t upload. The upload speed here must have prevented them from uploading completely. Take a look back for the ones that were missing.

Today was a day that I was able to spend with Daniel.

He is a young man that has been a friend since the very first team sent by CBC came in 2012. We visited the school he was teaching in today. He no longer teaches since he is attending University to be a lab technician. He is currently a sophomore there. We have a great relationship and I’m glad to be a friend of his. I gave him my camera to walk around and take some pictures today. I’ll ask him again perhaps if the pictures he took are something I find interesting. He did get a close up of a chicken if that’s any idea of his photography skills. I just read that line to him so I have his permission to share.

Emmanuel and Wintee left this morning and came back around 4:00 p.m. He had invited me to come along and he said I could wait around for them to finish their scheduled meeting. I chose to stay back and I think that was the correct choice. Emmanuel has a habit of being so busy that schedules get changed frequently. It was good for them to have some time not worrying about me.

The ladies in his home fed me and cared for me by doing my laundry today. They are extremely hard workers. Emmanuel in turn helps them as well in any way he can with food or other needs. The cultural differences between the USA and Liberia are many. The care for those who need help is done in a different way than the government helping out. This is not available in Liberia so you see many families helping extended families and friends in exchange for helping around the home.

An update on Blessing is that she is doing great. Thanks for praying. I didn’t know what to expect from typhoid, but the injections she is getting twice a day have been helping greatly.

Tonight we continued our study through Jerry Bridge’s book, ‘Trusting God’. We had a good time of discussion and we will continue this tomorrow night. We made it through chapter 3 tonight. We will attempt to do 4 & 5 tomorrow night.

I will be planning The Bible Overview class with the teens on Friday and Saturday. Sunday I will be at Titus’s church with next week up in the air. I will be meeting with Titus to finalize any other plans for next week. I’ve been invited to speak at two other venues, but at this time I am committed to Titus and his church.

I look forward to seeing the children at Betty Jonah Orphanage soon. I also hope to encourage Mother Betty as she still struggles with the passing of her husband, Father Anthony this past year.

I plan on meeting with Pastor Moses, not to be confused with nurse Moses, to get a better understanding of the spiritual oversight of the CBC Clinic.

I’ll try to get more pictures for you tomorrow. The one below is from yesterday. This is Naomi Johnson. She is one of the trainers for Women of Purpose.

Today actually seemed more relaxing than yesterday. My preliminary plans were to have The Bible Overview class today, but as things worked out I had only a meeting at 5:00 tonight to work through the ‘Trusting God’ book with the leadership at LCMI. All those who teach or serve were encouraged to come. It reminded me of our Discipleship Hour setting. We put chairs in a circle and my thought was we’d go through this together. Pastor Jonah was called to pick up some people at the airport so he was not planning on being in attendance. I had highlighted certain sections of the first 4-5 chapters with plans to push through that far. For those that watched Pastor Dave go through this book in 12 weeks you can understand why I just got into chapter 2 by cutting through chapter 1 and touching chapter 2 in 1 hour and 45 minutes. It was a great discussion and I especially appreciated the challenges as I encouraged them to look to the Bible for verification. We ended on a great understanding and awe of the sovereignty of God even when life hurts. Many were thinking that all good comes from God, but it was hard to imagine God in the bad things. That is why Trusting God is a great book to work through and not just a glib saying. I look forward to further study on Thursday with the leadership.

Prior to our meeting I started the day with quite a smorgasbord of food.

They are taking great care of me.

For lunch I had GB which is a traditional Liberian dish.

I only ate about half of what they served. Tonight I declined supper and the rest of the cake I bought from Princess and some popcorn they had also made for breakfast.

I also had fun playing with Snapchat with the kids here today. They would get so embarrassed at their faces with dog ears on or looking like an ‘Oma’ (grandma). Watching their reactions was more enjoyable than the pictures themselves.

Here is Daniel being a good sport and not hiding when he saw the picture.

Now maybe you can understand their embarrassment. I have a great friendship with these young men over here. I get teased by them and I tease them right back.

I look forward again to tomorrow and I appreciate all who take time out to pray for God’s leading while I’m here in Liberia.

Emmanuel returned from the clinic with Blessing. She has typhoid fever.

Please pray for her. Here she is sitting with her Mother, Wintee when she returned.

Monday February 5th

It is now the end of my day here. Almost 6:00 p.m.

overall it was a relaxing day. I woke up at 8:00 a.m., catching up on my lost sleep from traveling. Pastor Titus Namen came to visit me at Emmanuel’s home. Mercy, his wife, is up in Nimba County back where her family is located. I’m hoping to see her later in the trip along with her children, Diana and Yaytowee. It was great visiting with Titus for awhile. I will be speaking at his church on Sunday. He is the Pastor of an ULIC (United Liberian Inland Church) located in downtown Monrovia. I look forward to seeing his congregants again too.

