Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 1/4/2010
Our interpreter Collins, Jared, and I were walking through the village when we came upon a house where the family was outside preparing their lunch. They welcomed us to come over and visit with them. We spent some time talking to them and then we prayed for their specific prayer requests.
The next day we decided to go visit them again. They were so happy to see us, they were much more open and more talkative. They told us that their boy had a name that meant "trouble" and they wanted his name changed. They felt that his name might be influencing his general behavior.
Jared asked them who had originally named the child and why they had named him a name that meant trouble. One of the older sisters shyly said that she had named him, but she did it when she was young and did not know what the name meant. They asked Jared and I to give their son a new name. We looked at each other in shock! Jared said that we would pray and ask the Lord what his name should be. The parents said, "it's not a big deal, just name him". SO we prayed!
After we prayed, Jared asked them if a name popped into any of their heads. They all said no. The mom said "the ball is your court; you two give him a name". After standing there for quite some time, not knowing what to say, I finally thought of a name that I felt would be a nice name, "Jonathan". Jonathan means gift of God. Our translator asked the family if they liked that name and they all raised their hands as if they were voting.... yes they liked it! It was hard for me not to laugh through all this. I asked them if I could see their son, thinking they would bring a baby out, but nooooo,....a boy that was sitting nearby listening to this conversation stood up. This was the child. He was around the age of 12. He had been sitting there the entire time, through this entire process. I asked him if he liked his new name and he said he did. I told him that it was very important that he liked the name or we could change it, but he said he liked it. So, he shall be called Jonathan! In the picture, Jonathan is the boy on the far left with 3 of his sisters and 1 brother.
I have already named a child without even having one! News spreads fast in the villages and every one knows everyone else; most seem related in some way. Even while we were still there talking to them we could hear a lady down the road yelling out calling him by his new name and laughing. Everyone in the village seemed happy and liked his new name!
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 1/3/2010
The first house we went to while
doing ministry in the villages near Lilongwe, was the home of an older
couple, the Jackson's. They are Christians and attend church in
their village. We asked if they had a prayer request before we
left and they asked us to pray for their health. Mr. Jackson told
us that he has tuberculosis and his wife has high blood pressure. As I
prayed for the wife she said that she felt her heart rate go down
immediately.
The next day we went to visit them to
see how they were doing. Mr. Jackson was so happy to see us. As
we walked up he came out to greet us. He told us that his wife
slept through the whole night without waking up. He said that she
usually wakes up in sweats every night and has to go outside to get
fresh air. Mr. Jackson told us that his wife knew we were coming
to the village again today so she had gone to look for us to give us
her praise report and ask for more prayer. Mr. Jackson also informed us
that all his symptoms of tuberculosis had left his body as well.
Behind us is where he sews and makes clothes for people. He
told us that it was easier to work now that all the hiccups had
stopped! We were so happy to rejoice with him and praise God. Our
God is a good and healing God!
Mr. Jackson gave us a sack of fresh
mangos for stopping by and praying for them. He requested a Bible
and Jared and I were able to get him one. We also added a pen and
notebook to take notes for their Bible study. In the front of his
notebook I wrote a lot of physical healing scriptures and many
scriptures on peace and joy. They were so thankful. Thank all of you
who are helping Jared and me with our personal finances on this trip;
because of this we were able to buy the Bible, notebook and pen.
Please put this Godly couple on your
personal prayer lists and those of your church and small groups.
Pray for continued good health and prosperity for this aging couple.
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 1/2/2010
We had a wild, dusty and hot ride
on the way to Malawi from Mozambique. We all rode on a large flat
bed truck that had a thick tarp over it. We were all squeezed in
there with all of our big packs. However, I am able to sleep
anywhere, and did not miss any of my sleep on the 41 hour ride.
Since we've been in Malawi we have
been helping a man named Shadrack. Shadrack is a church
planter. He has already planted over 60 churches in the nearby
villages. Each week we've been going into the villages and doing
door to door evangelizing. Our team of seven split into three groups.
