Light of Togo

In the last post, I mentioned that I’d be preaching a couple times this week.  Thanks to all of you who were praying for this.  I really believe that God worked in a great way through both of these opportunities.  I, of course, can take zero credit for anything that God does.  He simply used His Word like He has promised to do, and He just happened to use me in the process.  It’s incredibly humbling that God would ever use somebody like me, and I give Him all the praise and glory for it.

I’ll hopefully be able to post the audio from Wednesday night’s sermon if I can get it from the sound ministry at church tomorrow.

Only 3 days to go!  We’ll be writing one last blog post before leaving Tuesday, and we’ll give you some details about the trip.

A few weeks ago, a friend of ours at church told us about his boss at work and about a unique donation that he had given to help missions work.  He works at Cutco, which is a very large knife and kitchen utensil maker.  His boss had heard about remote villages where the people spend countless hours peeling their potatoes and other vegetables with whatever tools they have available, which is usually just a very dull knife.  So, he donated a bunch of Cutco potato peelers to help some remote villages, in South America if I remember correctly.  Anyhow, they had a huge impact on the daily lives of these people.  They were able to peel and cut their potatoes in a fraction of the time it used to take, which freed them up to do many other important tasks around the village.

So after Eric finished telling me this, he said that he wanted to do the same thing for us in Togo.  Eventually, he was able to get 50 potato peelers which he gave to us to take over there and give to people in a remote village somewhere.

OK, so maybe potato peelers doesn’t sound to you like a profound way to do missions work, but as Eric and I talked it was very encouraging to me to see how he had thought through the implications of what a simple potato peeler can do.  He said, “You know, if these potato peelers can make a difference in some people’s everyday lives, that just might be the one thing that opens a door for you to talk to them about Jesus and what He’s done for them, and that is what it’s all about.”  I smiled and said, “You’re exactly right!  It’s all about Jesus Christ being glorified in all the world.  God is seeking people to know Him and worship Him in Togo, and if He can use potato peelers in the process, then He will.”

See, many times our problem is that we “compartmentalize” our lives into the “spiritual” and “non-spiritual” or “secular” categories.  But in reality, as a Christian, every part of your life belongs to God, and He desires that you glorify Him with all of it, not just the “churchy” parts.  What are the everyday, “non-spiritual” things in your life in which you could be glorifying Christ?

We are always amazed to see the unique ways that God provides things as we’re headed to Togo.  Last night we saw this happen again.

In my last blog post I mentioned the problem we are having with getting our appliances for Togo.  What I failed to mention is that it’s going to cost a lot more than we were first expecting.  We mentioned the whole situation as a prayer request in our Sunday School class yesterday morning.  What we didn’t know is that God had already been preparing to provide for the financial part of this need.

Last night at church, some good friends of ours pulled us aside and told us how they had been thinking for a couple months about doing something out of the ordinary to be a blessing to some missionaries.  They really didn’t know the who or how or what yet, but they just knew that God wanted them to do something. One day, the wife really prayed and asked God to show them what they should do.  The very next day, they were notified by their insurance company that they had been over charged a long time ago for some medical bills and that they would be receiving a $300 reimbursement.  Then yesterday when we mentioned the appliances, they knew that this was where God wanted them to direct their blessing.

They were such an encouragement to us as they told us that we were the first missionary family that they have known personally, and that it was a great example for their kids to see that we are just a normal family like them who God chose to go to the mission field.  Now, I don’t know that I would define myself as “normal,” but I think I know what he means.  Many people have the idea that missionaries are some kind of mutant species from another planet and God only calls them to serve Him, but the fact is that we are real people and God has just happened to choose and call us to be a part of His work in another part of the world.  It’s not because we are any more special or different than any other family at church, it’s just that God told us to go and we said yes.

OK, sorry for the rabbit trail.  Anyhow, they were such a blessing to us and we thank God for their friendship, their generosity, and for their willingness to follow God’s leading in their lives.

We just can’t help but give all the glory to God for His goodness to us.  We don’t deserve a bit of what He does in our lives, but we know that He does it because we are His children and He loves us.  It’s our responsibility to simply be content with whatever God gives us, whether poverty or riches, health or sickness, trials or victories, because we know that through all of it He is seeking to bring glory to Jesus Christ through our lives!

