(Note: I am breaking this up into several parts, hopefully to encourage you to read it all. I know it's a lot!)
It’s so hard to sit down and describe how God blessed and worked through different people and events. I had the privilege two weeks ago to take part in a ministry trip to the far north part of Cameroon. There were six of us total on the trip, three Africans and three Americans. God provided an amazing unity between the six of us. Before I went on the trip, I didn’t know a single one of them. By the time we got back from the trip, I felt weird leaving them—we had spent nearly every waking hour together for two weeks. After traveling for three days straight, we had definitely seen each other at our worst!
During this trip, we encountered obstacle after obstacle. The first day of our trip, we had a seven hour drive. Our car broke down and we had to wait for another one to come. We crammed six people and luggage into a very small car. We had to pull over six times during that trip with various car difficulties. Our seven hour trip turned into a thirteen hour trip! But, we saw God’s hand of protection in every aspect of that journey. He stopped us in time to catch some potentially fatal car problems. He gave Pastor Julius the opportunity to lead a man to Christ. He gave us safety and protection even though we had to drive during the night. God was good!
We caught the train headed up north on the 1st of the year then took multiple other forms of public transportation before we reached our final destination the night of the 3rd. I’m not sure how many hours we actually traveled—I think I’m a little nervous to add up the total!
Our first day in M was a day of rest. We enjoyed a leisurely morning, catching up on sleep and such. I believe this was also the day that the men drove around to try to locate the nomads and see if we could spend the night with them. God allowed them to have success in this venture. Contact was established and plans were made for us to spend the night on Friday. In the afternoon, we headed to the market at a neighboring village to pass out some tracts. The difficult thing about passing out tracts in a market is that a mob can quickly form when people realize that someone is handing out something for free. The best course of action is to engage in a one on one conversation. The men were able to talk to many people and passed out scores of tracts. We ladies were looking for other ladies to talk with. None of the ladies, however, spoke English, and only a few spoke French. Most of the ladies spoke Arabic, Fulfulde, or another tribal language. Rosemary was the only one of the three ladies that could communicate in Arabic or Fulfulde. She did have some good opportunities, but overall, communication was a challenge.
That night we were able to share our personal salvation testimonies with the team. What an encouragement it was to hear how God worked in each of our lives. Despite our different backgrounds, God graciously drew each of us into His family.
On Thursday, the men headed into a neighboring Arab village to visit. The ladies were able to head over to the B's to spend time with mom and the kids. We had a great time just talking and cutting out flannel graph. That afternoon, we gathered back at the their house for their mid-week prayer service. There was a fairly good-sized crowd out (larger than their regular number of four or so), and one of the men from our group challenged us on the topic of prayer.