Jared and I were together with our translator. We go door to door
telling the people about Jesus, praying for them, and inviting them to
the church. Many of the people told us that they knew very little about
Jesus, but really wanted to learn more about him. As we would walk door
to door all the kids would follow us laughing and yelling "Muzungu,"
meaning white person. Some were seeing a white person for the first
time in their life, some of the younger ones would run and cry because
they were so scared, all the older kids would laugh. They followed us
as we would go to the other houses listening to what we had to say. At
the end of the day when all of our groups would meet back there would
be many kids that had followed all of us all the way back. We
would spend time playing with them, singing fun songs, and teaching
them about Jesus.
Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year! Please read Amanda's Blog
to see what happened and the deliverance that a young girl received
Christmas Eve! We all got to eat a nice lunch together on
Christmas and relax, it was great. We did secret Santa's within the two
teams that are here. The people that drew Jared and my name went
together and bought fruits and veggies for us! We were soooo happy! On
New Year's Eve Jared and I took our two translators to a service and
Amanda and Leigh came along as well. There had been signs put up all
over town about this service so we decided to go to it. It was great to
get to pray in the New Year with many other Christians. I was
delighted to discover that the service was in
English. I miss going to church services or any type of
Christian service so much. We go every week, but our team is in charge
of the service and one of the team members has to preach, so it is a
lot of preparation and work. It was nice to just sit and
receive!
Jared and I covet your prayers. We
are beginning to pray and consider our future in the USA. We are
requesting prayer concerning what we are to do when we
return. Where we are going to live, work, and all of that.
Pray for us to have opportunities in our career and job choices that
will bring glory to the Kingdom and provide for us financially as well.
Lastly, we still need some financial
help to finish our financial obligation to The World Race. We are
so thankful that some of you have made very generous pledges and are
extremely faithful to honor your pledges. We have been incredibly
blessed by these gifts. In addition, we still need about $1,500
that is not part of the pledged amount. Once that obligation is met, any extra money in our World Race account can be used toward reimbursement for trip expenses we personally paid
for before we left, such as health insurance, shots, ect. These items total approximately $3,000. If you
would like to donate to our World Race account, you can do so by
clicking on the "Support Me" button to the left. Also, if
you would like to give into our personal account that would be greatly
appreciated as well. You can send that to my mother. She has been a
huge help taking care of our personal stuff back home. Please
keep our finances in your prayers.
What a joy the past seven months have
been! Jared and I know how fortunate we have been to have this
opportunity and would like to spend time with all of you; sharing our
stories, pictures, and experiences and letting you know what God has
done for us and through us on this incredible journey. We
anticipate being back in the USA the first week of May! I am
still excited about where we're going and what we'll be doing, but I do
have to admit I'm getting really excited about being back in America.
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 1/1/2010
November and part of December was spent in Mozambique. It was wonderful! We were only able to get onto the internet a couple of times and not for long the whole month. Hopefully, this long blog will give you a good picture of our work in Mozambique. Jared and I were excited about going to Mozambique from the time we saw it on the race route. We were not disappointed.
Our assignment was to help a local church in Vilanculos, located on the eastern coast of Mozambique, within walking distance (African walking distance) to the Indian Ocean. Our work with this church "Jesus for Africa" was to do outreaches into the local hospital, prison and neighboring villages. "Jesus for Africa" was founded seven years ago by Pastor Jaco and his wife, Maria. They have two kids, Maggie (10 yrs) and Rudo (9 yrs). This was an awesome family. Even though their home was very small, they made all of us feel very welcome.
We lived in our tents, camping on Jaco and Maria's property near a beautiful small lake. We had access to cold water showers and we had the luxury of a flushing toilet. On our first night camping by the lake, some of the Racers were awakened by lots of noise and yelling. Jaco had forgotten to tell us that the natives fish in the wee hours of the morning. They set out nets, then go to the other side of the lake and start hollering and thrashing the water to move the fish into the nets. This was a startling way to start our stay in our new camp.
All sorts of wildlife lived around us and they did not all have four legs. Some were pretty scary. One day we saw a Black Mambo snake and a Spitting Cobra snake. Jaco gave us a good lesson on recognizing these snakes and said that people are paralyzed within 20 minutes after being bitten by a Black Mambo and killed within two hours. Needles to say, both snakes were promptly killed.
