My team met with Pastor Emmanuel when we arrived in Iringa and immediately were caravanned to International Pentecost Holiness Church, where we stayed a couple of days before a member of the church offered their unfinished house for our accomodations. The owner of this house was a wealthy businessman and was out of town most of the time, but God gave us favor with his wife who is a member of IPHC and she welcomed us to live there. So after a couple of days living at the church, we moved to the unfinished house and lived comfortably there with beds provided for the girls, electricity, a small stove, running water, plumbing (the toilets were furnished with seats, yay! :), and a security dog named Lion and a security guard named Sam. There was a pool there as well, but no water in the pool. My team always joked about inviting our neighboring World Race team over for a pool party, but no pool party ever happened. I guess the unfilled pool was the drawback. Hey, well I was willing to spray people with the hose! 🙂
We started English classes at church at the beginning of this month. Priscilla and I taught the classes three times a week, planning for six lessons. On average, we had a faithful showing of 6 students, and ended “graduating” 7 students March 22 for completing our English course.
My team also visited a nearby orphanage twice this month. We sang songs with them, did a skit, and then played games with them. I taught the kids how to play kickball, but somehow it turned into a semi-game of cricket when the kids started running to second base only and then back to home base. So much for teaching an American sport classic! Play ball!
I also started giving guitar lessons to a few members on my team as well as to Pastor Emmanuel. Pastor Emmanuel got so excited when he learned to play “Soon and very soon” and “O the Blood of Jesus”. He would come over to our house almost daily to practice with Austin’s guitar for hours. I still can hear him singing “Soon and very soon we are going to see the King….”
We built up ministry at the church through the English classes, teaching Sunday school, and sharing in Worship and in the Word. We built friendships with Anthony and Rebecca and Petrol, key members of the church, and with Tony and Kathryn, the son and daughter of Rosie, the lady who allowed us to stay at their unfinished house. We built on team fellowship with a safari we went to at Rhana National Park and a Sunday picnic we had at Iringa’s Stone Age Preservation Park. This month was about building up the body of Christ. May God bless our work in Iringa.
