Voyage to Benin: July 2010

“Another 5 Days”

I can’t believe that this time has come. I have really come full circle. I began this blog with a post 5 days before I left to Benin, and now I am writing one 5 days before I leave to come back home. I felt it only right to name it the same as the last. But although the name is the same, the post is much different. I will not be talking about 5 points of any kind or five things I’ve learned, I just wanted to share a few stories that have happened in the last while. As I come to the end of my trip, and I look back at all that God has learned and taught me, these stories show just how awesome God is and will stick in my head as a reminder of all that God has and will continue to do in Benin.

“The Village Lady”
In our last week in Benin, the DRIME team joined together with GAiN one last time to do village ministry. The GAiN team had a few people from North Carolina come in to officially dedicate a well they had sponsored as a church for this very village. It was very interesting. When we got to this village there was not very many people around and we actually started to do our ministry right in front of the voodoo temple of that village. After having trouble with our generator (which usually works just fine) we get through one drama and our generator gives up. We begin to pray and after a while we somehow get the idea of borrowing power from the only place nearby that supplies it- the voodoo temple. The one place that would be against God’s work, God ended up using for good. We were doing dramas not too shortly after that although there were not very many people in the village, most of them were there watching. After finishing our first drama set, we did an altar call and the majority of the people who were watching came up and gave their lives to Christ. You could see in some of there eyes that they really got it. Most of the time we do ministry amongst the several people who come up there are a few people who seem to be joking around when they come up. When it is a smaller group those people laughing and joking about stand out a whole lot more. This was how it was during this ministry time. It made me feel a bit discouraged. I had become very used to seeing a lot of people watch the dramas and then have most of those people make this big step to have Christ become their personal Lord and Savior. For some reason I had forgotten what God has been showing me this whole time, that he is bigger and greater than me. He was about to remind me. After the alter call, we had people come up if they wanted to be prayed for healing. Many people came up and each one was prayed for. After this, one lady pulled the speaker and the pastor from North Carolina aside to tell them something private. It was far from my ear but for some reason I felt the need to pray. Janna did as well. For me it was a bit different however, I felt the need to pray for something specific. I felt as though this lady had an issue with having children and that was what she was telling them. I said a prayer about it but I quickly forgot it because I thought it was the midwife in me coming up. Later on, after a whole day of ministry, we pulled the speaker aside (Alphonse who has been a great partner to work with from GAiN ) to give him a gift for how awesome it has been to work with him. He was overjoyed and he pulled us aside. He began to speak about how much joy he has had working with us. He talked about how uplifting it has been to know that there are people all over the world allowing God to work through them. He wanted to encourage us by telling us that God is working whether we can see it or not. He went on to talk about the lady who pulled him aside. She has spoken about how 8 years ago she had had two children but since then she has been unable to become pregnant. She had come back to this village (her mothers village) randomly to visit for a while. This random visit just happened to fall on the time we were there. She asked if God could heal her of her barrenness, and the pastor along with Alphonse said yes. They then began to pray for her and during the prayer she began to shake and cry. They continued to pray. At the end of the prayer they asked her what had happened. She spoke about how when the pastor prayed “that any dark spirit should be sent back to the pit of hell it came from” she began to loose feeling in her legs. She said she felt as though she was floating and that something came off from beneath her. She spoke about a lightness she had never felt before. The pastor told her that if she believed, God would give her a child in the next year. I for one believe that this will happen. Along with hearing what had happened to her personally, God was there to show his work not just to her or the pastor or Alphonse but also to Janna and I. I could have thought of ANY random thing to pray for. There were a MILLION things she have been talking to them about, but God talked to me about this specific thing. I wish I could better explain how amazing it was to hear what God had done in that moment, but I know the words are not full enough to explain it. I do hope that those who read this blog are able to see that God is truly amazing!