Our weeks were very full. Here is a sample of our schedule. Sunday: Our team ran the morning and evening church services. Monday: Our day off. Tuesday: Hospital, prison ministry, and house visitations. Wednesday: Ran the healing service at the church at noon every week. Thursday: Hospital, prison ministry, and house visitations. Friday: Showed the Passion of the Christ movie. Saturday: House visitations and/or prayer walking.
Many people gave their lives to Christ as we ministered during the week. It was amazing to see how God worked! The people were so hungry for the Word and so receptive of the message. The first Sunday we were there a Muslim man who came to the service gave his life to Christ. He is a very influential man in the city. He works for the city. The following Wednesday a man who was working for Jaco gave his life to Christ. Jaco asked Jared if he would spend a lot of time praying and discipling him while we were there. They were able to spend many hours together praying, talking and reading the Word. This was a wonderful mentoring time for that young man to help him get his feet firmly planted in the Word.
Shortly after we arrived in Vilanculos Jared was preparing to teach at one of the Wednesday healing services when he noticed some of the older village kids had followed our team mates to the church. They had all been playing soccer and decided they would like to join the World Racers at church. Jaco also noticed these newcomers at the regular Wednesday healing service, so he asked Jared to change the healing message into a salvation message. This was definitely the hand of God working. Many of the guys confessed Jesus as their Lord for the first time that day. Jared spent time praying with them afterward as well. Praise God!
Their hospital is made out of UN tents. Their original hospital was destroyed in a cyclone in 2007. It really looks like what I have seen on the old TV show MASH (with mosquito nets). Some of our group spent lots of time in the burn unit. One man who was burned by an oil lamp over a huge percentage of his body just 2 days before we arrived has new skin growing on his back without any scars! By the time we were leaving Vilanculos, almost every person in the burn unit had been sent home, fully recovered.
Jaco wanted to start a prison ministry. This had been one of the things that he wanted our team to help with while we were in Vilanculos. The first time we went to the prison almost all the prisoners raised their hands that they wanted to receive Jesus into their hearts and confess Him as their Lord. We saw a change in the men from the first time we went to the last time. They seemed full of joy and on the last day we went to the prison they were singing praise songs. Jaco is continuing to go, even though we are no longer there. Please read my teammate Amanada's blogabout the prison ministry. It seemed that most the places we went people would want us to tell them about Jesus. I have never seen so many people wanting to hear about Jesus. Everyday our team was able to touch lives and teach about the love Jesus. We were truly able to be messengers of the Word this month.
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 11/20/2009
We have been working in Swaziland at Remar Christian Rehabilitation Centre. It has been great loving on the kids for those two weeks. We stayed at a place called The Cowshed. It use to be a dairy farm and is now a small hostel. It was on beautiful land. Jared and I spent a lot of time helping two of the kids garden. We made flower beds, fixed ones that were already there, and pruned trees. II will try to write more about that later. We came to Nelpruit, South Africa for debrief for 5 days and are now headed to Vilanculos, Mozambique. We will be driving for about 17 hours. Please keep our travels in your prayers as well as our upcoming ministry. Internet is very slow in Africa, but I hope to write some blogs soon with pictures. I'm not sure if we will have internet yet or not. We will be tenting in Mozambique. Also, please pray for all of our health, this is a malaria area. Thank you so much for all your prayers! Jared and I know that there are people back in the states praying for us! It means so much to us!
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 11/13/2009
The beginning of October we stopped in Istanbul, Turkey for about two weeks. We weren't able to fly into Turkey because of the high cost during their Holiday. We had a contact there that had us do Ethnography. Ethnography is the study of people based on their culture and
lifestyle. While doing that our team went into a nearby smaller town for a few days. The ministry we were working with has a huge vision for the the area. I was glad to get to play a small part of that. They are all about learning the people and the cultures there and building relationships with the people, before ever preaching the gospel to them.Some of course receive Jesus right away, while others, they just continue building relationships with and praying for them.
