-Our New School begins
Last Tuesday we started school properly in our building including running water, electricity, painted walls, tiled floors, lots of excited children in their new uniforms, a Zambian Teacher called Fatima and quiet a few ants.
The first week of school has gone very well, the children have been enjoying all the activities we are doing with them from singing to playing games to writing their names to counting a bit of sports, music, art, science and then some more singing (we do a lot of that).
They seem to be picking up English reasonably well the main phrases of this week have been "please may I go to the toilet?"and remembering what to say when someone says "good morning" most of them used to reply with "I'm fine" so we recapped the difference between "how are you?" and "good morning". Oh and they have all learnt a new word "SCOOTER" this is a vital one for them as this is their favorite toy and we encourage the to ask for it in English.
-Some new adventures- going out and about
After breakfast on Saturday, as Anne-Mette, Charlie and I talked about what to do with the rest of our day, we remembered that we had talked about going out to different communities to see what God wanted to do but hadn't actually gone yet. So we thought we would go to a nearby village where there is a clinic to offer to pray for people there.As we cycled up to the clinic we recognized a lady walking away from it (she is a teacher from another village around 10km away) we asked why she was there she explained her daughter was unwell with suspected malaria but the clinic was closed. She then asked what we were doing there, we explained, and she was very happy for us to pray for her daughter. It felt like we were where God wanted us to be. We have since found out that just a few hours later her daughter was feeling well again! How exciting!!
While we were there I remembered a lady (Albertina) who had been taken to a witch doctor and been held there for over a month because there were rumours in the community that she was also a witch doctor (not sure how this was meant to help her?) she had been released just before Christmas. So we set off to visit her house. Along the way we passed the house where one of our pupils (Purity) lives she had been unwell and missed school on Friday. When we saw her she was still looking very weak and unwell so we offered to pray for her and her grandmother was happy for that. So we prayed and continued on our way to Albertina's house. We chatted with Albertina prayed for her and her grandson who had been with her at the witch doctors, she seemed encouraged! On our way back we saw Purity again and she was looking a lot more lively which is great!
-a new level of recognizing Gods provision
One of the most difficult things about being here is missing people in the UK especially when there are big things happening in their lives. Since I have been here one of my best friends has got engaged and is getting married at the end of March. We decided as I couldn't be there we could set up an iPad with Skype and then I could still be part of it! But to my utter shock through some very generous people it has become possible for me to actually travel back for her wedding! I am so excited to get to be fully part of it! God really does provide for things that are important to us!
- a new theme - Emmanuel - God with us
God seems to have been reminding of this name of his in a number of ways, so funny when it feels like everywhere you turn you are being reminded of the same thing. Here are some examples of how God has been reminding me that He is Emmanuel (God with us):
- songs
- printed on a milk carton
- finding a bible in the roof of a prayer hut with EMMANUEL written in big letters across the front
- on stickers on the buses
- in the name of one of the churches we visited