When it was time for Titus to leave we were also headed out so we gave him a ride. We dropped him off and headed to get my phone activated for Liberia. After buying a SIM card and converting my iPhone to the new SIM along with a scratch card for $5 that is data only and spending a total of $15 my phone is up and ready to go. My family is an iPhone family so I can FaceTime with them on data only as well as update my blog. I’ve already been texting them and talked to Jessica and Heather also with Adelyn and Ivory. What a special thing to hear ‘Hello Poppy’ from Adelyn when she saw me. It made the miles disappear.

We then went to visit Boye Nelson’s (a driver who drove for our first trip back in 2012)mother in a clinic where she is recovering from a stroke. I was able to pray with her family for her continued recovery. What a privilege. We then stopped by a place for Daniel McCarthy to purchase a new crutch. Daniel had polio when he was young and he can’t get around without the one crutch and the terrain he uses it in wears them out. We then stopped by the Exclusive store (mini Walmart type that has many American products) for Emmanuel and Wintee to pick up some things. They graciously bought me a couple of things I needed and also treated me and Daniel to an ice cream sundae. That was quite a treat. We then came home and, yep, we had supper. That in itself was interesting. They had potato greens as well as another soup topping for the rice called ‘rock meat’ or ‘kiss meat’. I tried some of it since it was new to me. Emmanuel told me they ate it a lot during the war. It is a snail like crustacean with a spiny shell.

If you look closely you can see the spines. Now to why they call it kiss meat. It’s because you have to suck the meat out of the shell in a kiss like fashion. Not really a fan of kiss meat, especially when potato greens are available.

I took a break from writing to take a walk around the community with Emmanuel. It is now after 8:00. He wanted to visit a member who was sick so we went to pray with him and his wife. Joseph, the man’s name, believes he has malaria. The lack of money causes people to make self diagnoses and they just try to fight through things. We continued through the neighborhood visiting other members and encouraging some that haven’t been coming to attend. We were returning after dark and when almost home we found out that Blessing, Emmanuel’s daughter, was taken to a clinic herself. We walked back to the local clinic and Emmanuel stayed while I came back home. I believe she may have a bug of some sort. We are praying it’s not malaria as that is harder to deal with. I’m still waiting for them to return.

I came back, took a shower and then decided to try my malaria meds again. Since I got sick yesterday morning I waited until tonight to take the pill in case it does make me sick I can lay down and rest. Other than being sick yesterday I’ve felt good today.

I look forward to tomorrow. I will be meeting with some church leaders to go through the Trusting God book by Jerry Bridges. I studied with Emmanuel this morning going through the first chapter.

I have a Liberian data plan for my phone. Here is my record from yesterday.

Sunday, February 4th, 2018.

Today begins my first full day in Liberia.

After feeling sick yesterday before leaving Brussels I gradually continued to improve. The flight was good and I met and talked with many nice people.

Today, as I type this note it is before Sunday School with the worship service to follow. I have the privilege of speaking this morning. What a privilege to share God’s Word regardless of the location.

As I mentioned earlier I felt sick yesterday and gradually improved. Well today brought another wave of nausea. So much so that I ended up throwing up. I may have isolated my problem however. Both mornings I took my anti malaria meds on an empty stomach. I will not do that again. I do feel better now and ready to go. I’ll write more later. We have a busy day planned.

Well, the day has come to an end and it was every bit as busy as expected. Church started at 10:00 a.m. with SS until 11:00 when the morning worship started. I spoke this morning and last night I asked Emmanuel how long I should plan on speaking. He just said 20 minutes, 30 minutes, 40 minutes or more if you’d like. I was prepared for around the 30 minute mark. Little did I realize that (although I should have remembered) that the early part of the worship service lasted a long time. It was 12:15 the last time I noticed the clock and I didn’t start right then. When I did start I didn’t look at the time, but after I sat down it was after 1:00 p.m. No one seemed to mind. We had communion afterward as well. It was interesting to see how another culture follows the Scriptures in serving the Lord’s Supper.

During the announcements of the morning they announced that there would be a business meeting immediately following the service. By this time we were pushing 1:30. The time is only relevant when you know that the graduation ceremony for the Women of Purpose was scheduled to start at 2:00. Needless to say the whole day kind of blended. The business meeting ended with an immediate transition into the graduation ceremony somewhere around 3:00 p.m. Oh, incidentally I was the guest speaker for this service as well.

What a great service it was, honoring these women who studied baking, tailoring, crafts and such that would empower these women to add to their household economy. In Liberia, every little bit can help a family to survive. Also in Liberia the women are not thought of as highly and the vision for this class is to teach the women that they have marketable skills. The class is approved and recognized by the government of Liberia making the certificates that Bobbi Buckley made up an official government document. I was able to charge the graduates to use what they learned to the glory of God.

