Saturday, September 26, 2009

A couple of before & after pics

This may not look overly exciting as missionary work to you. But it is part of living out here. You always have to repair/keep up your house. That is one reason landlords like us because we do keep up. Anyway, now we're not in the mud, our cement is better and the house has kept its value again. We thank Moussa & his team for being cheerful to work with, and keeping his word. (That means a lot out here.)

We started this job because of scorpions, etc. It was an intense 2 weeks of workers carrying sand, pounding it down, making bricks, having the welder in town make doors, coming in to hang them, etc. almost all done... Just a little electric work left for our generator to be installed and ready to go...


Before... Old cement pounded out, sand brought in


Moussa laying bricks. (Great job Moussa!!)


New porch area! Nice.

In the midst of all this, it seems that ministry opportunities are booming too. I've been teaching ESL 4 days a week. Starting at 4pm ending at 6pm... I come home tired from that, but encouraged because the students are really making progress. They can talk to me in English now. Short termers coming out, (Like Dusty in December) will appreciate being able to speak to some people in English.

Also, night/evening conversations with pastors keep going on. We've been talking alot recently about cults, and denominational differences and how to know who is a sister or brother in Christ and who is a downright stranger to the Gospel.
Its been fun to talk through this with guys here. The idea has been brought up for me to teach a section on this at church for whoever is interested, but focusing on village pastors. We'll see how that turns out.

Thanks for praying for us,
God is really blessing, and we're doing great.
(Caleb was sick, and it turned out to be a case of Malaria. The meds did fine, and he's fine now. PTL!!!!)

Tom & Lisa

Sunday, September 13, 2009

September house work




Hi. This week we've been doing some remodeling on our house. We've brought out some money to improve our house a little bit. We're trying to re-cement our porch area, which is also our dining room & veranda. We've also bought a generator so that even if the electricity is out (Like it was all of last night) we can still charge Lisa's batteries so she can hear. It would be nice to run fans and a few lights as well...

So there has been a lot of pounding and thrashing as the builders are ripping out the old cement, then pouring the new...

Hopefully, we'll have no more holes where scorpions and other six legged friends will come from. When you get one like this walking boldly through your living room, it makes you think its time to fill some holes in the walls & cement.



Yesterday we got tired of listening to pounding, as you can imagine, and we took a motorbike ride out of Kadiolo into the countryside. We had a little picnic. That was fun. Caleb is enjoying being an only child right now, having all of mom & dad's attention. This is a pic of Caleb & Lisa on her new "old" motorbike. It is running really well now, thanks to a repair job on the carborator.

Lisa likes this bike better than mine because it is like the ones we had back in the Ivory Coast. It is also a lighter bike, and has no gear box. So she doesn't have to change gears. Some african friends in town asked my why I have a nice bike, and she has the old ugly one, though... :D



I've been working a lot teaching english to some of our students so they can start the school year stronger in english. So that has been interesting too.


But it is all for the kingdom. Pray for us as we continue to build and sustain redemptive relationships....


Thanks for stopping by,

Tom & Lisa Seward


Monday, September 07, 2009

Motorbike Video

Hi. I just went to Zegua today on the motorbike. This would not be such a big deal if it wasn't RAINY SEASON. The road is 14 km of dirt, very bumpy on a normal day. But today it was both bumpy and mushy. Fun :D
I had to drive to Zegua, because that is where Ecobank is where my money is coming in from the States. So I was able to get there and back without wiping out or having an accident, and I was able to get our money for September.
So look at the attached youtube video, and see what kind of good road conditions we have here.
The video is 4 min long, so it won't take you all day to enjoy.

If you cannot click on this link, maybe you can copy & paste it into your browser.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-bIJwfYqJs

Thanks for stopping by,
and thanks for renewing your prayers regarding safe travel!
Tom & Lisa

Sunday, September 06, 2009

Women's prayer and fasting


Hi. This week the women at our church contacted Lisa and asked if she would like to be a part of the prayer and fasting Friday and Saturday. From Friday 6pm to Saturday 10pm.
The commitment these women have is humbling. The AGEMPEM women from all over Mali had set aside these days for prayer and fasting. (AGEMPEM is the association of evangelical churches of Mali.) So our women locally here wanted to be a part of that. A prayer agenda sheet was sent from AGEMPEM. So the women met from 6pm to 10pm Friday evening, then from 10pm to 6pm yesterday. Lisa was amazed because they had no breaks. It was pray pray pray, sing a bit, pray some more... Which is great. The commitment these women show... wow.
Lisa came home tired but encouraged....






Calebs' new bed

Another project I took on last week was to remodel Caleb's bed. We had seen what some friends in Bamako did with their kids' beds to put mosquito nets up. So I thought I could do that too. Mosquitos are a problem, and Caleb seems to get bit more than we do. Of course, we've had our turns with malaria, hoping to minimize those sick times as well...

In the past we've not been excited about mosquito nets, they can bunch up and make you feel claustrophobic. And if your body is next to the net, the mosquitos can bite through it into you anyway. But with this frame, it addresses both those problems at the same time.


So I welded, shaped, painted... and this is the result. We were pleased with how it turned out...
Caleb objected to the mosquito net because the fan is outside of it, and doesn't blow through well. So I installed one in side attached to the bed. He was happier then... :D

Keep praying for us,
Thanks for stopping by!
Tom & Lisa