Goma - Day 10

This morning the staff and volunteers of Light of Africa Network(LOAN) got together for prayer and bible devotions. It was a truly blessed time of heart felt worship and prayer from the depths of the heart. We prayed for the country, the sexual violence issue as well as many other topics. We believe that we serve a God who not only hears these prayers but also delights in answering them.

Much of the morning was finishing the preparations a a two recording engineers from Ghana coming to record the bible in Swahili. They are partnering with LOAN on this project and with be here for about two weeks to complete the project.

With Camille still in a full length cast on his leg, I have taken o the responsibility of chauffeur. I drove to the port and pick up Esther when she returned from a very successful trip to Bukavu. Esther and I went to the market (with me driving) which was an eventful trip. Driving at home is easy because all there is on the road is cars and the road is well paved. Try driving on a dirt and rock road after a night of rain. Then add lots of people, motorcycles driving crazy, little kids wandering about, and other various obstacles, Oi! The market is not stores you walk into, it's the streets lined with everything you might need or not need. As soon as we started to slow down, we had the mama's coming to Esther's window try to sell their goods. On my side were people staring at the Muzungu (white guy) wondering why is he driving around this Congolese. I did see something you don't see in OC. I was looking across the car to what Esther was doing when there was a knock on my window. I turned to see a man holding up a handful on chickens, big & dead, I declined!

Today was the first day here that I did not have a speaking engagement. Part of me feels like a slacker, but I have enjoyed some rest and re-cooping from the past week and a half. I was to speak at the prison this morning but that got moved to Thursday. I bought 100kg of beans and about the same in rice for the prisoners. Patrick, you will be happy that I did not forget to take care of that.

I have committed our church to sponsor 10 kids in the Hope for the Hopeless program. I encourage you to check out their website to learn more about them. (www.hopeforthehelpless.org) This ministry works closely with C & E, and you can see pictures on the blog from the day I went to their tutoring and bible study program. The young man, Andre, who runs the program here keeps very busy. Every other week he is in the schools checking on the sponsored kids and once a month he goes to the home to do the same. Every Saturday they come for tutoring and Bible study. This isn't just pay some school fees and that's it, there is a lot of accountability.

"The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and wonderful results." - James 5:16

Keep praying.

Grace and Peace,

Michael.