A C0MEDY OF ERRORS

It's so important to be able to laugh, and here are a few of the things which had us in stitches!
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A COW WEARING TWO PAIRS OF BOOTS
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One of the funniest stories I remember, was the man in jail, who, when asked why he was in there, said he had been caught whilst trying to steal a cow. He put two pairs of boots on the animal, to try hide its tracks, but got caught as he was on his way home That really made me laugh!
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Practical and visible things make it easier and more fun to learn...
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Armindo and I sometimes preach with various visual aids. It's great fun. I have a very lifelike rubber snake, that lives in the Land Rover, and has more uses than you might imagine.
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OUR SECURITY GUARD
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Theft out here in Moz is rife, our Land Rover is at constant threat of being stolen, so a guard is normally posted when ever possible, to help prevent that happening. Our friend the snake has proved to be a very effective way of safeguarding the Landrover. By simply placing the snake on the dashboard inside the car. It's amusing to see people making huge detours, to keep well away from the car, once the offending snake has been spotted.
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RATS AND CATS
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Rats are a big problem here. Armindo`s house, made from poles and reeds, is now infested with them. It's a small house, and the rats are in holes in the floor. They can be seen scurrying around whilst we have our meals.
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I asked Armindo why he did not get a cat to catch the rats, as poisoning them is out the question due to the smell they produce when they die. Then I remembered he did have a cat, but I`d not seen it for a while. With a deep sigh he looked across at me and said, "It's no good, brother, I can`t keep a cat here. My neighbours eat them all !"
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THE POLICEMAN AND THE SNAKE
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It can get very trying being pulled up by the police all the time, for no particular reason. They are like wolves. preying on whoever they can, to get a fine or a bribe. On my first few trips to Moz .I used to get fined all the time. Now I play them at their own game.
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When stopped, I usually greet them in their local language, and have a bit of a laugh. They sometimes check around a bit, and usually let me go, realising that I am not a tourist from South Africa and that I actually work here.
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If that does not work, I show them a photo of the children in the orphanage, and explain to them that I also work with the church. Normally that deflates their desire to rip me off, and they let me go.
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Sometimes they are bent on getting some thing out of you. On one particularly hot day, I was tired, I did not want to play, this one policeman got right up my nose , so I decided to give him "the snake treatment!"
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Whilst he was thinking of another bizzare reason to fine me, Iasked in Portugese if he had met my friend the snake, and produced it throught the open window.
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Again the reaction was far greater than I was expecting. The policeman leaped back from the vehicle with a shriek, losing his hat at the same time. I thought I might have over-cooked it this time. Thoughts like "do not collect two hundred pounds but go straight to jail" came into my mind.
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Fortunately moments later he was laughing hysterically and let me go!
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The police in the area are starting to recognise the Land Rover, and I have not been stopped for some time now!
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OUR FEEDING PROGRAMME IN MAXIXE

This has proved to be a vital part of our work out here in Mozambique.
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We are currently running two feeding programmes , one down at the orphanage in Malavela, and the other here in Maxixe.
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Our feeding programmes cater mainly for widowed ladies with young children, who find themselves on their own, with young families to bring up, and no means to support themselves.
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We also support a number of teenage girls and guys who again, find themselves on their own through the death of their parents, in very difficult, vulnerable and sometimes dangerous situations, often with no shelter and no food.
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Our feeding program in Maxixe

Having spent a stretch of time out in Mozambique this year I came away more convinced than ever, that our feeding programs play a vital role in our work amongst these lovely people. It's one thing to rescue some one from difficult circumstances: it's another thing altogether to have the means in place to prevent it.


