The Ultimate Payment

At the end of August, we were able to start our building for our future feeding center with Manna International. Our church is so excited about the potential opportunities and blessings the center will bring. However, we never thought God would work so fast.

Our general contractor is a Burkinabe, but he hired five bricklayers from Togo to come up and build the building. During the time of construction, they were to “camp out” on our church grounds. I must admit, I was initially hesitant about the situation. However, it is normal in this culture, and it ended up working out ok. They even attended our church services during those five weeks.

On Wednesday, October 1st, after the evening service, they informed me that their part of the project was almost complete and they would be leaving in a couple of days. I thanked them for the good job they had done as well as their participation in our services while they were with us. We were going to miss them as they had become our friends. At the end of the conversation I mentioned that they had heard me preach several times and we had a few discussions about the Bible, but I would love to talk with them specifically about salvation if they would allow me to do so. To my surprise I received a call Thursday evening asking if I had time to come to the church and talk.

For an hour and a half we discussed their background and beliefs and how it compares to the truth of God’s Word. After explaining salvation, Mathieu (one of the bricklayers) told me he wanted to be saved. I wanted to make sure that he understood the implications of his decision. He was leaving his ancient animistic practices to follow Christ. He said he understood and he wanted to accept Christ. I was thrilled! I asked if there was anyone else who wanted to be saved. Immediately, the four other bricklayers raised their hands. PRAISE THE LORD!

These gentlemen came to Burkina to earn a little money. Little did they know that they would leave with something far more valuable than money - the ultimate payment - the gift of eternal life.

Jour D'Ami

In the past, we’ve run a few other friend days, and it’s always exciting to see how many people will invite their friends to come and be a part of our service. We offer a prize to the person who brings the most people to church – A large 50 Kilo bag of rice.
Today was our 3rd Jour d’Ami. Mike had been announcing it for several weeks and reminding our people on visitation to bring their friends. The turn out today was beyond our expectations. There were 61 adults in service. We didn’t have enough benches in the church building, so we borrowed some from the children’s service. Even at that, there were several people sitting on some boards we have stacked to the sides for our construction project.
A lady by the name of Assitou won the prize. She brought 7 visitors who showed up on time, and another 2 who showed up after the announcements were read (the cut-off time for counting visitors).
After service was over, three women (two of them first-time visitors) asked Mike and Douninoma to pray with them – one for health, another for difficulties in her life. But the last one that he prayed with wanted to ask Christ in her heart. We had a meeting planned with her the night before, but her husband asked her to go to a wedding with him. So, when she asked Mike to talk after services, he thought it was to set up another time when she could come to our home and discuss our beliefs of the church and salvation. Her request however, was to accept salvation. She said she was ready to ask Christ to save her right then. Mike explained to her how she could come to Christ and she prayed to accept the gift of salvation.
What a great way to end an already exciting service! Mike preached on salvation. The message was so clear, and 61 adults walked away knowing exactly how to come to Christ. Some of those hearts have already turned to Christ, another one having done so that day. But the seed is planted in so many new hearts. Pray that we’ll have the opportunity to speak with those visitors in the near future, and to see them, too, accept Christ as their Savior.

Sunday School Campaign

During the month of July, we ran a campaign for our children’s ministry. At the beginning of the month, the kids were given a list of 40 verses – some that we had already memorized. Each week, the kids were to come a little early to church to recite their verses to one of the teachers – word-for-word.
On August 3, we announced our winner. A young lady by the name of Mamounata had recited 20 verses throughout the month, word perfect. We brought her and all the other children into the church to present her with her prize. To help her and her family, her prize was some basic supplies that she would need for school – backpack, pencils, pens, notebooks, eraser, and some crayons and color pencils. When we handed her the prize, her face lit up. She is a very timid girl, so the smile she gave us was so very rewarding.
We focus on memorizing verses in our Sunday School. Most of the children who come to church do not have a Bible in their homes. The children love to memorize. It is one of the primary ways that they are taught at school. So, we have the opportunity to put Scriptures in their hands and encourage them to memorize it and keep it in their hearts.

Ministries of L’Eglise Baptiste de la Bonne Nouvelle

It’s so fun to watch new Christians grow in their faith and to see the results of that growth. All but three of our members in our church are new Christians, newly baptized, and ready to serve. When we approached our people about starting a teachers training class, we had several people show interest in this new ministry. They want to be involved in their church. It’s fun to watch them taking ownership. In our first class, I asked them why they wanted to be involved – was it because they saw the missionary, me, acting like a crazy woman trying to teach and control 80+ kids each week with only one helper, or was it because they saw the need to instruct kids in the Word of God? Each one of them responded that they saw a need and felt that God wanted to use them to work in this ministry.
Since that first class, we’ve incorporated two helpers per week so they can become familiar with the way we’ve been doing things. This has been such a help, though recently our numbers have dropped considerably. But even at that, from what they’ve been involved with and seen, they’ve already been able to give us a few helpful hints.
Last Tuesday evening, we had 7 adults show up to our class, with two that weren’t able to make it. For a part of our training, we worked through the colors of the wordless book. We gave them a paper explaining the significance of each color and some verses to teach the meaning. We gave them each a color bead bracelet that Edgewood Baptist Church in Rock Island, IL had made for us. At the end, we had them practice leading each other to Christ. It was so exciting to listen to them share the gospel. Though it was just practice time, we believe that practice time will help them be more comfortable when they share with other people. We encouraged them to take it home and practice, even to share Christ with family members that are not saved. We look forward to hearing how that goes.
Douninoma approached us a few weeks ago about another ministry that several people in the church had expressed interest in – starting a choral group. We left that in his hands to get started and now each Sunday he and another man lead the choral practice after church. So many people stick around after church to learn new songs and how to correctly sing old ones. This new ministry has made a huge difference in the congregational singing on Sunday morning during service.
Our ladies Bible study is doing well. We’ve averaged six ladies/study, and they are becoming more and more involved in our study time – asking questions and making comments. We’re enjoying our time together and I’m growing closer to our ladies as a result.
God continues to bless our ministry there in Somgande (a neighborhood in Ouagadougou). It is certainly not without its problems and difficulties as any new ministry anywhere in the world, but God is working in the hearts of our people and burdening them to reach their families and friends.
Thank you again for your prayers for our ministry here in Burkina Faso. Please keep our people in your prayers as they grow and strive to do God’s will in their lives.

