And a child will lead them.

      A few weeks ago we introduced you to the Heemstra family. Manoah Heemstra is a second grader at our school. She and her family will be leaving Lesotho in about a month to return to the Netherlands. 
     Manoah is a planner. She was eager to take charge of setting up a yard sale to get rid of things they would not be taking to their home country, including many of her own toys, books, and dress-up clothes. She set prices for the items to be sold and then invited friends to come to the big event. 
   

      While most children would be excited to sell their things in order to buy new things later, Manoah had another plan. She wanted to use all the money from the sale to purchase audio Bibles for shepherd boys living in the mountains. This is one of the ministries her dad has been involved with over the years. She also intends to buy special gifts for some of the local orphaned children. Here is one child with a huge heart for Christ! 

Collecting money from a customer

Ms. Beth bought a lot of treasures!

Top Ten Favorite Sounds

Drum roll please...

Our collection of 5 liter bottles

1.       shkooooo (a hopeful sound)
2.       tlock tlock
3.       drip
4.       splatter
5.       splash
6.       splosh
7.       swish
8.       swoosh
9.       shower
10.       flush

We have been without running water for over 2 weeks! Specifically, this meant that we were unable to use our tap water for washing dishes, lathering up and rinsing our hands, flushing toilets, mopping floors, showering, shampooing, brushing teeth, yadda, yadda, yadda.

       In order to make due, we made daily trips to the local "Pick-n-Pay" to buy "still water" (mineral water) for drinking/cooking/teeth brushing. Then we gathered several 5 liter jugs (as in about 15 of them) and sponged off nearby friends for unfiltered water to be used for flushing the toilet and general cleaning. At the end of each day we would take a trip to a nearby pool for swimming and/or invade their shower room for shampooing and washing up. It's been somewhat of a draining experience. 

     

       But, today at 11:22:32 a.m., the toilet tanks began to fill. The tap began to spit out bursts of air and then bits of muddy water. And then...a glorious stream of sparkling clear water burst forth! Thank you, Jesus! Isn't it interesting how much we take simple pleasures for granted? Tell you what, our family has a new appreciation for running water! 

Um hmm, we are fully prepared for next time!

    

Meet the Heemstra Family!

Over the next few months, we would like to introduce you to some of the incredible families we get to live alongside of  here in Maseru. We have one Dutch family in our school: the Heemstras. They are very dear to our hearts. Here is what they have to say...

The Heemstras

We are so blessed by the coming of Beth and Dawn. We’d love to share some of that with you, but let me first introduce ourselves. We are the Heemstra family from Holland and we’re privileged to have served Lesotho for five years now. We’re proud of our four kids: Manoah (7), Jiddo (5), Kamiel (3) and Luuk (1). Boukje is a mom at home and Jakob Jan works as a registered nurse. He has set up a local clinic in the rural area in the mountains of Moteng, here in Lesotho. He also volunteers in a local clinic in Maseru. He, along with some local pastors, does outreaches to the shepherd boys by handing out Megavoices (solar charged audio Bible). He also set up a cultural focussed HIV-education with a Basotho friend. Together they also run a Christian lifeskill program in the youth prison. We’re blessed to be a blessing!

Since the birth of Luuk, homeschooling the other kids grew into a more challenging task, especially for Manoah because of all the academics. We were so happy to find out the Fennema’s were coming. Our Dutch sisters from far away :) 

Manoah loves going to the school. The first weeks she woke up 5 o’clock in the morning: more than 2 hours earlier than normal. She is so excited about school and the teachers. Us too, they really have a beautiful individual approach and insight in the kids. Manoah wrote a little about them for you. “I love the teachers because they are sweet.” She wrote in Dutch, because if you talk about what you love, it’s best to express yourself in your mother tongue, isn’t it?  

Manoah's Note

We’d like to encourage you to support them in any way you can, because we know how important it is that people got your back all the way from home.

Manoah with the shield she made at school

Happy New Year!

     I made this word cloud using words from the January 1st entry of My Utmost for His Highest, a classic devotional book by Oswald Chambers. A new year, a new house, a new baby, a new car, a "new" anything brings along its own set of dreams, hopes, expectations, fears, concerns, anxieties. People ask us how long we plan to stay in Lesotho.  We don't really know. Honestly, while on the one hand I believe we have been providentially placed here for this time and this purpose, another part of me questions whether we are being financially responsible. Charis hasn't completed college yet, Dakotah hasn't even started school yet, and we are in our fifties without a grand retirement plan to fall back on. This is where God speaks to me through the writings of Chambers:

"My determined purpose is to be my utmost for His highest--my best for His glory." To reach that level of determination is a matter of the will, not of debate or of reasoning. It is absolute and irrevocable surrender of the will at that point. An undue amount of thought and consideration for ourselves is what keeps us from making that decision, although we cover is up with the pretense that it is others we are considering. When we think seriously about what it will cost others if we obey the call of Jesus, we tell God He doesn't know what our obediance will  mean. Keep to the point--He does know. Shut out every other thought and keep yourself before God in this one thing only--my utmost for His highest. I am determined to be absolutely and entirely for Him and Him alone.   

     The Sunday before we left for Lesotho, we sang "I'll stand. With arms high and heart abandoned." What does that kind of life really look like? What could 2015 bring if we choose to live completely surrendered, abandoned to God's purposes? Let's pray for each other.