This service had a cake and craft procession where the women explained how they made what they were holding and they would have a buyer to purchase their wares. One of the graduates, Princess Kau, baked and decorated a cake. The cake had the initials W.O.P. Across the top and the initials R.N. Along the bottom. Needless to say I had been targeted to purchase Princess’s cake before the ceremony. I didn’t mind in the least. I had some cake before I came to bed. It was very good.

Before the cake Emmanuel and I were sitting in the building under construction next to his home. For all of you who’ve been here, you may remember the lawn that was being cut with a machete like tool one time to a volleyball court on another visit. This visit brought the change with the start of a guesthouse that Emmanuel and Wintee hope to use to house visiting missionaries and teams. The slab is poured and a couple rows of blocks are laid. Emmanuel plans on a 2 story building with an indoor kitchen. That’s pretty big news.

Getting back to our sitting in the unfinished building and a young couple comes up to speak with Emmanuel. It seems this couple is planning on getting married and Emmanuel thought it would be a good time to have one of their counseling sessions. Since I have 34 years of marriage I was asked to stay and lend my advice. Another 1-1/2 hours later and I came in (partly because I was really getting tired and partly because it was getting dark around 7:00 p.m.)to have a piece of my cake. We had to wait awhile since they wanted to wait until the power came on. The man who owns a generator and ran his own electric lines doesn’t always have a reliable power feed. It eventually did come on and I had a late supper and cake.

Speaking of the electricity, I didn’t even notice earlier, but there are official power lines being run through Emmanuel’s community. Normal looking poles and wires. Emmanuel tells me they will drop hookups to the houses and have people pay by use of a scratch card. On your meter you will have the ability to use a scratch card, type in the number and whatever denomination of card you purchased would be available from the new electric grid. When the card runs out you go buy another card. This system works with their cellphones so it looks like prepaid is the Liberian way of the future.

Tomorrow I will go and purchase a SIM card for my phone and hopefully update each day. This post will be posted on Monday, but I wanted to type it in when it was fresh in my mind.

Today I am humbled (again) as I sit in Brussels to board my flight to Monrovia. Humbled that I don’t feel well, humbled that even though I was put up in a nice hotel I didn’t sleep well. After a long night of trying to sleep I am here, at the airport, wondering how much more difficult it may be and wondering if I rest in God in all things. Frailty of the human body can drain the best ambitions of the mind.

God, grant me your grace and peace as I long to serve You more. I know my time in Liberia may be physically challenging, but I want to be more like Paul and less like my ‘normal’ self.

From the rough start at the Chicago airport to a one day layover in Brussels Belgium.

I last left off with the problem solved at O’Hare airport. That didn’t mean to infer that other problems wouldn’t arise.

After the part was replaced on the second plane and the gate ramp pulled away from the aircraft there was a medical emergency on the plane. We were informed they were bringing the ramp back so the paramedics could board to help the problem. At that point I prayed for whoever it was that needed medical attention. As we waited there was a rush of 4 paramedics headed towards the rear of the plane. After a few minutes a young lady was wheeled out, thankfully with nothing hooked up signaling to me at least she was stable. I prayed again for her. The last paramedic left carrying a young child around 4 who I assume belonged to the lady in distress.

Now, time to go….right?

In a few minutes our hopes were dashed again as the captain announced that due to the use of supplies from the emergency medical kit they needed to be replaced. That would take a little more time. The next announcement was the proverbial icing on the cake. Due to the long delay and already with all hope of catching my connecting flight gone, the captain announced that the crew scheduled to fly to Brussels, due to FAA rules, could no longer travel as they would not have enough work hours to make the trip. Another delay to wait for a new crew. Through this all I found it encouraging that nobody was complaining, but more of in awe that so many things could simultaneously happen to cause the delays.

We finally left about 6 hours later than scheduled.

That brings me to where I am now, which is sitting in a Sheraton Hotel in Brussels. The airline comp’d everyone that missed their connecting flight with an airport food voucher, a room at the Sheraton and 2 more meals at the Sheraton (at least all that in my case since my flight now leaves at 12:10 local time tomorrow). I will ultimately arrive in Monrovia one day later, but around the same time in the evening.

Incidentally I was told that my original connecting flight from Brussels to Liberia also had mechanical problems and even had I made it on time to Brussels the flight wouldn’t have been here. God surely didn’t intend for me to arrive Friday in Liberia.

Now I have a more comfortable setting to finalize my Sunday sermon.

I’ll see what tomorrow brings. I’m so grateful for technology that allows communication with family and friends to let them know all these things as they happen.

The captain announced that the part that was broken was replaced and we will be on our way in 15-20 minutes. Total of 4 hour delay. Connection should be made, but now it’s more interesting.