We went to one of the Universities one day to spend time with people while they weren't in class. Here is a group of people that we had fun talking to on their pretty campus!
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 10/31/2009
One week while we were in Israel we stayed with an Orthodox Jew, David. Only part of our team was there, it was just Scott, Jared, and myself. We learned how to keep a kosher kitchen while we were there. There was a lot more into being "Kosher" than I thought. Jared and I helped him make his kitchen "easier" to be Kosher. All the silverware that was to be used for dairy we painted the tips white with finger nail polish. Then the kitchen drawer that was for dairy we put white tape around the handle. David had assigned each of us parts to read and study out of the Old Testament and then New Testament. We were to talk about them on Shabbat. Scott did Fridays diner and I did Saturdays lunch, while Jared did Saturdays diner. The majority of the time we were there was focused on Shabbat and getting ready for it. We had to make sure the house was clean, buy tons of food, some traditional and some of whatever we wanted, and we had to read and study to lead the discussion during our part of the Shabbat.
We got to go to the market in Jerusalem called the "Shuk." We had to buy a lot of food for Shabbat. They eat small meals during the week and then spend a lot of money and eat a lot during Shabbat.Jared and I had a lot of fun walking around the Shuk and seeing all the amazing foods.
Jared and I ate Falafel's almost everyday while we were there...they are so good! There are falafel stands everywhere around Israel. here's a picture of Jessica and I eating a wonderful Falafel!
We got to go into the Old City twice while we were there. One just, Scott, Jared, and I and the other time was with our whole team and another team. We got to take a tour together. Our contact Eldon, is training to be a tour guide right now, so he gave us a tour. We had a great time walking all over Jerusalem and learning so much history!
The first time we went Jared and I got a tour in Christ Church. A lady named Hadar gave us the tour. After she told us all the history behind that church and churches built in Jerusalem, we sat and talked to her for a while. She told us her testimony of when she, a Jewish girl received Yeshua, the Messiah (Jesus). It was a great! She is doing so much for God's Kingdom now!
We had a wonderful time learning while in Jerusalem, even when we weren't on a "tour" we learned so much in the Holy Land!
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 10/31/2009
On October 13th Jared and I had our 2 year wedding anniversary! We got to spend it at the Dead Sea! It was so nice and relaxing. I have wanted to go to the Dead Sea since I was young, so I was so excited. It was only a 30 min bus ride from the house we were staying at. The bus ride was a bit scary. We were going down hill most of the time and taking sharp turns the whole way. They said that they don't ever use their brakes because then it would make people car sick.
The whole bottom and the Dead Sea was covered in salt. I could pick up huge chunks of salt and also small amounts of salt, like you would buy when buying bath salts. I wanted to take a lot home with me, but it would be too heavy to fit into my backpack.
Jared and I got mud and put it all over us. I had never had a mud mask all over, it was so much fun!
After we spent most of the day floating in the warm and salty water, we went to the hotel across the street and got a nice 30 min. neck and back massage before we went back home.
What an amazing day! I thank the Lord He gave us the opportunity to go there, esp since it was on our anniversary. It was a special day for me!
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 10/31/2009
We have been through Turkey and Israel and now I'm back to blogging! I'm just sending out a quick email letting everyone know where we're headed. We left Israel and drove into Egypt. We stayed here last night and we are leaving today for Swazliand, Africa. I hope to get some blogs up soon with some pictures of the past two months.
Posted in General Posts by Amy Christian on 9/25/2009
We are boarding a train from Romania to Istanbul, Turkey at 7 am. We will be there for ten days before going into Israel. They are in the middle of a holiday so we won't be able to enter in yet. We will have little contact with people back home for this month. These are "closed countries." Please to not comment to my blogs. I am not allowed to even be on the site for the month. I may try to send my mom some emails and she can post them on my blog for me.
Please keep us in your prayers. We are still financially behind some. Also, if anyone is interested in sending money to our main account please contact my Mom at sehansontx@yahoo.com. We are in need financially there as well. She can explain what all we have to spend our own money on as well.
Love you all and thank you so much for your support by prayers and financially!
