Ebeye Church Location Change

This is four of the six guys who took their first preaching school test.  We don't know the results yet, but I think it is safe to say, some will pass, some will fail. All will learn more about God's word if they stick with it and study hard.

God is good, God is great!  We now are meeting on Ebeye at the Community Center every Sunday morning. The heat of the afternoon was too hard on everyone. The building is open on both sides and there is usually a breeze, plus we have plenty of room to grow. We have needed this move for a long time. The Ebeye City Hall gave us a great monthly rate too. Lee and I are going to be going to Ebeye one week and Gugeegue the next.  Our Marshallese brothers will be preaching at the church's when we are gone.
To God be the glory! Praise be HIS Name!

Government Blankets

The preaching students studying during class.

I would like to tell you that we are getting all the help in the world from the US Army in getting the students onto the base to learn to preach God’s word.  Unfortunately, I am ashamed to say about my government, that would not be the truth.  They have now created a NEW blanket regulation to keep the class from happening in our home on Kwajalein. I bet if it was a Muslim class they would have broken their necks to accommodate.

 

We are going to meet at the church building on Gugeegue while we work on getting over the multi government hurdles. Meeting on Gugeegue has its own set of hurdles for the guys as well as costing us $120 per week for the taxi rides to Gugeegue.  God never promised us cheap or easy. To God be the glory!

For now we are meeting in a private home for church on Ebeye.

Learning God's Word

 These are all our preaching school students.  They are showing up for every class. There are two more weeks on their first unit, then they take their first test. We intend for all six to succeed.

Lee preaches every other week at Gugeegue and Ebeye. Ramey preaches at Gugeegue the next week and Peterson at Ebeye. Our goal is for both churches to be independent churches with many Marshallese preachers to spread God's word.  God's will be done.

Half Way Through the First Unit

Our Bible students are doing well.  It is hard to tell when you are dealing with two languages if the students are actually understanding what is being said or not. We are about ½ way through our first unit. We will see exactly how well they are doing when we take our first test in about 4 weeks.

We still have not gotten the younger boy onto Kwaj.  He has been keeping up by watching the DVD at his home. Every week we are told a different story, every week he comes to the dock and they will not let him on.  This week his mother is coming with him, but I’m not counting my chickens until they actually let them on the island.  Even if he gets on this week, we are still not set up the way we need to be. We will keep fighting until we get things set up right. The US government has enough red tape to choke everyone to death. Surprise, surprise!

Lee and I used to think that the weeks went by fast on Kwaj.  They really fly by fast with the students coming over twice a week. We meet at 5pm, I feed them, we watch the DVD for class, Lee explains anything he feels they may not understand and we try to get them back on the ferry ASAP because one of the guys has to ride a bicycle from Ebeye to Gugeegue.

Run Around

We are trying to get our preaching school students over to our house twice a week.  We are dealing with the US government, they NEVER make it easy.  Lee chased after a mysterious permission form to get, Erick, the 15 yr old above onto Kwaj. for classes.  After Lee spent days trying to find someone who knew about the form, he ran out of time and gained more things to get done at work.  It was pouring out most of Saturday, but I finally found someone who knew the answer to our mystery.  If they do not throw us any more curve balls, we may have everything set up for now.  Nothing ever stays the same with the government.  Some smarty britches will come along and decide to change everything. Pray for all 6 of the future preachers.

Lee is on Ebeye trying to get our stuff out of the kindergarten class room.  The Ebeye school is starting this week and they have not let us back into the room since they locked us out.  The place we are meeting right now is someones  house.  It is really hot in there and there is no chance for A/C.  I ordered a high capacity fan and there are a few 'last mile' fans.  Lee is going to see if he can fix an electrical plug in that room that is not working this afternoon while on Ebeye.

It always amazes me how creative people can be when you can't afford what you need.  I saw a toilet that had a toilet brush (that you clean with) as the float in the tank.  Nothing in the tank was the usual bowl innards.  It was totally rigged, but it worked. Hooray for ingenuity.

Blessings to all.  Keep us in your prayers.