April 23. A lovely, very warm day today after the rain yesterday. After breakfast and quiet time, I got the theme verse put up in the meeting room. Got e-mails ready to send to Christy and Connie. Started sending them when Sosthenes came to read his second Owena primer so I let Daddy finish taking care of the sending. Received a few e-mails as well. Steve came right after Sosthenes left. His reading was smooth; and even though he made a few mistakes, he did a much better job overall. It was obvious that he had practiced, and I commended him for a job well done. After that, I worked on lesson plans for a while until lotu started.
Lotu bells rang at 7:00, 8:00, and 9:00. People came early, and we were able to get an early start. Rebeka gave testimony of her being saved in 2003. Today Daddy covered “Meeting Together” and “Praying Together.” Between meetings, Erisapet and Matthew talked with Taqita, and she put her trust in Christ. She left before the second meeting, but she will give her testimony in the morning and then be baptized with the others. Erisapet and Rebeka had prepared some food for people to eat between meetings. That gave me time to fix spaghetti for our dinner. We had leftover greens to go with it. Had an early lunch, then the second meeting, and about an hour earlier nap than yesterday. I was thankful to have an early lunch because we had had no snack, and I was feeling hungry and getting a headache.
There will just be one meeting tomorrow morning. Then the fellowship dinner and baptism. The men went this afternoon to dam up the water for the baptism.
This afternoon, I spent more time on lesson plans for the rest of this week and for next week. We just have three days this week, and next week ends the term. Looks like we will finish our math book on Monday and probably will do extra English and Owena lessons.
“3Withal praying also for us, that God would open unto us a door of utterance, to speak the mystery of Christ…. 4That I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak.” Colossians 4:3,4
April 24. We had planned to do laundry this morning, but after I got it sorted out, there was barely enough for two loads. So we decided to just wait a couple more days. We are glad we did because the day was mostly cloudy, windy, and very cool.
Graham came very early this morning to read his primer. I was eating breakfast. I finished eating, and then listened to him read. He is an excellent reader. After he left, I went back for quiet time, and then did a bit of walking before busying myself at the computer with school lessons. Just before the meeting, I got the uxai ready to cook for dinner.
People came later for the meeting this morning. We figured that would be the case, as everyone was cooking food for the fellowship dinner. My, you should have seen all the pots of food they brought! While we were waiting for the men to come inside, Daddy and I had a good time joking and laughing with the ladies about all the food they had prepared, about who was going to eat it all, and about how they would all look “pregnant” by the time they finished eating. (Don’t worry, these people have no trouble putting away potfuls of food.)
It was about 10:15 or so before we started the meeting. It was good to see Daniel there today. Amos had a bad cold this morning so Tomas led the singing. Taqita gave a good testimony of salvation. I sang “A New Name in Glory.” Daddy preached about “the church meeting together for business.” The meeting ended around 12:00. Afterward we took pictures of the five baptismal candidates. Then the people ate; and some time after 2:00, they went down for the baptism. Daddy and I took our nap.
I had cooked the uxai and warmed up the spaghetti for our dinner, and we went to nap around 1:45.
This afternoon and evening, I cut Daddy’s hair, worked on school lessons, got supper, made lemon-orange sugar cookies, did dishes, got things reorganized in the schoolroom to make it ready for school tomorrow, did some printing, took a bath, put away the cookies, had a snack. Now here I am, glad for the sleep time hours soon to find me in bed.
Tomas and Matyu each came by this evening for something or other, and they both said that the baptismal water was really cold so they two plus Amos all did baptizing so they could get out of the water as soon as possible. I’m sure they were thankful for the sunshine the Lord sent for the time that they were down at the river.
The special meetings are over, but it seems to have been a good time for everyone. They spent a lot of time together which appears to be what they really needed. The theme Daddy chose for the meetings turned out to be a fitting theme. It is a blessing to see a church family growing in love and learning to care for one another.
“5Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. 6Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man.” Colossians 4:5,6