Blog 20^th May – 8th June

The early part of the week was the end of a very long process of getting our visas! But by Tuesday we all had the correct documents to stay here until July. Praise God!

 On Monday we invited Pastor Albert and his whole family round for a huge meal. It was great to treat them and see them in a more relaxed setting. On the Wednesday we had a heavy days hoeing at Farmfresh but it was all worth it for another great Zambian meal cooked by Zenia.

On Friday Tim and Jim recruited the help of Kris from Lifeline to finally fix Pastor Albert’s water pump. He was really grateful to have his clean water back. The girls had a nice time with Lifeline, meeting one of the volunteer’s new born baby.  In the afternoon the girls went to St. Anthony’s while the boys had a really relaxing (yet poor quality) 9 holes of golf with Kris at Ndola golf club.

On Saturday morning Tim’s brother-in-law Steve, and his father Phil came out to stay with us for a week. We introduced them to Africa with a 3 and a half hour church service at Kamfinsa on Sunday morning! On Monday Jan and Jim had a quiet day while the other 5 went to the sunken lake. It is a huge lake in the middle of nowhere, which no one knows how deep it is. We had great fun finding it down little dirt tracks and an awesome time jumping in to the water from the rocks. On Tuesday Jim, Jan and Jo went to St. Anthony’s Orphanage spending time mainly in the cerebral palsy unit. Steve and Phil joined Tim and Natalie on hut-to-hut where they met with a group of people that are struggling with addiction to alcohol. After praying for them Tim and Natalie shared how they should come back to church.

When Natalie, Tim, Steve and Phil returned to lead the bible study on Thursday some of the people they had met on Tuesday were there. Tim and Natalie spoke on worshipping God with an honest heart and one man came forward for prayer for help to stop drinking. It was amazing! In the afternoon we introduced Phil and Steve to St Anthony's. 

 On Friday, Jan and Jim went to Lifeline to work at the playgroup while the rest of us started our epic journey down to Livingstone and Botswana. We spent all day Saturday in Chobe national park, seeing so many animals we couldn’t keep up! We camped overnight in the park hearing the lions roaring all around us! We travelled back to Zambia in the morning and went to Victoria Falls for the afternoon. While they were there, Tim proposed to Natalie and she said YES!

Mean while, on Friday afternoon, Jim and Jan left for a relaxing weekend at Kapysha Hot Springs. They had an amazing time relaxing by the river and soaking in the warm water from the underground springs. It was just how they imagined the Garden of Eden to be with all the amazing vegetation and the beautiful river flowing by.

They arrived back in Ndola on the Monday evening in order to go hut to hut with Pastor Albert at Kamfinsa on the Tuesday. The afternoon was spent along with the rest of the team listening to Lene give her first lecture on Fasting.  The rest of the week followed its usual pattern with Farm Fresh Wednesday morning.  In the afternoon at Isubilo we met Oliver who will be doing some Puppet workshops with the children over the next few weeks.   On Thursday Jim, Tim and Jo went to Kamfinsa to do some painting on the teacher's house as it still hasn't been finished.   Friday we all went with Lifeline to Chipulukusu to run the playgroup.  On Saturday after Isubilo we enjoyed our first lecture from Henry Bambala on the book of Jeremiah.  In the evening we invited our neighbours Zenia, Emmanuel and family for a meal.  We had typical English food, cottage pie or pizza followed by apple crumble and custard.  Afterwards we enjoyed playing games with our Zambian friends.

Prayer Points:

·       Dwindling numbers at Isubilo on Wednesdays.

·       Our upcoming week camping and working at Kamfinsa.

·       The Landcruiser - we have a cracked windscreen and the battery has had to be replaced.

·       Continued good health for the whole team.