Burkina Faso Week 6

‘Ne y yibeogo!’  That’s good morning in Mòoré!  One of the sixty eight languages spoken here in Burkina Faso =) 

Only seven days left here in West Africa, I can’t believe it!  It’s been such a blessing to be able to teach God’s Word and build relationships with the people here, although I’m excited about what’s to come next I’m definitely trying to savor every last bit that I have here as well. 

We had some ups and downs last week with David being sick for the first half and me missing girl fellowship but God showed us great grace and we were able to finish strong as a team, teaching Bible Overview at two different churches and having two different sermons on Sunday as well, with David preaching on a lifestyle of worship and me preaching on learning to be content in all circumstances.  As you can imagine with the struggles I’ve been facing in missing comforts of home as well as Jonah and my girl friends, this came at a perfect time, allowing me to not only preach about something that was real for me but challenging me to practice what I preached too!  I talked about learning how to be content in our weaknesses, the challenges we face, and with what we have.  The people really enjoyed it and were challenged to apply what they learned as well!  

Talking about King David: How God looks not to the outer appearances but rather to the heart of a man

In other news, I’ve been getting a lot better with my French too! 

I had the funniest conversation with Elda the other morning, she was going around saying ‘Tanti Leslie ou, Tanti Leslie ou?”, asking, ‘Where is aunty Leslie, where is aunty Leslie?’ When I came out to eat breakfast with her I told her ‘Bonjour (Hello) Elda, bien dormi? (Did you sleep well?) Bon appetit (Enjoy your meal) Mange, mange, mange’ (Eat, eat, eat).  We had fun for a little bit and then all of a sudden she said, ‘Laisse moi,’ which pretty much means leave me alone, and I was like, Quoi?  Ce matin Tanti Leslie ou, Tanti Leslie ou: maintenant laisse moi?  Pourquoi?  Fine, laisse moi!  (What?  This morning, Where is aunty Leslie, where is aunty Leslie, now, leave me alone? Why?  Fine, Leave me alone!) =P  It was the longest conversation I’ve had in French yet!  Although it was a silly conversation I was pretty proud of myself =P 

I’ve also been spending more time with the maid here (Felicity), helping her with odds and ends around the house like dishes and cooking and stuff.  Although we can’t communicate as much with my limited French, I appreciate her companionship =)  Yesterday I saw that she was pounding something in a bowl outside and I went to inquire about it.  I thought that maybe she was making something like Fufu which is an African dish consisting of mashed up yams.  But to my surprise, she was mashing up something quite different, bugs actually!  They looked like big termites!  I was like, what are you going to do with that?  Then Elda walked by, grabbed one, popped it in her mouth, ate it, and offered one for me to eat too!  There’s only one other bug eating experience that I’ve had (aside from eating ants when I was three) and that was in Korea with silkworm pupae.  I swore that I wouldn’t eat those ones again but it was a quiet afternoon and I was looking for an adventure.  So guess what?  After three minutes of contemplating whether or not I was going to do it, and Felicity and Elda laughing at my funny facial expressions, I did it!  I ate the bug!  And you know what?  It actually wasn’t that bad!  It just tastes like dirt really =P  Apparently they like to add it to a bunch of their dishes for the extra protein =)  

 

Eating and mashing bugs with Elda and Felicity =) 

So yeah, all is well!  Only eight days left until I get to see Jonah and my other friends!  And only eleven days left until I return to the states!  I can’t believe it!  But once again I’m trying to make the most of the time I have left here.  Our team is debriefing this week, taking time to reflect on our experience here in West Africa, spend time with Gerard and his fiance, family and friends, and just relax before we head back on another twenty hour bus ride and two flights.    

All in all it was a great week from learning new phrases to preaching a fiery sermon and eating a bug too!  I finally feel like my African experience is complete =)

Burkina Faso Week 5

Greetings from Burkina Faso!

After a LONG twenty-hour bus ride, we finally made it to Burkina with slight exhaustion but great excitement about what we would experience here, and a great week it has been!  Burkina met us with a few challenges but great rewards as well =)

We kicked off our time here teaching Bible Overview at a nearby church!  Bible Overview consists of nine steps starting with Creation going all the way to the Second Coming.  David and I broke it into three parts, I took the first three, he took four through six and I finished off the last three since he’d be preaching on Sunday.  

