"Surely against me He turns His hand again and again the whole day long.
...He has besieged me and enveloped me with bitterness and tribulation;
...He has walled me about so that I cannot escape; He has made my chains heavy;
though I call and cry for help, He shuts out my prayer;
He has blocked my ways with blocks of stones; He has made my paths crooked.
...He has made my teeth grind on gravel...my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness is; so I say, ‘My endurance has perished; so has my hope from the Lord.'
...But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope:
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.
‘The Lord is my portion,' says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in Him.'
The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him.
It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord."
LAMENTATIONS 3:3-26

Dear family and friends,

After my last update, we returned to the bush full of hope and excitement. The man was coming soon to thatch our roof - finally we would be finished with the frame and roof and could move on to water, septic, and interior walls.  Our first week back we completed the pole frame for the roof, even as the thatch began going up on the other end of the building.  But there was no celebration.  It quickly became obvious that our Lozi friends had grossly underestimated the amount of grass that we needed.  We had 600 bundles of grass; it looks like we will need 2400, four times as much! 

But "grass season" is July to October, and we are now in the middle of the rainy season. Our first challenge was finding grass that wasn't rotten from moisture.  We finally found a village with enough grass - 2 ½ hours away.  Then we needed a trailer to haul grass (it will take at least 8 trips).  After a week, we finally had access to a trailer, but by then we were out of money to buy grass and out of fuel to go get it.  In defeat, we sent our thatcher home until we can collect enough grass.

In the midst of all this, our chief wanted to push to finalize the land issue with the Royal Council.  We made 3 trips in 3 weeks (a miserable 8 hour round trip).  On our first trip, we learned that the Council had lost our paperwork from our May visit, and had forgotten all about us.  They acted as if they'd never seen us before.  In addition, the king had to give his formal approval, and he was out of town.  Could we please come back next week?  So we returned the next week.  "Oh, sorry, the king was supposed to be back yesterday, but he ran out of fuel traveling back from the capital. Can you come back tomorrow?"  No, we couldn't stay overnight and leave our families camping alone in the bush.  So a week later we returned for the third time.  "Oh, sorry, the king had a very long meeting this morning, and now it's raining, so he's canceled all visits for the afternoon.  Please come back tomorrow."  (We still don't know what the rain had to do with anything, but I guess any excuse will do.)  Well, by that time we were also out of money and fuel for any more trips to the Council.

Now, I can be kinda slow sometimes . . . but I'm starting to get the feeling that the hand of God is hindering everything we have tried to do for the last few months.  It seems like we are fighting divine providence, and we're tired of fighting.  Our 2 month building project is now entering its' sixth month, with no end in sight.  All of you who are wanting to come on building trips this summer, are you paying attention?  You wonder why we are so hesitant to give you dates or tell you what we'll be doing.  How can we?  We cannot begin work on our houses until the land is finalized with the Royal Council.  Will that be done in time for teams to plan a trip?  We hope to have the camp structure done by June, in which case, what would build teams do?  You see, God doesn't seem to understand our dilemma or care about our timetable. What is He doing?

But then again, the last few months have been full of dark and difficult days. Maybe we're supposed to take a break from building, focus for a while on our relationship with God and our families, take a more informed and realistic look at how to start a Lozi church, and then finish the camp structure when teams can come.  Hey, that does sound like the way God might prioritize things.  Like I said . . . I can be a bit slow.  If anyone has a ‘word from the Lord,' I'm listening.

Speaking of the Lozi church-to-be, for the past 6 weeks we've been meeting every Sunday at 2 p.m. under a tree next to the river.  Our group averages 7 to 10 men and women, plus children.  Over a 10 week period, we are briefly summarizing all the major stories of the Old Testament - Creation and Fall, Cain to Noah, the Patriarchs, Moses and Exodus, and Judges/Kings/Prophets/Exile.  With each story, we reveal the character of God, point to Christ, and question the unbiblical elements of traditional Lozi culture.  Our dear Lozi friend, Joseph, may not be able to prepare an expository sermon for many years, but he can quickly learn how to take a narrative and explain what it teaches about God, see Christ in everything, and apply Scriptural narrative to his culture. 

The hand of God certainly seems to be upon Joseph. If you remember, he's the one who's been so sick with tuberculosis.  Three months ago, he was too weak to walk without help.  Although in his 30's, he moved like a man in his 90's.  Now he is walking 2 hours every day from his home to our build site and back!  God has graciously answered our prayers for healing.  Now Joseph is zealous to visit all the sub-villages, sharing the Gospel and inviting them to our weekly meeting. 

So, in closing, how many of you have found yourselves in Jeremiah's sandals in Lamentations 3? When all is pain and trouble, when you've forgotten what it feels like to be happy and at peace, when you can't see the Lord's hand doing anything in your behalf, do you still have unshakeable confidence in His love, mercy, and faithfulness?  Can you wait for His deliverance without complaining?  That is faith, my friends.  I want to be like that someday.  But, oh, the painful school we must attend to learn that faith.  (How lightly and easily did I preach so many things back home in the States.)  Yet, what rich rewards for faithful students - to know, really know, our God!  Please pray for us, for wisdom from the Spirit, endurance in suffering, and humility before our God.

Kept by Him,
Sean

P.S. As I think back on the report, I felt that perhaps I should add a P.S. I wonder if some of you will read that update and think, "Wow, Sean is being a bit dramatic.  He just described the frustrations of building in Africa and problems in dealing with third-world tribal leadership.  That hardly seems to match the words of Lamentations 3."  So...what I failed to mention is that those trials are only the ones that I can talk about.  There are other trials - deeper, darker, more difficult and painful, that I do not have liberty to discuss.  Yes, Jeremiah's words are very appropriate.  There is no better description of how we feel.

I say this only to spur your prayers. Some of these trials you may hear about in the future after God delivers, or you may never know what your Spirit-aided intercession accomplished.  Whatever the case, please pray.