Burkina Journal

Wednesday. March 25
It is church time back in the United States. Here Burkina Faso it is 12:30 Thursday morning. What a start to a mission trip this has been. Corrinn hurt her ankle the day I left. Christa played in a soccer playoff game the day after I left. Add to this the lost luggage and things are just compounded. Our interpreter, Oumarou, is new and just learning his way. Now for the bad news, I am sitting under a shed (For David, Tami and others who know I am at the building where the tailor works) across the street from our property. Darrell and Oumarou have gone to the church to sleep because we are in the middle of a rare March rain storm. We cannot just leave our things and go to the church so I volunteered to stay and play guard during the storm. I cannot see our things when I am here so I sit at the hill for about two hours and then I come back here to dry off. This may sound hard to believe, but I was getting cold! Sitting in the rain for two hours can do that to you even in West Africa. I saw lightening earlier in the evening and asked Issa, pastor who works with the village while we are away, if that was rain. He said it doesn’t rain in March. Just to be safe, I covered the equipment with a tarp. Glad we did that since our tent was one of the pieces of lost luggage. That means that everything is completely exposed.  I continued my pattern of guard and dry until the lightening got to close. Then I went to the shed for an hour or so and would go back and check. I will ride out the storm and catch some sleep later.

I don’t know what the Lord is trying to teach me, but I hope I learn it soon. To be quite honest I am a little frustrated by this. I travel 6000 miles from home to tell Burkinabe about Jesus, sleep outside to draw more attention so more will come hear the message and it rains. When I saw the clouds and lightening earlier in the evening I began praying that it would not rain. I prayed as it began to sprinkle that it would not rain hard. I prayed that it would be short when it began to rain hard. It rained hard all night. As I watched it rain and saw the lightening pop, I asked God what He was doing. I told Him I didn’t like it. I was wet, sometimes cold, tired and wanted to go to sleep. Nevertheless it continued to rain. How could this teach me? There has to be a lesson to learn, but at this point I wasn’t really concerned about the lesson. I just wanted it to stop raining.

It is so dark here when it rains. No electricity makes for complete darkness when the clouds hide the stars. So here I am listening to rain and watching the occasional lightening strike. What in the world is happening?

Thursday. March 26
As I walked around this afternoon, I was I was very pleased will how cool it was today. Yesterday it was 105 degrees. Today is mild to high 80s maybe 90, but that is good compared to yesterday. Currently, we only have one interpreter so I took off on my own to prayer walk through the village. I am getting more and more familiar with the villagers and the reciprocal is true. I have learned to greet them in Jula during the different parts of the day. That may not sound like much, but in Burkina Faso villages a greeting is much more than “Good morning” or “How are you?” You greet them according to the time of day and might ask how they rested. That is followed by asking about their family. You then ask them about themselves. At the same time they are following their response with the same question to you. You finish with a thank you for asking. All of that just to say hello.

Friday. March 27
In my Conversation with Samuel he told me many things.

Here are few:

Many people come to Samuel in secret to discuss Jesus and listen to the CD’s we leave for them. He told me that he played the CD’s often until the batteries ran out on the player. Adama (far left in the picture below) wants to accept Christ but his parents are obstacles. They are Muslim and so do not approve of him being “a believer” as Christians are known in this village. Moumouni (in the gold shirt), the chief’s nephew, is very close to accepting Christ, but not yet ready. Moumouni is a very influential man in the village and I feel he would be a great asset to the Kingdom work in Badara. Many men listen to what he says and I believe his uncle will pass the responsibility of being the chief to him when the time comes.

In the picture below, Darrell is teaching a group of girls a song.

They are singing songs that have motions and then he is going through the creation to Christ story. They really enjoy singing with him.

Boukary, an additional interpreter with a heart for evangelism, will be here today shortly after 11:00am. He will be bringing the rest of our luggage with him. Tonight we will have a tent to sleep in if it rains. He also will have all the t-shirts that we plan to “sell” in the market on Sunday. We sell them for about $1.00. Giving them away creates jealousy, so we “sell” them to prevent that. All the money is given to the school to help with thier garden project.

Later that day, I started to the well to draw water. I only made it across the street before a young boy came and took the empty bucket from me. He carried it the rest of the way to the well. After drawing the water I started back to the hill. The bucket was too heavy for the boy. I began to carry it. I made it only 100 yards before Lati

took the bucket from me. She put it on her head and carried it the rest of way. Needless to say we had more water left in bucket upon arrival than if I had carried it. She did not spill one drop! It is a difficult part of the culture to let the women and children do things like this, but that is not “man’s work” so someone almost always comes and takes it from me.