I was a little nervous to teach Thursday night as this was going to be my first time teaching bible overview in an African church.  Up until this point my experience with bible overview was in a practice setting but this time it was for real!  Upon arrival the electricity went out which meant I was pretty much going to have to teach in the dark.  It was one of those times when I just had to surrender it all to God and pray that his message would be delivered despite the circumstances.  I got up to teach and greeted the church and instantly felt comfortable and welcomed, saying, ‘Although I can’t actually see your faces right now, I can feel the love’ =P.  Things proved to be challenging, teaching with lots of illustrations and me not being able to see my notes very well but overall everyone really enjoyed it and learned a lot and I learned a few things myself, like the need to memorize my notes more and to find other ways to present if people can’t actually see what you’re talking about! 

We finished teaching bible overview on Saturday and then David went to preach on Sunday where he too faced his own challenge.  He was already feeling tired and as though his voice was going to give out and then five minutes before he was going to preach a HUGE thunderstorm came and it started POURING!  The church we were at had a tin roof and no speakers so he too found himself having to just surrender it all to God and was thankful that if anything, it was Gerard who had to raise his voice since he was the one who was translating.  But just as before, God provided him with the strength he needed and he did really well!  The church was really touched by his message on living a life of worship and afterward a woman came forward to give her life to the Lord!  

Burkina Team going to church in style with matching team outfits, oh yeah! 

So all in all the teachings went really well this week!  In other news, we finally got to meet Gerard’s stunning fiancé!  It was so nice to finally meet the woman who has captured Gerard’s heart and we look forward to getting to know her more.  Gerard insists that David and I come to his wedding this November and says that if we don’t he’s going to take us hostage =P  Don’t worry mom, he’s just kidding, I’ll be coming home soon =) 

There’s also a super adorable two year old on base whose name is Elda.  She has become my new best friend and brings so much joy to each day.  She is also my new language exchange partner!  If you don’t already know this, toddlers are the perfect people to learn a new language from as their vocabulary is very simple and to the point so I’ve been having fun trying to learn French from her and have been teaching her some English too!    

Gonna meet up with our other Burkina Faso team from Togo this week to teach Bible Overview again with them at another church, looking forward to it =)

Prayer points:

- Rest for David, he unfortunately has a cold right now and is trying to recover, please pray that he’ll get better soon and be able to finish outreach strong and enjoy the rest of his time here in west Africa.

- Gerard continues to prepare for his wedding and is in the process of finding a home for him and his fiancé, please pray for provision for those things as well as continued strength and joy as he serves.

- Me:  Overall I’m doing okay, I think the greatest challenge since coming to Burkina has been the fact that I’m an extrovert and I’m the only English speaking girl around so I’ve been missing having girl time.  I am so thankful for the girl friends that I had in Togo for the first half of outreach and Gerard and David’s continued compassion as well as my new friendship with Elda and God of course, but yeah, if you could pray that I’d also hang in there and finish strong that’d be great =)

Thank you so much for all of your love and support!  I can’t believe that in just a little over two weeks I’ll not only be finished with outreach but leaving Africa all together!  It’s been an amazing year and it’s not over yet, hoping to make the most of every last bit of it =)  Much love to you all! 

Leslie

Togo Week 4

Hi Everyone!

We are happy to say that Titus Project has officially been established here in Togo and with great success too!  We came not knowing what to expect and not knowing how things would go but everything exceeded our expectations and we pray that it will continue to grow.

It’s been a busy last few days of making sure all things were completed before sending the teams off for outreach but all was done with great success as God miraculously provided for each team and everyone pretty much got to go where they wanted.    