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Two of the young girls on our feeding program in Maxixe.
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Esperance, 20 years old, and her two year old son Daniel, together with her sister Juvitta,16 years old, are on our feeding programme. They go to school, and are part of the young peoples' group at church.
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Without the support from our feeding programme, they would be on the streets by now.
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At thirteen years old this young girl is in one of our "Home Care" projects.
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We now have three youngsters in home-care families and it's working well. Here the child is supported in a loving family enviroment, where the child can grow up as normally as possible. It seems to be the way forward for these children and young adults.
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We currently have twenty widowed ladies and teenagers, on our feeding programme in Maxixe and ten in Malavela.
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FATIMA

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Fatima pictured here at the orphanage in Malavela.
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All of our kids are great, we have no favourites...well we shouldn't have, but here is someone who is a bit special, She`s four years old, according to the doctor in Maputo who aged her according to the formation of her teeth.
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When she came into our care we knew nothing about her, we did not know her name, or where she came from, she could not speak. All we knew, is that she had been found abandoned in a ditch at the side of a road. We did not know how long she had
been there. She was looking rough, and had been putting dirt in her mouth trying to feed herself.
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A passer by heard her crying, and rescued her.
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Enquiries were made for several weeks, in the near by town of Manihca, as we tried to locate her parents. No one knew where she was from, or who she belonged to.
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Martha decided to call the little girl Fatima, after the lady who found her. She is doing really well now. She rushes up to greet you in the morning with the other children, her big brown eyes meet yours and she breaks into a big smile. Another of the little treasures from heaven that we have the privilege to look after.
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Our orphanage is getting quite well known now, which is great and we have the favour of the local authorities who have even asked for our help and occasionally have brought children to us. Every one who visits, is impressed with our premises.
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The children sleep in bedded rooms of ten, with a carer, and have flushing toilets, and showers, and each child receives three cooked meals a day
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Our orphanage is in a beautiful place, and as we are developing the site, we have been careful to keep as many of the lovely large trees as possible, which provide essential shade and also a wonderful place to hang rope swings.
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Lazaro busy enjoying life!
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It's well known these days that life in an orphanage is not the best way forward for the children's long term development. We aim to get these beautiful children that have been rescued, back into a local family enviroment, where they will be supported, and carefully monitored.
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In the meantime, our premises provide an effective life-line and a safe haven, where our children can get healed, strenthened, and released from past traumas.
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Matacalane Revisited!

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Day one. Clearing the piece of land ready to start building the church.

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We bring in our supplies of poles and reeds for the walls, and timber and corrugated iron for the roof.

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Four days later our team of builders and cooks proudly show off their new church building.
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The local people love the "Jesus" film and come back each night to watch it again and again! Our screen is a king-sized bed sheet, hung from the end wall of the church building. Played through our powerful sound system, it can be seen and heard for miles around.

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We wonder where the people come from in this remote location, but they do!


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Armindo and I, preaching on our last night of our evening outreaches, here at Matacalane.


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Reginaldo and his wife Sonia, who are now heading up the work here in Matacalane, under Armindo`s supervision.
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Pedro and His wife Louisa from an Assembly of God church, pictured here with Armindo, on our opening Sunday, being prayed for, as they will be working closely with Reginaldo and Sonya. Pedro is a great evangelist, and Armindo and I are excited about the potential which we can already see in this couple's lives.
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We are excited about the church plant here in Matacalane. We have joined together with around ten other Christians from the local AOG church, who's pastor had died. They are excited to have a building to meet in, and it's been a thrill to see them throw themselves into the work, helping to build the church, then praying and fasting for the outreach events.

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We were surprised how many people came to the evening outreaches. Some would be coming just to see what was going on, but the Lord was busy drawing even spectators to himself.
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Numbers normally drop off after we leave, but that's when the real work starts. We hold our breath, pray lots, and watch what happens as the church gets established, with Reginaldo leading a new believers' course.

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We had 40 adults and 15 children in last Sunday, which we were thrilled about. Thank you everyone for your support in every way. Please keep praying for our new churches, these new leaders, and the new Christians.

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All of us out here are in at the deep end, learning to swim, sometimes in difficult waters. Satan does his best to discourage us. He's not a fan of our work out here. He has hit us with everything over these last few months; but Jesus promises that He will build his church and tells us that the gates of hell will not prevail agaist it - and on this promise we stand!!