Once again I thought of the relative coolness of the weather. Even after the journey to the well it was not unbearable. You have probably already realized this, but I am little dense sometime. The rain! It was not some mean God testing my faith; it was a blessing of cooler weather for those of us who are not ready for heat. I am so glad God does not always give us what we ask for but rather He gives us what we need. One sleepless night was well worth the effort for temperatures 20 degrees below normal for a couple of days.

Boukary arrived this afternoon. What a blessing! He brought the lost luggage with him. We set up the tent. It is great!

Ouattara Tcheiba stopped by because we were putting up our tent. He wanted to know why were there. We told him we were there to tell the message of Jesus. We told him to come back in the evening and we would talk to him about Jesus in much more detail.

I went to the village soccer game. I shot some Video and took some pictures. As in most places other than the USA, they take their soccer very serious.

After the game most of the players come by to look at the video on the camera screen.  I told them to come back Tuesday that we were trying to get a projection system. We will also show the Jesus film in that night.

Tcheiba came back this evening and participated in our discussion. After our discussion he prayed to receive Christ. Sweet!

Samuel sopped by late tonight to bring the CD’s. It has been a very good day.

Saturday. March 28
We went to meet the chief of the other Badara Sambla Village. They are much more traditional than the first Sambla village chief we have been working with. After the formalities of presenting ourselves, they asked our reason for coming. We told them our reason for coming was teach the people the good news of Jesus Christ. The chief and several other elders discussed among themselves whether or not they would listen to the message. Their decision was that they would not listen to my message at that time. They did say they would come to the hill at a later time and then possibly listen to our message. I shared with them again that we are here to tell them TRUTH of Jesus. I told them that they I could see they have lived many years, seen many things and that there was much wisdom sitting on the bench. I told them since they were so wise, I was confident they will welcome the truth when they hear it.

We had chicken for lunch. Here you see the chicken tied up until we were ready to “process” him.

It was a gift from Moumouni’s mom. It was first meat we had in four days. It is a pretty big gift for us to receive a chicken since they rarely eat meat. It shows that we are making progress with the people in the village.

It is a strange evening as very few people came to the hill to talk this evening. Children are even scarce. This evening the only person who showed up is Tcheiba. He said he just had time to stop by and say ‘’Hello.” We spoke with him for about 1.5 hours. That is ‘’Hello” in Africa I Suppose. He ate supper with us and then left. We also found out that Burkina Faso was playing Guinea in a African Cup soccer match. Everyone was glued to the radio to listen to them game.

Later that night a believer stopped by and Darrell spent some time encouraging him and gave him a Jula Bible.

Sunday. March 29
Awoke at 2:00am and decided to work on my sermon for church later this morning. I moved to the tent since all of us had been sleeping outside. It is much cooler outside. But I do not want to disturb the others, therefore the move to the hot tent.

Samuel’s wife prepared Guinea for us this morning.

It was good. Yes that is the head you see in the picture.

Church began a little before 9:00am. Tcheiba was one of the first to arrive. Of course we were asked to sing. I delegated this to Darrell. He sang God is Bigger Than Any Problem. He did a great job.

Check out the church nursery. The kids just lay down on the concrete floor behind the women and go to sleep. By the way, men sit on one side and ladies on the other.

We sang for 45 minutes. Then all first time Visitors were asked to tell their name and why they are here.

I preached from Daniel 3. It was the best interpreted service I have ever been a part of. The Lord really used it in the lives of the people. 

After church we went to the market to sell shirts. All I can say is Julian is the man. He could make a fortune as a salesman in the US.

He sold all the shirts in less than 30 minutes. He works with a “hard close” approach and the people love him for it. We bought coffee for Darrell and then went to find a coke. Since it was market day, they had ice. What a treat! A drink that was cooler than the temperature of the room.

Another blessing of market day is fresh salad. Suzanne prepared that for us as dinner tonight. Market day is the only day we can have fresh salad. It was a welcome relief from pasta and rice.

This afternoon (morning in Lufkin) I called Southside during the worship service. After speaking to them for a few minutes they sang “Happy Birthday” since today is number 47. Then I began to pray for the church. At this point, I became overwhelmed with emotion. Those who know me know that I very seldom (understatement) cry. But when I considered the faithfulness of God, of the people of Southside, and where God has brought me in my life, I could not control it. My Family of Faith allows me to be 6,000 miles away from them for weeks at a time for the cause of Christ and cover all the expenses for me to do so.  Never before in my 47 Years have been so overcome with emotion that I could not control my crying. I could not stop! God is too much! You can still say that in 15 years you have never seen me cry, but you cannot say that you have not heard me cry!

We began using the CD’s tonight. We had people come and go for hours. Never a big crowd but a steady stream with 6-10 people at a time. Moumouni came and stayed for a while and we had a good discussion.

