Thursday Blog

We are wearing down – while that may not be the breaking news of the day it certainly is the fact that the three of us are dealing with! A breakfast at the Lighthouse and then off to teach. It was extremely hot and humid today. At times a good breeze would blow in the window we were sitting by but mostly we were just sitting and it seems sweltering in the heat and humidity. We were given a big surprise for lunch. I mentioned to Christian that we all liked pizza (Connie will tell you that I do not like as much as I should) and we were going to go to Crown Bakery and hoped on Saturday to get a pizza. To our surprise he brought us a Crown Classic pizza for lunch – now folks you want to talk about three American pigs eating at the trough! Boy was it good!

Before Theopholis gave his lesson a young lady who is the niece of sister Asgill and who had been attending our lessons the last week and half came forward to be baptized. Her name is Cecilia Coocka. God is good - all the time! Today was not an exception!

All three of us gave encouraging and uplifting lessons. We have addressed so many hard issues that we all wanted to have these last two days of teaching to be very uplifting. We are planning on doing this tomorrow also. Our last lesson will be delivered by John and it will be on heaven. We will change our order of how we have been presenting them and have Justin to go first and then Theophilus will give his second lesson on Colossians and then I will give one on a shelter in a time of a storm. Our plans are that the three Americans will leave the folks with lessons that will encourage them to seek the shelter of the Lord and look toward heaven.

It is amazing to see the progress that has been made in the 18 months we have been coming to Sierra Leone. There are two congregations that are really trying to follow the pattern of a New Testament church. Other congregations are now turning and it will take some time – things are a bit different in culture here and they are imbedded with the thought that institutions will take care of them because of their poverty. However, the last three trips particularly have really helped them understand that institutionalism is a perverted gospel. There are men here like Christian Asgill, Theophilus Kartusche, Eric Conteh, Augustine, John Kabul, Jerry Lewis, Taijon, Brother Abraham and others who are good men. Ladies such as sister Asgill, sister Kartusche, the one we call good sister and other ladies who are good ladies. The Lord’s church in the Freetown area will be strong because of warriors like these. However, we must continue to work with them to give them strength and to hold their hands up. The battle for truth in the Freetown area is not over it is just beginning.

Christian and Theophilus have some real depth in their knowledge of the scriptures. Now, that they have learned about the proper way for the organization of the church and the work of the church they will make sure institutionalism does not infect Priscilla Street again. John Kabul is still learning but has the desire to teach and do what is right. To God be the glory that He opened this door and we are thankful to good brethren like those reading this blog that you have made it possible to come through the open door with your funds and prayers.

John and Justin have gone now to bring a lesson to a new small congregation in Murray Town. I wore down finally when we got back from our teaching today and am staying in the room. I guess this is fair since Justin had his wearing down last week and John had his wearing down afternoon earlier this week. Being the oldest I think it finally caught up with me.

Addition by John:

Murray Town is a very impoverished portion of Freetown near the military barracks. Samuel Thompson, a corporal in the Army, works at Murray Town along with two brothers from Nigeria, Jeremiah and Basarra. I thought I had seen the worst parts of Freetown, but was not prepared for the depth of poverty we saw. No one has electricity, running water or windows. The streets will not accommodate a car and are little more than a tiny dirt path between their houses.

Justin preached a sermon from Luke 17 on the rich man and Lazarus. He did a great job with his lesson. But, the highlight of the sermon was Samuel interpreting. I thought I could be loud, but I can’t hold a candle to Samuel. His interpretation was animated and enjoyable even if I didn’t understand much of his Creole.

At the end of the lesson, Justin offered a passionate pleas to obey the Gospel. 13souls came forward. Some of them were children around the age of 11-13, but more than half of them were women who seemed stable and understood what they were doing. Although their building is right on a bay, the water there is too dirty for humans to enter, so they took a poda-poda to a nearby beach where the baptism would take place. Angels are rejoicing!

May God bless you as He has us!