Clean Water and Chiseka Village

Clean Water for Malawi had a training exercise this week with the Mzuzu and Blantyre teams.  They met here in Lilongwe.  They began drilling a well but had to stop due to broken rods and loosing their drill bit down the hole.  We're hoping for replacement parts to come in soon so that their drilling can continue.  

Meanwhile there was much to teach and learn.  

The team came here to our village (Chiseka) to repair a broken well behind the school.  

Even though for the teams this was a training exercise it was a vital and very important improvement to the village of Chiseka.  The Clean Water teams understood this and were very excited to help this village.  What an amazing group of men!

The first water from the repaired well!

This lady was so very excited!  Actually the entire community was on hand to watch the repair!

As the water began flowing there was much singing and rejoicing in the village!  Those pictures are coming in the next blog post!  

Praise God for His provisions, His work, His workers, and His harvest!

Our Purpose

I must admit...I'm a blog stalker! Ok, there, I've said it. I'm truthful and open about it though. About once a week I go to the sidebar of my blog and check in on all of the blogs that I follow. I put that sidebar over there mainly for my own use to be honest. It's easier for me to follow my favorite blogs that way. However, I do hope that many of you follow some of them as well. When the Lord called us to a third world country as missionaries I figured that I'd try to learn as much about the jobs, people, and culture as I could. Well, what better source than the actual missionaries who are there (or who have been there). So, I began stalking. I really think it's a harsh term. I mean, isn't that why a blog is there in the first place? Nonetheless, I love learning about ABC and Malawi.

I just stumbled upon a GREAT post by the Carlisles family. The Carlisles just moved to Malawi this past August and they are serving in the ABC Academy (where I will be teaching). They just wrote a wonderful entry on what they are doing in Malawi and the purpose of us being there. I thought I'd share part of it with you:

"So, I've been wanting to let you know what we do here--both how we serve and what life is like.I remember the first time as we were referred to as "missionaries." It seemed really strange. It still is, as what we do isn't what I think of missionaries doing. We have not yet had an opportunity to visit a village or go evangelizing like my sisters talk about from their time in Uganda. (Though we're going to a refugee camp later this month). That's not even what we're primarily here to do. I guess you might say that we serve in a support role. I'll explain.Malawi was evangelized by Presbyterians long ago (the Dr. Livingstone you've heard of). So many Malawians will call themselves Christians. There are many, many "prayer houses" all over the country. But there are very, very few pastors. Most pastors here cover a number of these small churches and may have thousands of parishioners. Of course they cannot preach in 20 places each Sunday, so when a pastor is not present anyone may "say a word." As you can imagine, with the level of education, particularly theological education, here, what is said may not be AT ALL Biblical. So you end up with lots of dangerous mixtures of old superstitions and religious beliefs. (Baptisms being thought of as magical, lots of health and wealth type gospel. There was even one church--or anti-church that was telling people and Jesus was just for white people and a new type of religion was needed for Africans). This was why African Bible College was begun, to train pastors and lay people in theology and communication, so that as they go out into their country they are leading others in the right direction, whether as pastors, teachers, leaders in their churches or in businesses, or government (and ABC graduates are everywhere here and being a positive leaven wherever they have influence--I know, I teach with one). So, then those who were teaching and running the college needed to have somewhere to send their children to school. Local schools were not a terrific option. Home schooling was going on, but there were getting to be a lot of children and so a school was begun. At first it was only children of ABC missionaries, but soon there was a desire that it be serving Malawi as well. So, now each class is kept at 50% Malawian and 50% Non-Malawian. Now, this is where we come in. This is where in begins to make sense for us--Brian and Scharlie--to be here. Brian's been working in schools for over 10 years and has had a lot of different experiences that help him with this one. I like teaching and being a part of a school community. Education, and yes, Christian education is something that's been important to us for a long time. We're really encouraged about how self-consciously Christian this school is. It knows it is Christian and evangelical. There are (of course) nominal Christians mixed with true ones, and there are also a few atheists, Muslims, and Hindus sprinkled in. We respect that their beliefs are different, but students are not excused from Bible classes, or chapel, or Scripture memory. So, in that sense, we are evangelizing, just not in the same way. I love being so free in the way I'm able to pray and speak about the Bible. Brian's Bible class had a pretty good discussion recently on the problem of suffering. I'm thankful He's their teacher. He made those older kids think. This brings me full circle, I guess--We don't always understand why we have difficult things to go through. We don't always know why God calls us to certain places at certain times or away from others at times, but we can know that He is good and that if we are in Him, he has our best in mind at all times. We are glad to be here. There are hard things (though, not really in the areas you might imagine or we expected). But, just pray for us. We will learn what we are supposed to from those things, I trust (sometimes)."

I am thankful that the Lord has called us and that He is providing the means for us to follow Him to Malawi, Africa. I pray that we will be able to glorify Him in all that we do. God bless!

Jill