“George”
Money. Money is a huge setback here in Benin. Unlike DRIME in Canada, there are a lot more things that the team need to spend money on. The problem is, there is no money. We have been praying about this fact. Praying for guidance on the best use of the money we do have. Praying for support raising that will happen here in Benin shortly to go well. Money.
We recently got new neighbors in the apartment beside us. We never got to formally meet them but we often see them around. A couple of weeks ago doing ministry at the beach, we got pulled aside….but our neighbours! The one guy George spoke about how much he loved this ministry. He thought it amazing that these simple dramas we did pulled almost 200 aside from the partying they were doing on the beach. He began to comment on the production as a whole and soon after commented on how we desperately needed a new sound system (which is so very true). After that encounter on the beach with George, we began to see more and more of him. He began to come over a lot and we would get into long discussions about God and religion. He had many questions. Each conversation would bring us back to the ministry of DRIME. At one point in one of our conversations with him, he straight up asked us what our needs were for DRIME. Janna told him. As the conversation came to an end, George stood up and said that our conversations have challenged him and answered many questions he has had about being a Christian and Christianity in this world. He spoke about how he was still very blown away by the ministry we were a part of. He ended by saying that he would pay to buy a new sound system for the DRIME Benin team by the end of the month but in the meantime he would pay to rent one for us each week. He left and an hour later came back telling us where to pick our rented sound machine the day of ministry and with an envelope to pay for transportation for that week (even though it was enough for the month!). God really answered prayers for us on the money matter and at the same time he worked in the life of George building him in his faith. Praise God for the way He has been working in this last two months, in ways we can and cannot see!

Home in 5 days! See you all sooon!!!!

Life

I can’t believe how close I am to departure day. This trip has flown by so fast. Although I am not even close to being fluent in French, I have grown more accustomed to not understanding all of what people say and accustomed to thinking about my words before I speak. It’s been about two months now since I’ve been here and I feel as though God has brought me full circle. I am not sure how many of you have been reading or have at least read my first blog post. But It was the post I put up 5 days before my departure to Benin. I brought up 5 things that I wanted to keep with me in my heart and mind that God had been showing me. Number one: I am His Beloved and He is mine, number two: No more playing Defense, it’s all about the Offense, number three: He is in control, number four: It is His plans not mine, number five: there is no number five (take a look at my first post if you need to refresh on what all these entail). I am coming to the end of my journey here in Benin, but God is showing me more and more that it is just the beginning of my journey with Him. I know that He was speaking to me about these five points because they have been the building blocks to all that I have learned here in Benin. I wish….I REALLY WISH, I was a better writer who was able to express to you all that God has taught me in the last two months in a short, concise and clear blog post but as many of you have already discovered…I have not been blessed with the gift of writing. Therefore, you will have to pull me aside when I return if you desire to know all the juicy details.
For now I want to say that I feel like I have come full circle because it was if God had given me all the points for the dot-to-dot picture and during this trip He has helped me connect the dots and fill in the picture. I have never felt more like His beloved than I have in these past months. So much that it’s not just a feeling, it’s who I am. Now I can’t fully say “what” place I have with God in His whole grand scheme, but I CAN say that “I have a place”. It’s different these days. I wish I could explain to you how. I know I can say to those of you who are reading this that you too have a place with Him, and many of you will believe that but not understand it. I somehow, through His grace and wisdom understand that. I do know however that if you surrender to Him completely, and start looking for your place with Him, you will not only find it, but you too with understand it!
God has also shown me how real life is. How what He told us about there being a physical realm and a spiritual realm is true. We often live our lives just in the physical but God said we are in fact citizens of heaven. In my last post I spoke of how not everything has gone smoothly here and how we have had some rough points. Praise God for continually seeing us through. I must say that for my second point “no more playing defense, it’s all about the offense”, acknowledging the spiritual side of life has brought me closer to God. It has shown me more of who He is and that I do not have to be afraid….of anything. Neither do you! There are a few stories that I would love to share but feel they are more for face to face conversations. But I do want to say that the devil is real. Very real. As I stated in my first post, he is not playing around and he doesn’t wait for us to acknowledge him before he tries to make our lives separated from God. People around the world devote their lives to the devil and the destruction of Christ’s kingdom (Philippians 3:18-19). But in all this, God has given me courage to not fear the evil one and I cannot tell you how much more FULL life is now because I am standing in God’s light with my courage in him living in both the physical and spiritual realms of life.
I am growing more and more everyday. Not just as a person (even though I am) but just in life and being able to “experience” life. Everyday is the new adventure, this new shot at growing and living life to the fullest. The point I made about there being no number five seems so exciting now to me. The fact that there is no end of my journey with God opens up each day even more to how endless and even eternal life with God is. It fills me with such excitement and wonder!
Life is so much more full these days, my walk so much more purposeful. I cannot express in these typed words all that I have learned, but I can say it’s a lot. Not all of it has been easy to swallow mind you, but all of it has been worth the chew :p. If you desire to know more details about all that I speak about, feel free to ask me when I return home. Thank you all for your prayers and your support. I feel love pouring in from every direction! Blessings!

P.S HAPPY CANADA DAY! WHOOOO!

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Random:

Our leaders took us to a zoo!