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Miracles of Provision

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The look on these childrens faces says it all!
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They wake up one morning to find themselves on their own, both parents have died being HIV positive.
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It's moving to see the children respond so quickly to love, and genuine compassion, as they come into our care.
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Zacharius at 5 years old makes a huge improvement in his health after receiving prayer, he was so poorly only a month ago. We did not take any photos, certain that he had only weeks to live!
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I have been coming to Mozambique on and off for five years. This visit has been my longest stay so far, I`ve been here for four and a half months now. Reflecting on my time here, I find myself having been stretched in many different ways. My biggest challenge is seeing and experiencing human suffering, it touches me deeply.
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God is amazing. He carefully knits us together whilst we are in our mother's womb, and gives us the life skills and gifting necessary to fulfill the call, which He places on each of our lives (Psalm 139).
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I thank God He has broken me in slowly. If I saw what I`ve seen in the past few months, on my first arrival in Moz in 2003, I doubt whether I would have managed to cope.
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As a compassionate person, I am easily touched by what I see and feel, and I find that I have to manage that gift carefully, using wisdom together with that compassion. Unfortunately you cannot help every one.... yet all of Africa cries for our help.
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There is a loud cry that goes out from the heart of this beautiful country, especially from the widowed and the orphaned. Gods heart is especially touched by this cry, as He tells us in (James 1:27). "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress......"
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Some weeks ago, I found my self walking away from a very tough situation, feeling gutted to the core. Martha and Regina, the local social worker, and myself had been to visit a lady who was looking after 17 children. Her own family members, brothers and sisters, had died, leaving their children behind. She was cooking a small pot of beans to share between them all, she had no food to feed them with!
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She was at her wits end trying to feed them and look after them. I noticed a young boy on his own, sitting quietly near a hedge. He was very sick, covered in sores and extremely weak. The lady broke into tears as she lifted the boy up and told us the story. He is HIV positive and too weak to do much now. He is five years old, can we help??
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Our bank balance rudely replied NO! We were already stretched, with a very low exchange rate against the pound. Food prices had increased, and we have taken more children into the orphanage. Should we be taking a very sick HIV positive child in? Martha still works full time, and we have nowhere to separate very sick children, and no one to give them full time care.
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Not sure what we should do, we decided to give ourselves some time to make a good decision. If we started giving out food now, we would have to continue with that choice, and we are already stretched to the maximum, with two feeding programs running.
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What did wisdom say? We need wisdom now!
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The exciting thing about being a Christian is that we have the life giving power of the Holy Spirit living within each of us, who is able to do so much more than we can. It's when we are really up against it that we see God move!
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We got on our knees and prayed fervently with tears for this little boy, and his situation, somehow believing God was going to do something.
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Back up north, busy with our church plants, I was haunted by the picture of this helpless child. We were about to start our last church plant, when our money ran out. The bank statement announced that was enough! Just then we had another blow. I had my wallet stolen.
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I had been financing much of what we had been doing, using my personal support money, which generous friends had given me from back home. What to do now? Human wisdom said it was time to draw a line under everything.
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But God's wisdom was singing a different song!!
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A long time ago I learned not to allow my bank balance to determine what I did or did not do for God! We prayed again fervently, the church in Maxixe fasting for our needs. We decided God still wanted us to go ahead with our last church plant in Jocarne, even though we had to buy the land as well.We scraped together some money, to buy the poles, to start building the frame for the church.
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Then it happened. All at once our prayers were answered. A call from the UK said that we had just received a sizeable gift of money, and we were suddenly free again to carry on. At that point we could no longer fuel the Land Rover, and were running around on an empty tank! Everyone was thrilled. The church was completed and opened in time.
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Returning to the Orphanage, we went back out to the lady looking after the 17 children, really not knowing what to expect. Martha and I were surprised to see the lady and the very sick boy looking so well. She told us that since we prayed there had been a big change.
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God had lifted the personal burden she was carrying, other people had helped feed the children and the biggest surprise was in the boy whom we had left so poorly. There was no sign of his sores, he looked well and strong again. In our inability to do something, God had answered our prayers again.
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The three children pictured above are now in our care back at the Orphanage. Marta (14) who has been washing and cooking for the last three years, her sister Leopoldina (8), and Zacharias (5) are settling in well. Thanks so much for praying for us. We so much need your prayers, and they work!
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Maybe you are reading these blogs, and hearing stories about how we invited God into situations beyond our control. Maybe you have never really prayed, or know how to. The bible says that if we draw near to God, He will draw near to us. It says His ear is attentive to our cry.
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Why not open your heart, and let Him who created you and loves you more than anyone else, carry your load and help with the difficult things you may be facing. He loves to answer prayer, and as He does we are drawn deeper into that beautiful relationship with Him, that we were really created for!
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Planning and Reviewing in Maxixe for 2009

