Saturday, July 2, 2005

Jeff and Brenda Holland

It is great to be home. We are all settling down well. Josiah has been with Danny and his other friends non-stop since we arrived. Ellianna had a few nights when she was off schedule, but is finally sleeping in her own bed through the night. She is finally starting to drink powdered milk after threatening a coup d'etat in retaliation for switching from American fresh milk. She is having trouble hearing the local language. Hopefully, she will be able to pick it back up in a couple of weeks. Rebecca is getting closer to sleeping through the night and has had the easiest adjustment of us all.

Jeff has tried to get the computer back up. After being down for a couple of months, the hard drive didn't want to work. Three start-ups didn't get it going. Finally, after a good prayer, the machine started up. Praise God the great computer tech! God did another miracle on our return drive to Togo from Ghana. Our car papers had expired by two days during our furlough. We decided to chance the return. Three times we were stopped. The first time reminded me a scene in Star Wars when Obi-Wan Kenobi leads young Luke past guards by using the force to persuade the officer to do and say what Obi-Wan said. God was "the force" for us and answered our prayers. The man only looked at one document (not the expired one) and then said "I have seen all of your papers. Go ahead." Two more times were similar with officials laughing, waving us on, and finally signing documents for us to leave Ghana. God is good!

We have been receiving guests, making appointments in the villages, and gearing up for our final year in Togo. Next week, Jeff meets with leaders from many areas. Please pray for God to bless our re-adjustments and our work.

Murphy and Christine Crowson

This week has been a week of coming and going in for our team. Tuesday night we had a fellowship meal at our house to welcome the Hollands back and also to say goodbye to the Parkers for the next month as Anthony goes to America and Maureen and the boys go to Singapore.

Last Sunday when we pulled up to the Sedome church building we were surprised to find that this was cluster worship Sunday. My heart was filled with joy as I thought back over the last three years when we were trying to evangelize this area and began the churches from nothing. Now there are two strong churches that work well with each other and are praying and planning to plant another church in the near future. Join with us as we ask the Lord to bless, encourage, and empower these Christians to share their faith at home and far away.

Christine continues to teach Stephen every day helping him finish the first grade so that he'll be ready to start the second grade this fall when our new teachers arrive. Matthew is also going to school some, getting ready for kindergarten.

Marty and Louise Koonce

We have been enjoying our first month of furlough and it is hard to believe that we are so far along in it. God has blessed us with refreshing moments throughout the trip, but we have been predictably busy seeing family and friends along the way. We had a great time with Louise's family in Alabama and then were able to visit with the Bunner family in Nashville. It was really great being with them and seeing the kids all together again brought us great joy. Of course in being together with all of them it involved shopping for Louise and Jenna, golf for Frank and Marty, and a water park for all of us. Marty was able to tell some of our story to the teens Frank works with as we attended Clarksville Hwy on Wednesday where Frank ministers. On Friday we traveled to Warrenton, Va where we will be for the next three weeks as we visit with our sponsoring church, renewing relationships and getting recharged. Please join us in prayer for the areas that we work in among the Watchi in our absence: Vogan, Afakomi Kope, the Atitogon cluster, Ahepe, and Tabligbo. Pray specifically that they will carry out their commitments over these few months while we are away and that God bless them all with increased maturity. Thank you for your prayers for us while we travel for safety and rejuvination.

Anthony and Maureen Parker

Greetings from Alabama- and from Singapore! Our family is split between opposite sides of the world. We all drove to Accra, Ghana on Wednesday. We were delayed for three hours getting an oil leak repaired in Lome, but we're thankful that we were able to identify and repair the problem before it caused problems down the road.

Anthony flew out for the States on Thursday night, and Maureen and the boys left for Singapore on Friday. Although they had a 23 hour layover scheduled in Dubai, God blessed them by being able to get onto an earlier flight, so they made it to Singapore a day earlier than anticipated. It was a great blessing both for Maureen and the boys and also for Maureen's family.