We spent about six hours this evening talking to seekers and new believers. They ask very interesting questions and are genuinely interested in learning more. Everyone left around 9:45.

It is 10:00 pm and I am in lying in my bed net. The sky is beautiful but I still have yet to see the magnificent African sky I have seen before. There are stars, but not as many as on a clear night. I hope I get to see the clear African sky before I leave.

Monday. March 30
Very comfortable night for sleeping. Slept as well as possible for an old fat man sleeping on the ground in a small bed net.

We waited all morning for Pastor Issa. We had scheduled to leave the hill at 10:00am. He came to the hill around 12:30 to tell us it was time to eat. We were planning to visit new believers all day, but did nothing a until 3:00pm. After lunch most people sit under a tree or in their home due to the heat of the afternoon so we waited until after 3:00 to start our visiting. We visited a couple of houses of the new believers from the last trip. We bought a shower(grass fence) and a Chicken (live) for supper. We purchased the chicken fairly early in our walk, so I carried the chicken some of the way and we even named him. One of our translators, Oumarou, carried the chicken most of the way. He carried the chicken in his arms the way we would hold a puppy, so we named the chicken Oumarou Du (two). Hope I don’t mourn the loss of my new African friend when he becomes supper later this evening.

People began to arrive around 6:00. We listened to Matthew for a while and asked if there were any questions. The topic moved to the Ten Commandments. After going through some of the commandments I pointed out that none of us could live up to the Ten Commandments, let alone all the laws that God had given us through Moses. I explained to them that is why Jesus had to come and die as a sacrifice for our inability to keep the law of God. Many question arise from the Old Testament due to the Muslim influence in the country. My goal is to show that everything in the Old Testament points us to Jesus. We had questions on the Virgin birth, the temptation of Jesus, hating your father and mother, and how to give up Animism. The Animism question was one of my favorites. A man said he wanted to be a believer but felt an obligation to the people who depended on him for answers through the animal sacrifices. This man was not at the discussion but was talking to those who came. This was an easy answer as there were new believers in attendance who had given up being a drunkard, or an adulterer, or a Muslim. I explained that we all have to give up everything. That is what Christianity is all about. It is absolute submission to the will of God through Jesus Christ. I told them I don’t really think this has to do with concern for those who are coming for answers. It probably has more to do with concern for the witch doctor’s pocketbook, as he gets paid for the sacrifice in addition to keeping the animal. After about two hours I stopped the discussion of the Bible. We had covered enough for the new believers in one night. I told our guests they could stay and most of them did. It is around 10:00pm. Around 11:00 all the men begin to “ask for the road.” One by one they come by to shake my hand and ask permission to leave, which is the custom here. They speak to me in Jula as the pass by and so I just give them the blessing of the road. As a man named Bicaba Dieudonne passes by and speaks to me, my interpreter Julian’s eyes light up. I give Bicaba the road but Julian says, “No, Pastor. Bicaba just said ‘Thank you for the discussion tonight. I really enjoyed. As a result, I have decided to become a believer.’” How incredible is God—or in the words of one our Burkinbe friends, Emmanuel, “God is too much.” We will pick up the discussion again tomorrow.

Our supper has ready since 6:00pm, but we have not enough for our guests so we are waiting for them to leave before we eat. It is around 11:00 when I am the first to use our new “Shower.” Afterward we eat Supper and got to bed around 11:30.

Tuesday.  March 31
All at us are sleeping outside due to the heat. It begins to rain about 1:30am so Julian, Oumarou and I pack everything up cover it with a tarp and move our bed nets into the tent. Darrell rides out the rain which is short lived.

Around 7:00am the builder came to meet with me. We settled on 400,000cfa for the labor to build the building that will house our teams when they come. We are using the same plan that Bartlett Baptist Used in another village. It works very well for them and will serve nicely as a church later down the road.

Darrell was given his African name today it is “Tu Babu” which simply means “the white man.” It came as a result of the interpreters calling him “the mean white man” based on the way he adds to or corrects everything someone says. My African name has not changed. It is still “Bande Tege” which means “chief aggrevator.” I now have a good enough relationship with the Sambla chief that I can pick at him. I love to see him laugh!

Around 10:00 am we set off to go visit people of the village and invite them to the movie tonight. Many people welcomed the invitation to see the movie, as this is very novel to them. We plan to show portions of a local soccer game that I videoed yesterday and then show the Jesus Film in the Jula language. After visiting the people with us, Samuel began “mowing” our property.

This consisted of him bending over at the waist and swinging a machete parallel to the ground. It is 105 degrees. Darrell and I “helped” as he cleared brush and grass in preparation for the movie tonight. I think we were more in his way than we were a help.