The Togo team immediately started outreach the day after we finished, we sent the Ghana/Nigeria team off yesterday morning, the Ivory Coast team left today, and the Benin and Burkina Faso teams will be leaving tomorrow, including David and I, bright and early at 5:00 am for a twenty hour bus ride to Burkina, woohoo!  Thankfully Jonah gave me ‘The Hobbit’ to read during outreach so I should be set with entertainment and I have cookies and apples to keep my stomach happy too =) 

Although I am sad to be saying goodbye to all of the dear friends that I’ve made here I’m excited for the new adventures that lie ahead and heard that there will be more meat in Burkina too!  If you don’t know already, food is something that easily helps to turn my frown upside down =)  Not to say that any amount of meat will replace my friends here but rather it will help me to cope with the transition =) 

We’ve finally reached the half way mark in our outreach with only three and a half weeks left to go, I can’t believe it’s almost over!  This is where I’ve been challenged to continue to remain in the present and finish strong.  It can be easy to get carried away with thoughts of what the future holds, especially with Jonah, but I know that God wants to continue to use me during my time here and so I look forward to giving it my all in our next location. 

I’m not quite sure of what God has in store for us in Burkina other than meat but if it’s anything like here then I look forward to building more relationships with the people, joyfully serving them inside and outside of God’s Word and continuing to learn more about God and the beautiful people of West Africa. 

That’s all for now, I hope this update finds all of you well, thank you so much again for all of your prayers and support! 

Leslie 

Togo Week 3

Hi Everyone!

Just finished our second week of Titus Project here in Togo!  Only one more week and then we’ll be sending our fellow bible teachers off to go teach others in Togo, Benin, Ghana/Nigeria, Ivory Coast, and Burkina Faso and then we’ll be heading off to Burkina ourselves.  It’s been such a joy to train and equip them and to see them grow as they’ve now had two practice teachings of the Inductive Method and the book of Philemon.  

Highlights from this week:

- I had the privilege of preaching at our Thursday night gathering on base where I preached on the topic of forgiveness as this is something that I’ve been dealing with lately.  It seemed as though there were a lot of people in the audience that were also dealing with un-forgiveness who were really blessed by the message and I was thankful that God used me and the situation that I was facing to be able to challenge and encourage them to also forgive.  And apparently it not only reached the adults but the kids too!  Our base leader came up and told me later on that his five-year-old son actually went up to his mom and told her that he was angry for something that she did, that she hurt him but that he wanted to forgive her.  A five year old actually got the message of forgiveness!!!  How cool is that?  You never know who God’s going to speak to through your sermon.  As I’ve been here I realize that God’s given me a gift in teaching and preaching and that I ought to be a good steward of this gift and continue to use it for His glory.  It’s little things like this that encourage me, not only in the fact that I enjoy it but that God’s actually using me to help transform other people’s lives too!

- Got to experience my first African wedding!  Love was in the air all week as everyone was preparing for the big day.  We had a little bachelorette party on Wednesday for the bride, which was exactly what I needed, as most of the people in our school are men so I really appreciated the extra fun girl time this week =)

- Had 13 of our students join us for a teaching and sleepover at a church in town last night.  My teammate David not only taught at a church for the first time but did it all in French too!  He totally rocked it and I was very proud of him.  

- And to top it all off, after three weeks of eating lots of dishes made of yams and corn and rice, we treated ourselves to some yummy cheeseburgers in town today! 

It’s our last week with the students before we all head off to our different outreach locations.  It’s been a blessing to be able to spend time here in Togo as I’ve fallen in love with the beautiful people and surroundings.  Gonna make the most of the last few days we have left =) 

Til next time, Au Revoir \(^_^)/ 

Togo Week 2

Bonjour à ma famille et à tous mes amis!  (Hello family and friends!)  Comment ça va? (How are you?)  All is well here in Noepe, Togo, here’s a little update from week 2 =) 

We had our first week of Titus Project here at YWAM Noepe in Togo and a great week it was!  We have a full class of 18 bible teachers from 9 different nations, some of whom are already leaders of schools within YWAM and one of them is actually going to take what he’s learned here and pioneer another Titus Project at his YWAM base in Cameroon next year!  Yay for bible training schools being spread throughout West Africa \(^o^)/. 