So here we are again....
.... sitting in the shade underneath the coconut trees, alongside one of the most beautiful beach fronts ever. It's deserted, except for a few locals fishing. The surf pounds in over the reef a couple of hundred metres off shore, producing a swell of white water in the pale blue ocean. Whales can be seen here regularly earlier in the year. The sea breeze cools our faces as we look out to sea. It's a relief here after the high temperatures inland, where it's up around 38 degrees now. It's almost a year ago since we were here for our last reviewing and planning session.
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Armindo and I have dragged ourselves away from our busy programme. It's hard to get away with so much going on, but essential to the success of our work out here. Taking time to seek God, and time to reflect and plan for the future, we choose this place as it's so quiet. There is no phone access here, or any thing much else for that matter. There is one small restaurant on the top of a hill with a great menu, but no food. Thats Africa! if it doesn't drive you mad, you´ll love it!
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Last year...
..... we sat here and allowed our selves to dream. We asked ourselves questions such as - what did we want to see happen this coming year, in 2008? What had God got planned for us to do? We have a number of leaders that we felt would be able to pastor new churches by mid 2008.
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God has given Armindo and myself the same dream to reach this nation for Christ, but how would we get there, and how would we finance such a dream? There is one great question that I love to ask people, to help them find their ultimate calling in life, and to dig out what God has already planted in that person's heart, it goes like this... "If money wasn't a problem and you knew you could not fail, what would you do with your life, for God?"
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The idea being, that if God is going to call you to do something, He would have to provide the means for you to fulfill that calling, and with His help you would succeed.
Having already prepared in prayer before our time away, we both felt it right to start a number of new churches locally this year, spreading a net out over the surrounding area.

We are sitting here again now, in this beautiful setting, reflecting back on the work we have been given to do. We now have our few churches up and running, each with their own leaders, all of them in fairly rural areas. We have kick-started them with our evening outreaches, which have attracted many people. Quite a number made some kind of response, and some of them have started attending the new churches. Over this coming year, more will come in especially though the evangelism programme that each church is running
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So where do we go from here?
Armindo will now be looking after and continuing to mentor his leaders who in turn are now looking after their own new churches. It has been a joy when we can to go back to some of the new churches we started this year and sit in on a service. We find ourselves moved as we recognise faces from our outreaches, now in church praising God.
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I will return to the UK on Dec 12th 2008 for a few months, to organise our trips for next year. I will be speaking at various places about our work out here in this beautiful country, and how other people can get involved.

What about next year and the future?
The truth is we never stop talking about it or dreaming about it. We feel this next few years will be a time for bringing in teams, to help us train and teach new leaders and pastors, to teach the mothers, the youth, and the children.
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For some time now Armindo and I have had it in mind to build a bible school here in Maxixe, which we are now calling "The Centre". We have drawn up some rough plans for a building, and are excited about what we feel God has put in our hearts. As we teach and train up new leaders, we can then proceed to plant more new churches, spreading the gospel throughout the area, reaching this nation with the fantastic news of Jesus Christ!
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Please keep praying for this essential work, and that each of our new churches would get well established. Thank you for working with us.
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I will be continuing the blog weekly with photos and news, when I get back to the UK, so please stay with us and follow what God is doing in this nation.

I am back at the Orphanage for a week now, before returning to South Africa. Today we brought in three beautiful, needy, new children to the Orphanage. I will be writing this later in the week, thanks for praying for us all out here. Pete, Armindo, Martha and the team.
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