LAST DAY IN LUSAKA

Today is our last full day in Lusaka. I have so much to share and so many deep emotions I hardly know what to write this morning. However, I will start by saying thank you for your prayers and support. Africans have an expression - "GOD IS GOOD - ALL THE TIME. ALL THE TIME - GOD IS GOOD! In the bemba dialect they say leza muzuma. This has been true for us this week. God has been good. And though a few have been wrestling respiratory ailments, sore muscles, stiff backs and shoulders, we have been protected and blessed. While our hearts continue to be with family and friends, there wi.ll always be a part of us that remains in Zambia - the faces and names of children at the school who soak up love like sponges, the teachers at the school who serve without pay - just a bowl of nsima and boiled kale. I will be forever bonded with some of the pastors who attended the two day training conference I co-led with my friend Karl Teichert from OC Africa. Some of those men and women travelled over 350 kilometers (200 miles) and many of them walked from other locations in Lusaka just to be there. They were so hungry for fellowship and encouragement and training. They, like the teachers at Healing Place often serve their congregations sacrificially with no pay. I was honored to be among them and humbled that they felt I had something to teach them. I felt they have taught me more and I will always be grateful, They have asked that Karl and I return in May to do a follow-up conference. That is one to pray about. Today we will work most of the day laying block for the walls of the classroom and toilet building. Then we will bid sad farewells to the teachers, exchange some parting gifts, pray with the teacher, workers and children then return to our lodge to pack up for our long bus trip to Livingstone and Victoria Falls tomorrow morning. As a thank you to Pastor John and Thenny Mpanga, we are bringing them with us for a well-deserved vacation and rest. Our long time friends Chimwemwe and George Banda will also be with us. From past experience, the resort at Victoria Falls will be an extreme dichotomy to the poverty and need we have encountered in the Kabanana District. On Saturday we will fly to Johannesburg where we will spend 4 days visiting and ministering with the Teicherts and the Witherows in Finetown - the township where our 2010 team went and worked with pre-schools and AIDS hospice patients. When we return to Enumclaw, our hearts and minds will be full to overflowing with gratitude for our experiences here; the people we have met; and the ways our hearts have been touched. "Once Africa gets into you, it will never leave." That expression is so true, Our hearts will always hold the orphans, the teachers, the pastors, and the people who gather every day at the pump to get water. I have been blessed as have all our team. We realize we will never be able to replicate what we have experienced by showing our pictures or telling our stories. Prayerfully our lives will reflect the profound and life-changing things that we have lived the last week and a half. This morning's devotional was based on Philippians 4:13 which says "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." We depend on that, May you also realize the truth of that Scripture. Until the next post, I am grateful and relying on God's Grace Fred