Random Thoughts......

Ministry …
Remember in my last entry how I asked you to pray for our day of ministry last Saturday? Well, we found out Friday night at 9pm that it was canceled. The person who invited us to do ministry with them had canceled the event they were organizing. We were so bummed about this as we were really looking forward to it! So thank for your prayers anyways – I’m sure God used them in incredible ways!

What we’re up to…
The end of last week was pretty relaxing as we did not have much on our schedule. However, this week is going to be a bit busier! On Sunday we received the completed leadership applications from our potential leaders and we will be meeting with them throughout the week. It is really exciting to be at this point of choosing the leadership team so we can move forward with them! Thank you for all your prayers about this process of choosing the leadership team. We really appreciate them – so keep them coming Thanks!

Humidity will be the death of me…
As I am writing this, the electricity just went out which has made our giant fan stop. Jamie, Carleigh and I are all sitting on the couch, moving nothing but our hands as we type or write. Yet sweat is dripping from our bodies [and I do mean dripping]. How is it possible to sweat this much from doing nothing?!?! We can’t even remember what it feels like not to be sweating! What I would give to dive into a pool right now!

An unexpected language barrier…
As you know, I am faced with a language barrier each day here in Cotonou. I don’t speak French, so I rely on Jamie and Carleigh to translate when needed. I was expecting this language barrier when coming here to Benin. However, what I was not expecting was a language barrier between Jamie and I! It never used to be a problem – I don’t know what happened! It began just last week – I only understand about half of what Jamie says and must rely on Carleigh to translate for me! We’re thinking there may be a few reasons for this: 1) Too much ear wax. 2) Jamie’s voice is a lot lower with his allergies bothering him. Perhaps my ears cannot pick up that low of a frequency. 3) I have a hard time understanding people that mumble. 4) I am going deaf. 5) Jamie’s voice is the same frequency as our noisy fan, so his words get lost in the sound of the fan. We’re hoping to resolve this barrier soon – Jamie has agreed to try and enunciate more and I have agreed to clean my ears [haha]. For now there are a lot of ‘whats?’ and confused looks between Jamie and I – and Carleigh laughs a lot at our confusion as she translates for us!