I’m not gonna lie, I was a little intimidated at first to be teaching a group of mostly older men as a young woman who just finished SBS, especially since some of them had already had years of staffing SBS.  I thought, ‘Who am I to teach them?  They’ve already been teaching for years and here I am teaching them how to do things?’  But the intimidation quickly faded and was replaced with confidence and excitement as I saw their friendly faces and eagerness to learn.  I had the privilege of teaching on ‘The Heart of a Teacher, How to Present a Teaching, and How to Give and Receive Feedback’ this week. 

As I reflected on the heart of a teacher, I was reminded that I’m not here for personal growth in order to better my teaching skills but rather so I can help to equip others with tools so that they can grow as teachers and bring transformation to others.  Having this mindset has helped to take the pressure off of teaching and to make it more enjoyable as I serve God in this season. 

My French is still quite limited but I’ve been making progress each day and am thankful that gestures can go a long way too =)  Here are a few more sentences that I’ve learned!

1. Where is the toilet? (Où est la toilette?0

2. I don’t like ants because they bite me.  (Je n’aime pas les fourmis car ils me piquent)

3. This food looks delicious!  (Cette nourriture à l’air delicieuse!)

Highlights of this week:

- ‘Spicy’ African worship on base and at church

- Got to try some Fufu which is a native dish to Togo made up of mashed yams paired with a spicy soup, I wanted to try the one with the large mysterious rodent (still not sure what it was) but it was too expensive so I had chicken instead =P 

- Got to ride a moto taxi in town today!  It was so fun riding through the streets and corn field with the wind blowing in my hair =) 

- Was sad to say bye to some of the outreach teams that left but was excited to welcome new people, once again thankful for the many friends that I’ve been able to make here =)

Okie dokie, that’s all for now!  The ‘students’ start teaching this week, looking forward to seeing them grow.

I love you all!  Sorry for the lack of pictures, due to the internet connection I can’t post much but will definitely post them after outreach =) 

Bye for now! Au revoir!

Togo Week 1

Greetings from Lome, Togo!  I can’t believe it’s already been a week since we’ve been on outreach!  Here’s a little recap from week 1 =) 

Things were pretty busy in our last week in Muizenberg as we were trying to get everything together for outreach.  Sadly one of our team members transferred to another team making our already small team of four even smaller with just three: our leader Gerard Rabo, my friend David Lewis, and myself.  (We miss you Doreen!)  But in the end I think everything worked out for the best =)

After a tearful goodbye to Jonah and my other friends, we were off!  We were looking forward to all that God was going to do in and through us this season as we embarked for Togo.   We had a bit of an adventure at the airport in Nigeria with a delayed flight and experiencing some cultural differences in communication and time management and although it was a bit frustrating, in the end David and I recognized the blessing that it was in teaching us to be humble, to surrender our rights of doing things and to embrace the culture that we were about to enter.  We were faced with the challenge to change our way of thinking in recognizing that the way that they do things here is not wrong, it’s just different, to not to be so quick to judge but rather to see the beauty in the differences and to learn from them. 

We were happy to finally arrive in Togo and to find that everyone was so welcoming.  Togo is a beautiful country in both the surroundings and the people and their culture.  As a lover of nature I was excited to see how lush and green everything was and to see new plants and animals that I’ve never seen before!  As a lover of food, I was excited to try some new things as well, the food here is a little high in carbs but still delicious—it just means I’ll really have to practice self control and discipline myself in getting some exercise too =)   As a lover of people I’ve been so thankful for the relationships that I’ve started building.  It can always be hard to leave loved ones and friends behind but God has been so faithful to providing me with family wherever I go and I look forward to developing meaningful friendships while I’m here as well.  I’ve been trying to learn a bit of French each day too!  In the last two days I learned two sentences!

