States Bound

We will be taking our grand daughter home at the end of this week. She has been bored with us most of the time, but we have loved having her here. We will be spending a month in the states on vacation. If you are around Hanford, CA on Aug 1st, come hear Lee give a presentation about our missionary work in the Marshall Islands at the PM service at the Hanford church of Christ.

Rip Roaring Time

This past week we received a box of flip flops the 6th grade class in VBS from the Walnut C of C in Texarkana, TX decorated for the kids at church. Walnut has been a huge blessing for the Marshallese kids at church for almost a year. What a great bunch of Christians to help some people half way across the world. The kids were thrilled to get a new pair of shoes. Thank you also to the Shiloh C of C from AL. for school supplies. Shiloh is a small congregation with a huge heart. Part of the supplies are still on the way but we are expecting those to come in soon. We had to meet in the "small" classroom again this week. It was so crowded and we were so pressed for time while we were passing everything out, I did not get pics of everything I needed. We had to leave to catch the ferry before everything was handed out. I am sorry about that. I tried. Our members held an honor celebration for our grand daughter after church. They sang to her and gave her many gifts. She said she felt like a princess. We then had a fellowship together and ate some food the members had brought. Thank you to the Marshallese people who have made Lee and I as well as our grand daughter so welcome. They are a very loving people. I have told you many times that you must be flexible over here. Every Sunday is a new adventure. This week Lee was hauling several boxes to church to give to the kids. He bent over to pick up one end of the dolly he used to carry the boxes and RRRIP. His whole backside was hanging out. Because of a bad back, I carry a cushion to sit on. He hung the cushion on his belt to cover his air conditioned bottom up. Thankfully, there was a store open with some Levi's that fit him. I had never seen a pair of Levi's in that store before. Julianna and I were LOL. Everyone in that store knew he was in there with a cushion hanging off his backside. They were probably thanking God for that cushion. I know Lee was.

Flexible

If we have learned anything since we have been in the Marshall Islands it is you MUST be flexible. We were locked out of the school room we have been meeting in....again. We ended up in another school room one of our members aunt teaches in. Things can change on a dime here. We have some great members who have followed us all over the place. I think we lost some of our crowd by changing rooms, but we did what we had to do and got all the lessons done.

Busy 4th of July

When you don't have the luxury of a nursery at church, you make do with a cardboard box to lay your baby. The baby, Tommy, will be one year old this month. How time flies. Our granddaughter, Julianna, has made several friends at church. The local kids have not seen a red head, fare skinned girl before so we get several double takes while walking down the street. After going to church, Julianna get to shop, play games, swim and watch some fireworks. It was a busy but very blessed day.

Flexibility Required

Julianna, our granddaughter, made it to Kwaj on Sat. She has several firsts already. First outdoors movie theater, first ferry ride, first worship with the Marshallese people. We had an hour and half delay getting into the school room. We were sitting on the steps of the hallway in the middle of the 2 story building waiting for the key. We started singing songs with the kids & it carried into the street, where there was a fence around the building.

People (mostly kids) started collecting outside the fence listening to the singing. Pretty soon we had as many kids outside the fence on the street as we did on the steps singing songs. The key to the room was finally located and we invited everyone to join us. Julianna was amazed how easy it was to attract the kids by singing Bible songs on the steps of the building. It always amazes me when the Lord turns a negative situation into a positive blessing for everyone. It has happened more times than I can count since we have been here.

Peterson preached the sermon again this morning. We could not understand him, but you could tell he was better at his delivery. But best of all, he has a love for the Lord and a desire to spread God's word. Lee presented a DVD player to Peterson from Paul Hester who sent the player as a tool for Peterson to listen to sermons on DVD to learn about God's word. Peterson was so proud of it he turned around and told the church crowd about it in Marshallese. God is Great!