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About 4 months ago we planned to have a women's meeting here in Chongwe for the whole association. This meeting would be to teach the women health type issues. As we were planning it the leaders in this association said we should only plan for about 30 women. This is about how many have been coming to their meetings. Well, when we went last Monday to start the meeting there were 62 women there representing 12 different churches. Praise God!! We were all so excited and our faith was increased. We had 3 nurses that taught on HIV/AIDS, Family Planning, Nutrition, Women issues, First Aid, Hygiene and Traditional beliefs vs. Biblical beliefs. We also had an eye clinic and many received reading glasses. Also, there were several questions about Blood pressure so Helen Neely (a fellow missionary) brought her equipment the next day and took most everyone's blood pressure. The women learned many new things and will hopefully carry back this information back to their churches and share with the others. Another volunteer Helen Owen came and shared from God's Word about what it meant to be a Virtuous woman from Proverbs 31 and then later shared the story about Rahab.
The two day meeting went by quickly and was enjoyed by all. Since this time I
have heard many make comments about how much they learned during this time.
Thank you for your prayers for this event.
Then,
this past weekend I went to Muyanga for another women's meeting. This is about 1
1/2 hours away from our house out in the bush. The women had not been told that
we were coming so they went out and invited people that night and in the
morning. The next day by 11:00 am we had about 15 women come. I told three
different stories from the NT and spoke about God's power. Then that night in
the pitch black, except for my little flashlight, I spoke about God's love for
us. It was incredible to hear many testimonies at the end as the women shared
about how God had showed them love.
I wonder sometimes why God had to bring me all the way to Zambia to teach me some things. I guess I am a little hard headed and to be honest I don't know if I could have received his message to me as clearly as I did this past weekend if I were in the states. I have been out many times in the bush and seen how hard it is for the people to live, but something was different about this time....
Late Sat. afternoon I decided to walk with two young girls, probably about 14 years old, to get the water. They had no shoes on and summer type clothes on even though it was quite cold outside. We walked about 2-3 kms. before we reached the watering hole. I looked down in it and the water looked awful and it was almost finished. It took about 30 min. to draw the water and fill up the buckets. We walked back as it was becoming dark. I carried water in my hands but these girls carried about 50 lbs of water on their heads with it occasionally spilling on them. I found out later that when the water is finished they have to go about 5 kms up a mountain to get water. These girls did this at least twice a day but maybe 3 times a day for our meeting so we could have water to cook with and drink. Also, they used this water and heated some for me in a small wash tub so I could take a bath two times. I was so humbled. I didn't ask them to haul this water, they just did it joyfully so that we could enjoy the meeting. I feel like I have so much especially compared to these women and they have so little. I can just go to my sink and get some water to drink or I can wash a load of clothes, or take a shower in my house without having to walk anywhere. These women were so humble and had such servant attitudes, it just blew me away. In this place they didn't have much food but everyone brought what they had. On that Friday night, we ate dinner and as soon as we finished someone else brought us more food which was the same as we had just had. Of course we ate again.
That's how it was the whole weekend. They gave all they had in different ways so that their guests would be comfortable. There were lots of others things they did but I just noticed how long this was getting so I better end. Just know that God worked in a great way in my life this past weekend. He showed me what it truly meant to be a servant.