Broken

Tonight we are in Addis for another quick trip.  We came in this morning to meet the Jacksons, take them and Russell shopping, drop Russell off for his flight home, and pick up the rest of The Woodlands team from the airport.  We head back out early tomorrow morning so that we can be back at church in Bantu for Sunday morning worship.  Today has been very busy as we’ve had to fit in a two hour car trip, shopping for souvenirs, grocery shopping for us and the 15 person team, laundry, exchanging water bottles and propane tanks, and enough internet and Skype time to last for another week. 

Grocery shopping here is very different from how I shop in the states.  First I head down the street to the roadside produce stand.  I have found a very good one where the men are kind and speak a pretty good amount of English.  Today I bought 3 papayas, 2 bunches of bananas, 6 apples, 1 kilo potatoes, 10 tomatoes, and 10 avocadoes for the equivalent of $12.  Next I head to my favorite grocery store, Abadir, where I can buy most everything else I need.  Then I double back to a second store to fill in what the first lacked.  I’m limited on what I can refrigerate in the guest house overnight, so I buy items I need to freeze the night before and pick up the rest the next morning on the way out of town.  You can’t buy ice for a cooler, so I freeze ground beef and buy frozen chickens to keep everything cool on our two our ride out to our home.  It’s been a learning experience.

As you can probably tell from the title, the theme of this week has been “broken.”  Since our last blog post a week ago, we’ve had a car that won’t start twice, two flat tires, the circuit breaker on our generator break in the ‘off’ position, a brand new faucet snap at the attachment while Larry was putting it on, a sink begin leaking, an inverter burn up, a massive window leak, and a septic pipe that had to be dug up, cleaned out, and replaced.   We’re pretty sure there’s something else that we just can’t remember now.  It’s been a little exhausting on the repair side of things this week.  One thing we’re learning is that maintaining a home here is a constant job.

House repairs weren’t the only broken things we dealt with this week.  Last Sunday as we drove back into the village before church, we witnessed a large crowd of people attending a ceremony just up the road from our home.  We discovered that it was a Waqqefachuu gathering, an animistic worship service.  We’ve never seen one before, and it was a powerful reminder for how broken this world is that we all live in.  It is heartbreaking to see people trust in lies, seek that which can never satisfy, and look for answers where there are none.  Daily living is hard here, but it is worth it if God will use us to help repair just a little of the brokenness. 

We are really excited about the ministry coming up this week.  The Woodlands team will lead VBS in a new little village called Bili Malima outside our sister village of Abebee.  There is currently one believing family in this village, and they are eager to plant a church in their home village.  We’ll also host a Ladies’ ministry program, work on finishing a water well, and help with the construction of the new church building in Abebee.  This past week we held a four day session of the Rural Pastors’ Bible Institute.  How awesome to see 43 men and women gathered faithfully for study, prayer, and instruction in God’s word.  We are honored to have been able to teach there again.  We have also been so grateful to have Larry’s brother-in-law, Russell, here this week.  What a tremendous help, support, blessing, and encouragement he has been to us and the boys. 

Thank you so much for your love and prayers.  We need them!  We will be back in town next Thursday, so look for another blog post then!