Anniversary Sunday

I really struggle with remembering to put blogs up here. So please do forgive me and enjoy the story I’ll share.
Our anniversary Sunday was May 18th. We had planned to celebrate it on the 11th of May, but were quickly reminding that all the Catholic churches were holding their baptisms on that day. We decided to push our celebration to the following week, so that all of our members could be present.
So, early May 18th, four women showed up at our house to help me cook the riz gras we were making for everyone that day. We planned for around 75 adults and 125 kids. In the past, I would have considered for more children. However, in recent months, our numbers have dropped considerably. We’d only been averaging around 40 kids each week the weeks prior to the anniversary.
However, as we were cooking and packing the food, Mike called me from the church to tell me at 8:45 there were already around 140 kids at church. We had told them that we would have food. Note to self…..So, we filled every bag we owned to give to the kids. That totaled 198. At the end of service, we counted all the kids and discovered we had 221 kids in attendance. Where’d they all come from!!!! I have no idea. There were so many new faces in the group. I was happy to see them, but not prepared for them. We ended up telling them each to grab a friend and hold on to their hand and get in line. If there’s one thing I’m quickly learning here, when there’s food involved…..WATCH OUT! For the next 45 minutes, it was absolute MADNESS. The kids came to the gate without their friend, so they had to go back to where they’d left them and get back in line. After they’d made it through the gate with their friend, so many of them lied to say they hadn’t received any or ended up climbing back over our wall back into the courtyard to get back in line with a new friend. UGGHHHH! Live and learn.
I have to laugh at it all now. But I think the kids were frustrated too, because our numbers dropped again in the weeks that followed. I’m thankful to say they are picking up again. But we all learned some very valuable things that day, and I will hash out every bit of info gained before I even think about doing something like this again. But what can you say? Ca va aller. (It’ll be okay…..)

From Marabout to Christ

Burkina Faso along with many other West African countries experience what one might call mixed religion. Because of the animistic culture, the doctrines of many religions have been altered to fit into a mold that will work in this culture. For those of you who are not familiar with animism, it can be defined as the belief that a spiritual force is in all living creatures and even in inanimate objects such as rocks or the wind. They use magic, spells, enchantments, superstitions, etc., or anything that they believe will help to protect them from the evil spirits and placate the good spirits that are found everywhere in everything. Their religious leaders are what we would know as witchdoctors. One example of this doctrinal alteration is found in certain forms of Islam. They have their mosques and religious leaders, but many Burkinabe also consort with the “Marabout,” or Muslim witchdoctors.

Two weeks ago we celebrated our church’s one year anniversary. We had a great day with many visitors. One of these visitors was a man by the name of Mamadou. After the service, while everyone was eating, he came to me and said he wanted to be saved. Earlier in the week, he had listened to a message on the radio that Jesus was the only way to go to Heaven. That morning, he heard me speak from John 10 that Jesus is the door. Isn’t it amazing how the Holy Spirit works! We talked about salvation for more than thirty minutes. He confessed that he was a Muslim and relied heavily on the counsel of the Marabout. He was now ready to leave it all for Christ. As we bowed our heads to pray, he said, “WAIT, what should I do with all the ‘stuff’ from the Muslim witchdoctor?” I explained that first, he needed to repent and ask Christ to save him, then he needed to go home and get rid of it. Praise the Lord, he did! He told me he was going to go home and get rid of it immediately. I asked him about it last Sunday at church and he confirmed that everything was gone.

“A Picture is worth a thousand words”

I can remember growing up hearing the phrase “a picture is worth a thousand words.” I saw the truthfulness of this saying last Friday evening. Four times a year we show a film at our church as a way of outreach. We have shown the Jesus Film twice. The last time we showed “Facing the Giants”. However, this past week we showed a film that the majority of our people had never seen, “The Passion of Christ.” Because of the literacy problem here in Burkina, we had one of the institute students give a commentary in Moore (the local tribal language) during the film.

God blessed and we had about 230-240 people in attendance. I was touched as I watched people young and old a like shed tears as the events surrounding Christ’s death unfolded before their eyes. I had the opportunity to preach and share the Gospel, explaining the necessity of the Christ's death. Unfortunately, no one responded during the invitation. However, I know God was working. We had several new visitors at church the following Sunday. Please pray that the Lord will continue to speak to hearts and we will see decisions for Him.