Friday, August 24, 2007
Dear Friends,
It seems that an update is way overdue with many people wondering
how things are going for us. As you probably know, we have been in
opposite corners of the globe for the last five weeks so are very
thankful to be back together again as of Sunday when I, Monica, got
back from a month in the USA. It was a long time to be away from
Doug and the boys, who stayed behind and did a lot of traveling here
in Madagascar.
During my time in the USA, I was able to celebrate with my parents
on the occasion of their 50th wedding anniversary. In addition, I
took advantage of the trip to take classes and attend a training
conference. One of the classes was about how to make unique books
and I'm hoping to share many of the ideas from that class with the
makers of antaimoro paper here in Madagascar so we can get some
creative new designs, including earrings in the shape of books.
The training conference was specifically about handcrafts and
marketing those handcrafts in the US. There were a lot of
interesting things I learned as well as making some interesting
connections that may turn into future business partnerships,
depending on where the Lord leads. I also had time to meet with
the board of Manna, USA, and speak with other people involved in the
ministry on the US end and other clients of Manna for Madagascar.
During my time there I received wonderful news from Doug about
events in Madagascar regarding the ministry of Manna. You may
remember that earlier we had written that there were problems within
the Board of Directors of Manna. It all stemmed from the president
of the board and her jealousy over my inviting my colleague, Lova,
to attend the handcrafts conference with me in the US. The
president felt SHE should be the one invited to attend and when we
didn't do that, she set out to destroy the whole ministry of Manna.
In a very amazing way, most of the rest of the board has rallied to
address the issue and save the ministry. They went against their
cultural norm of trying to maintain harmony and actually hired a
lawyer to get rid of the president when she wouldn't agree to
resigning. It is nothing short of a miracle that the president did
agree to resign so we are praising God that the doors have been
opened again for work to continue. As you can imagine, it was a
very discouraging time as we wondered what would happen. It was
hard for me to see all our efforts to build a ministry being torn
down and especially for such a selfish reason, yet my grief was
nothing compared to what the producers felt as they saw their future
hope being ripped away from them.
We are praising God along with them today though as they are all
happily working hard on new orders that will be sent to the US next
month for orders as Bazaar Kits. Once again, God has provided far
beyond what I had imagined was possible. I really did not believe
we would get the Bazaar Kits out this year but the producers are
working extra hard to try to accomplish in a few weeks what we
usually would have done in a few months. They are motivated and
thankful!! If you have not ordered a Bazaar Kit, please consider
doing so to support this ministry and help these women. You can
email Lea Mulqueen at lea.mannausa@yahoo.com or call her at 410-
667-9181.
While I was away, Doug and the boys had 2 adventurous trips in which
Doug was able to combine fun for the boys and ministry for him.
During the first trip up to Diego for two weeks he had our niece and
nephew along so they helped out a lot with Ben and Jeremiah when
Doug was busy teaching and in meetings. Then on the second trip to
Manakara (on the southeast coast of Madagascar) he was especially
thankful for such patient boys who cooperated wonderfully even when
Doug's work time stretched out much longer than expected. They
returned to Tana just a couple days before I flew back from the US.
Unfortunately they had heard about a problem in our yard while they
were away so were eager to get back and check it out. The day after
they had left Tana for Manakara a fire was set to some bushes just
inside the fence of our yard. The fire spread rapidly, in spite of
neighbors trying to put it out. The greatest help was that they
called the fire station and, because of the Indian Ocean Islands
games being held just a few blocks away from our house, the firemen
working at the games were able to come quickly. If not, we are sure
the house would have caught on fire since there were two trees in
flames very close to the house. The firemen even said that within
as little as three minutes the flames would have likely spread and
we suspect the whole house would have gone quickly. Had the fire
trucks been at their usual location they wouldn't have made it in
time to save the house!
As we try to sort out what happened, it seems most likely that
someone purposely set the fire. One neighbor speculated that it was
possibly someone trying to get revenge on our landlord since the
people around do not get along with him and he is very hard on his
employees. Most likely we will never know. But we will always be
thankful that our house did not burn down even though our yard is
looking pretty bare and ugly right now. The biggest negative
though is that the fire burned the telephone line running above the
trees. As a result, our phone line was not working and normally,
one can expect repairs to take weeks or months in this country. Yet
amazingly, the telephone company came the day after Doug reported
the problem and everything was fixed immediately and we're able to
use our phone and internet at home again!!
We had expected to be going to the American School frequently to
check emails from there but it's great to have this ability at
home. We figured we'd be spending a lot of time there anyway since
the boys already went back to classes last Wednesday. Jeremiah is
very excited about being in Kindergarten this year and we are very
thankful he will have a wonderful teacher. Ben is not as excited
but we are praying that he will slide into the routine much easier
this year since he has one year of English schooling under his belt
and one year of experience at this school so he won't be the new kid
yet again. He IS excited about one aspect of school: he will be
starting band this year but does not know which instrument yet. The
summer has been a good one for Ben. We appreciate all the prayers
for him after our last news was sent out with our concerns about
him. We appreciate your ongoing prayers for him, especially as he
starts a new school year now.
We also appreciate your prayers for the ministries of Project Shalom
and Manna for Madagascar, for our own discernment about what they
need and how to proceed in each. Please also pray for the country
of Madagascar and its people as they seek ways to help the country
progress economically and alleviate poverty. Also, for those who
still do not have freedom in Christ, we ask for prayers that they
might put their trust in the Lord. We continue to be inspired by
the many true stories of those around us, of miraculous healings and
conversions. God is working and God is good all the time.
We'll share more news about wonderful developments in Project Shalom
in our next update.
Blessings,
Doug and Monica