Anyone who’s ever been to Africa, or most any other third world country, will tell you that the country moves at its own speed and operates by its own rules.  There’s nothing you can do to change it or speed it up.  You either adjust or get an ulcer.  I know that one thing that will be difficult for me to adjust to is the customer service in Togo, or should I say the lack thereof.

So, over the past couple years whenever Tiffany and I have experienced terrible customer service, we simply tell ourselves, “Well, this must be God’s way of preparing us for Togo.”  We are in the middle of one of these kinds of experiences right now.

Almost three weeks ago we ordered all of our 220 volt appliances from a certain website that was a trusted and well-reviewed appliance dealer.  With us, however, they didn’t live up to their good reputation.  To make a long story short, they are phasing out of selling 220 volt appliances and have not updated their website in order to indicate that, so just about everything we ordered is no longer in stock.  Rather than notify me of this, they just canceled the order.  About 10 days passed before I figured out what was going on, which puts us in “rush mode” to get some appliances ordered.  We are now going through a supplier that is used by our shipping company, and should hopefully have the order completed on Monday.  Please just pray that they will arrive in enough time for them to get loaded into the overseas container.

We’re just taking this opportunity to say thanks to God again for another session of Togo training!

Click here to download a printable PDF copy of this letter: Dec ‘08

Fifty-three days and counting!  Over the past few weeks since you last heard from us, we have been incredibly busy in our preparation for heading to Togo on February 3rd.  God is providing in so many unexpected ways, and we give Him all the glory for it.  We discovered shortly after getting to Oregon that our home church, Greater Portland Baptist Church, was going to give their Thanksgiving offering in order to help out with some of the costs involved with the shipping and set-up in Togo.  We just found out the other day that over $7,000 was given!  We can do nothing but give God all the praise for moving the hearts of His people to do this.

Even though we are extremely busy right now with all the packing and logistics involved in our move, God is giving us some great opportunities to serve Him at the same time.  Last night Tiffany and I were able to go with a group from our church into a maximum security juvenile detention center where we had a special Christmas party for the men there and gave them Christmas stockings filled with gifts, including a Bible.  At the end of the party, the gospel was presented and several people believed on Christ and were saved.  It was a great privilege to be a part of what God did there.  Please continue to pray for these guys as they will be discipled in the coming months.  Also, please pray for me as I will be preaching at the Portland Rescue Mission on the 15th of this month.  My desire is to present the gospel as clearly as possible straight from the Bible.  I’ll be speaking from Romans chapter three.

We are working on finalizing all of the details with our shipping company, so pray for wisdom in that as well.  We have a LOT of packing to do in the next 10 days or so, so if you don’t hear from us for a while it’s probably because we have collapsed from exhaustion!

Thank you again for praying for our big move, and for supporting us through it!  You are such a blessing to us.

Last night we had a special Thanksgiving service at our home church.  We did not know until just a week ago that the church had been planning to donate their annual Thanksgiving offering to help with the cost of our Togo departure.  We were extremely surprised but elated to see God once again using His people to help get us to Togo.  We have no idea yet how much the offering is, but whether it is $100 or $100,000 we are giving God thanks and praise for His provision in our lives.  And we thank God for our church being willing to help out in this way.

Our pastor asked me to give a testimony about our lives and how God has brought us to where we are right now.  The main point that I tried to get across was that God’s goodness in our lives is not what makes Him worthy of praise and thanksgiving.  God is worthy of glory and our adoration whether we live in poverty or riches.  Many times, I have found myself being more thankful for the “stuff” than the Giver of the stuff.  God has really been teaching me that I need to detatch my heart from “things” that it can be attached only and completely to Him.  That’s a hard lesson for a materialistic American like myself to learn!  But it is an absolutely necessary lesson in the life of every Christian.  If we are to seek God, we must come to the point where we are content with Him and Him only, where He is the soul possession of our heart.  God has blessed us with so many “things” to have, but He alone is to be our heart’s sole possession.  The greatest way to show thanks to our Creator and Provider is to abandon our desire for things, and to seek and pursue only Him.