1. J’aime les chats, mais j’adore les chiens. (I like cats but I love dogs)

2. Ce matin j’ai vu beaucoup de fourmis; j’avais peur!  (I saw many ants this morning, I was scared!)

Ha, I know these aren’t very useful, but they were fun to learn nonetheless and the people here appreciate the efforts I’ve made in learning the language =)  

We got to go to a farmer’s market a couple of days ago too!  I’ve been to quite a few farmers markets in my day but never have I been to one like this before!  The streets were lined with people selling goods filled to the brim and the women were walking around carrying everything on their heads too!  I was happy to be able to buy some fruit and to find that it was rather cheap too!  We got ten oranges for about forty cents and a full hand of bananas for about seventy cents!  Yay for keeping healthy at an affordable price =) 

So all in all it’s been a great start to our outreach here in Togo.  This week we were able to start preparing the classroom and do some lesson preparation and we got to meet some of our students as well!  We begin teaching on Monday, I’m super excited!  That’s all for now, until next time, au revoir! 

It's Not About Me

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When I first came to do SBS my desire was to study the bible so that I could grow in my relationship with God and gain a deeper understanding of Him and His Word.  My last few blog updates have highlighted this personal growth, as I’ve explained how God has brought me through challenges these last nine months and has shifted my perspective in how I view Him and His Word.  As I approached the last week of SBS, I was saddened by the fact that this season was finally coming to an end.  But I was thankful for the newfound passion that I had for the bible, and for knowing that I had the rest of my life to study it.  It was just ten minutes into our last lecture that this newfound passion was challenged to the core: our speaker challenged us that if what we were walking away with at the end of these nine months was a deeper love for the bible, then we’ve completely missed the point.  That it wasn’t the bible that we were supposed to fall deeper in love with, but rather we were supposed to fall deeper in love with who the bible is about: Jesus.  Loving the bible is a good thing, but loving Jesus is better.  This challenge was exactly what I needed to hear as we finished our studies with the book of Matthew, where I was able to truly savor learning more about Jesus and the life he lived on earth as the fulfillment of God’s perfect plan.

            

After finishing SBS we had a three-day weekend to get some rest before starting the lecture phase of our Titus program, where we were going to learn how to teach everything that we had learned.  I was super excited about the opportunity that I was being given to be able to share all the goodness that I learned with others, in addition to gaining valuable teaching experience also!  As I am a teacher by profession, I was looking forward to learning some new teaching tips and honing my skills.  I showed up to class super excited to start, and low and behold within the first ten minutes my intentions were once again being challenged as our speaker told us, “If you’re here to become a better teacher, then you have come for the wrong reason.  Titus is not about becoming a better teacher; it’s about meeting the needs of the people. This is not about you, it’s about equipping others with tools to study the word of God so that they too can be transformed.” I instantly felt a deep conviction in my heart as I realized once again that I was making things all about me.  I realized that although SBS had been an amazing season where I was able to grow in my relationship with God, and that Titus was a privilege to be equipped with the skills to teach others, at the end of the day, it wasn’t about me at all!  Rather it’s about Jesus!   

The next morning I took some time to meditate on the things that God had shown me. As I was reading the bible God brought deeper understanding of the purpose he had for me, and what I was to do with all that he had given me.  As I was reading through the book of First Peter, I came across a verse which read, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.”  (1 Peter 4:10-11).  I was reminded that everything that I have: from the things that I own, to my time, and my gifting as a teacher, all are from God, and at the end of the day I am just a steward of God’s grace.  I realized that God has given me the privilege to have these things, and that it’s up to me to decide how I’m going to use them: to benefit MYSELF in order that I might be glorified, or to be used by God to equip others for HIS glory. 

           

I’m thankful that God has shown me this as I prepare for outreach.  I’ve been privileged with the opportunity to pioneer a Titus project in Togo, as well as to go throughout churches in Togo and Burkina Faso to equip believers with tools that they need to be able to effectively study God's Word and bring truth to others.  All together the cost for the outreach including the airplane ticket, accommodations, meals, vaccinations, etc. amount to almost $2,000.  If you are interested in partnering with me in this opportunity, you’re welcome to make a donation using the PayPal link below.  As always prayer is appreciated, for myself as well as my fellow classmates as we finish off the lecture phase of Titus and prepare to go on outreach. 

           

If you’d like to know more about Titus or about the places that we’ll be visiting feel free to email me at: sunny_d3_85@yahoo.com.  Thank you once again for all of your support. 

Much love, Leslie =)

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