Newsletter (March 22, 2012)

Dear all, A family from SIM Canada will be coming to TCCA. The husband is going to teach here. They came for a visit in late October 2010 and later decided to apply to come here as long-term missionaries. They will be coming with their four children and we are looking forward to welcoming them soon. It took quite a while for them to raise the necessary support and now they are very close to attain their targets. As a result SIM Canada gave them the approval to book the tickets to come to Ndola.

They plan to come in late May, early June. Please urgently pray for a suitable house for them. At first we thought we would be able to secure a house very close to the college for them, but now it looks quite likely that we will not be able to rent that place. We are trying to see if other suitable properties are available but it is not easy to get one that suits a family of six. We need a four-room house at least and rental in Ndola is not cheap either. Please pray that such a house which is in good condition will be available for them.

Our church has changed the structure of the weekly services. Instead of one morning and evening service on Sunday, we are now having two services one after the other, with a simple lunch in between. Most likely this is because not many people are attending the evening service and the church would like to encourage church members to use Sunday afternoons to visit friends, newcomers to church, others that have not come to church for a long time, and those that are sick.

Also, instead of Bible study home groups, we are now having a midweek service on Wednesday. We have just started last Wednesday and the turnout is good, with more people attending than that of the home groups combined. The surprising thing was that Timothy was asked to lead the midweek service. So he has to prepare the messages every week. He is going to speak on spiritual transformation in the coming weeks, and we value your prayers for this new ministry for Timothy. He definitely needs all your support and encouragement.

We are going to attend the annual spiritual life conference on the second week of April. This is the time when we will be able to meet all the SIM missionaries serving in Zambia. Unfortunately there are some missionaries whom we have never met ever since we arrived. They are serving in Mukinge Hospital and some of them can never leave that place as they are the only people that can do the work. The surgeon is our fellow New Zealander. We have been in correspondence but we have never met as yet.

After the conference we will attend a wedding in Lusaka. One of our students is getting married and since the conference venue is quite close to Lusaka we will attend the wedding as well. After that we will return to Ndola for a few days and then we will take three and a half weeks off. We managed to get a very cheap ticket to Slovenia (cheaper than flying to South Africa return) so we will spend some time there, as we all are tired and need some rest. We will arrive back in Ndola on 13 May.

We are quite tired recently and we do not know the cause of it. Please continue to pray for our health and that God will give us strength to do everything that he wants us to do for him. With Christian love.