3:00pm and no word on the movie. 4:00 and still nothing. 5:00 and we had not heard from the man bringing the equipment and the movie. At 5:30 we call him and he says he is on the road from Bobo-Dioulasso which is around 45 minutes from Badara. 6:30 comes and we have not seen him. 7:00 is movie time, but this Africa time so we are not really concerned. We called him at 6:45 and found out his car has broken down between Bobo and Badara therefore we will not be able to show the movie tonight. I was disappointed, but also believe that God knows what is best so I trust Him in this situation to make the showing better tomorrow. I regret that I will not be there as I will be leaving the village early tomorrow morning.

We set up the CD player and played more from Matthew. At one point there were 23 men sitting and listening to the Bible. After each chapter Darrell pauses the CD and asks if there are any questions and many times there are. Most questions relate to the chapter we just heard. For example, after listening to Matthew 10 the question was asked about hating our mother and father. In chapter 12, a new believer named Tcheiba asked “What kind of fish can swallow a man.” A question that is very pertinent for the most educated believer, but especially real to the man who has never seen a whale.

Even though Darrell is a little older than me, I look older to them because of my gray hair and so most of the questions are directed to me. Tonight I slipped off to give Darrell a chance to establish himself with the men. He knew I was still listening and that he could call on me, but he did a good job and only few even noticed that I was gone. One of the men questioned me later about being gone.

Wednesday, April 1
We started the day with the usual—Julian making tea, Oumarou checking with his girlfriend, Darrell and reading and praying. I packed for the bus and headed to the road to wait. There is no bus station. You stand on the side of the road and flag down the bus you want to get on. They stop, pack your luggage, pick you up and you are on your way. My flight does no depart until tomorrow at 8:00pm, but the risk of missing the flight is great if you try to leave Badara on the day of the flight. Besides I am to meet with Emmanuel’s family when I get to Ouagadougou. The bus leaves Oradara at 8:00am and should be through Badara around 8:25. 8:30; no bus arrives. 8:45, 9:00, 9:15 and 9:30; no bus. It takes about an hour to get to Bobo-Dioulasso by bus, but really depends on the number of stops the bus makes to pick up people. I really needed to catch the 10:00am bus from Bobo to Ouaga because the next bus does not leave until 2:00pm. The bus comes to Badara around 9:45 and Julien and I jump on head to Bobo. We arrived at 10:40. Now we have over three hours to sit and wait on the next bus to Ouaga.

While we were in Badara waiting on the bus, many were there to see me off.

The chief came, Moumouni, Pastor Issa, Darrell and Oumarou were all there. Others came and brought drinks as we waited. Specifically the brought a “tea espresso” is the best way to describe it. It is a VERY STRONG VERY SWEET shot of hot tea. By 9:00am it is already very hot, so I declined. Not ready for hot tea when it is 90 degrees, but most people gladly received it. I like the drink, just would rather have at night in January when it is 60 degrees. I have everything I need to make this tea it at home, so if you are interested, I will be glad to make it for you.

I was talking with Oumarou the youngest of our interpreters and asked him what his plan and or his dream for his life was. Then something unusual happened. He turned and asked me about my dream. The way he said it was what was amazing. I am often asked about my dream for Southside or my dream for reaching the world with the Gospel through Southside, but he phrased his question this way. “Pastor, what is your personal dream? Not your dream for your church or your home, but your dream for you.” I must admit, I was a bit taken back by that. It has been a long time since anyone has asked me such a thing. I am a late middle aged man. I am the pastor of a church. All my dreams should center around that shouldn’t they? I thanked him for asking such a question and told him the dream for my life that started decades ago. My dream is to be remembered as a man who loved and lived for the One True God through Jesus Christ. Sometimes hearing words that come out of you own mouth are impacting. That is what I have always dreamed, but have not verbalized that in quite a while. I think the thing that blessed me the most was Oumarou expressing the thought that he felt I was living out my dream.

We rode the bus all day and arrived in Ouagadougou around 6:30, caught a taxi to the Baptist Guest House and bedded down for the night. A cold Coke on a hot night; sometimes it is the simple things we miss most. It was so good. I think I will have another. OK, three is limit! But they were good!

Thursday, April 02, 2009
Left for Emmanuel’s family home. We arrived around 10:00am. They were preparing lunch for us. The father was not home so I sat with my interpreter for about three hours while they prepared lunch. We ate lunch, I prayed a pray of blessing over the home and prepared to leave. They presented me with a gift of a traditional suit of clothing for an African man. I will have to wear it to church one day.

Came back to the guest house to pack for the plane ride home and to work on editing this post.