K9 Mantrailing

 

Gallup looking so professional, though keeping her feminity obvious with her pink harness.  

2020 was a strange year, and there were so many losses, so many things that stopped or have been put on hold.  I love one new thing that came into our family.  Here's the story of how I "just happened" to meet a girl in the park, wearing a K9 Mantrailing T-Shirt.  

Tim and I took the Cousins for a hike one Saturday morning back in June, I think.  I saw Lauren, as I later came to know her with her man-trailing t-shirt, and it made me laugh, because it does sound a bit desperate for a man.  I asked questions, and she invited Gallup and I to a training session to check it out.

I was so excited!  One of my dreams since childhood was to train a dog for a blind person.  I like the idea of useful, working dogs.  The training sessions meet on Saturday morning which is perfect because Paul sequesters himself Saturday mornings so he wouldn't miss me if I took off for a few hours.  

Those Saturday training sessions are wonderful!  Turns out, Gallup has the number one talent for being a man-trailer:  DRIVE!  She LOVES finding things!  and people particularly.  So she has learned to sniff out people, with me in hot pursuit, dragging along ungracefully behind.  

Another fun thing, three of the cousins have joined me in this.  They are hiders and helpers and enjoyers of the whole Saturday morning outings.  We have tacked shakes onto the end once, and explored parts of towns where we rarely go, and just love our outings, except for eating dog hair.  Gallup is a shedder for sure.   

When she's not being an amazing sniffer dog, Gallup retains her other hobbies, particularly chasing Karoo the cat that lives downstairs.  

If I say, "Where's the Kitty?"  She runs to our bedroom window, as shown, and scans the yard tensely, hoping for a glimpse of Karoo.  I think it's too cute!  

 

Gallup's "classmate" Titan looks so pleased after a successful find of whoever was hiding.  His owner, Bruce, has been mentoring us.  Nathanael's face gives a clue on how much we enjoy these outings.   Daniel and Connie are bringing up the rear.  

Daniel, Connie, and Nathanael in their K9 Mantrailing shirts.  (Getting our shirts was a big deal to all of us.  😏)

A big perk of all this training has been a new friendship with Lauren.  She's a Christ follower too!  She goes to church where the pastor is our kids' former beloved youth group leader, Martin, so the girl talk in the middle of the dog talk is sweet.  😊  We didn't add too many new friends in 2020, but Lauren and her husband Bruce are keepers.  (She wasn't really desperate for a man, she had already caught hers.  :-)

Another of Gallup's passions is this particular frisbee.  She loves to lie down in the water and "sizzle" when it's hot.  She looks so pleased with herself.  I call her Halo-Head when she wears her frisbee.  Unfortunately, we have sunk 2 of them in the water so she doesn't have one right now.  

So I'm besotted with this dog, but who wouldn't be?  She loves me back, even to the smell of my socks!  Is that true love or what?  

I have high hopes that she will be a great asset to society and rescue missing people and give me a great story for a blog post.  😊

I want to have drive too, to find people who are lost in their sins, and need to come to their Creator.  I'd love to help find them.  

 

Christmas Eve in Quarantine in Namibia

In August Paul preached over Zoom to a church in Pakistan. We began to be flooded with “friend requests” on Facebook. We got hundreds, and then thousands! It was hard to deal with them all. Paul tended to say “yes” to most of them, to edify or win them. I was picky and tried to read their profiles and make sure they were OK.

If we accepted them, many wanted to talk on Facebook Messenger. It was too much! Hundreds of messages, mostly from people we didn’t know, and many were hard to understand. But we tried. We spent hours on there, though we’re not usually Facebook junkies, especially Paul. Some of the people invited him to preach for their churches. He prayed and asked the Lord where he should go, if he should go, when, and how. He got guidance to DRIVE to Kenya, and be with several pastors and other ministries, and then go on to Uganda to be with a good many more pastors.

All but one of the pastors worked out! Paul had to use a translator a lot, which is different from South Africa, but still we had good meetings. We saw people come to profess faith in Christ. We loved meeting the pastors, and many other people. One pastor told the people, “I met this man on Facebook, and he chose me for his friend!” with so much emotion. I instantly felt so guilty for the people I had deleted. It meant more than we knew.

One pastor, Pastor Jonathan near Kampala, was beat up, perhaps because of being with us. A group of men broke into his home yelling, “Where is the money?” Maybe they assumed we had given him money. They cracked the bone in his forehead with a thick hoe. He was in a coma for over 24 hours, until the doctor operated to relieve the bleeding on the brain. We went to see him the last morning before we left Uganda and were so thankful that he could see a little, and recognize us, and was thanking God for sparing his life.

Another pastor had the most enthusiastic church worship team we have ever seen. It was good and inspiring to be with them in Kamuli, and again at a more rural church. We learned that we do like savory bananas for breakfast, though I didn't get the recipe.

I'm sticking in a "surfer dude" picture of our Grandson Cyrus and a monkey to give some comic relief, and a dose of sweetness.

When we stayed with Lois, we visited a few of her “sons’” churches and saw people we had met back in 2018. Only one is not going on with the Lord, but the others press onward, leading churches, managing a children’s home, and planting new churches.

We had many little crises which kept throwing us back on the Lord. One time a police lady kept my driver’s license after a police check in Kenya. It was quite a procedure to go through all the hoops, and we drove away without noticing she kept my license. I slumped down for a nap, tired from the ordeal, while Paul struggled with the traffic of driving through Eldoret.

As I woke up, I was reliving the whole annoying police episode in my mind, when I suddenly realized she hadn’t given me back my license. We were like 5000 miles from home! NOT a good time to be without a license. I was panicking. And praying! And calming, then thinking, and beginning to panic again. It was a long, slow hour of driving back through Eldoret to try to get it back.

We finally got there, and the police lady was gone from her post. Others kept pointing until we found her. She immediately called out, “You forgot your license.” I didn’t trust myself to speak, but then she said, “I’m so sorry I didn’t get it back.” It’s amazing how an apology takes all the sting out of the mistake! It was “above and beyond” what I expected, and I’m so grateful. I got my license back, and I didn’t say anything wrong! I was grateful for both.

That same day we had a scheduling glitch with our next appointment being impossibly far to make it to on time. We couldn’t get the pastor on Facebook or on the phone. Paul was driving, I was checking the maps, looking for a plan, and we prayed. Then I got the idea to call Gideon, one of Lois’s “boys” who is nearly my age, and ask him for help. He sorted us out in about two sentences! We were heading the wrong way, and the right way was much closer! And also closer to the Ugandan border where we needed to be the next day! We were so grateful!

While we were near Nairobi, we took the Jeep in to be repaired. The place had no parts for a Jeep, but they told us we needed a new cap on the radiator. From the time they looked at it, we began to have problems with that radiator. About the third day, it boiled over three times, leaving us on the side of the road or the middle of the intersection until it cooled! We prayed, poured water, and tried to make it to our appointments. It was a rough day, though we had two really good meetings.

After the second meeting, five o’clock was approaching fast and we began to hunt for a new radiator cap. We had been told we’d have to import one from a Jeep distributor in another country. We prayed and stopped to ask at a Toyota place if they knew what to do. They sent us to a parts place back in the thick of traffic. There we found a radiator cap that did the job! We haven’t had another over-heating situation since! We thanked the Lord!

Another little scare was when Paul started getting sick. No!!!! That is not allowed in this Covid era! Even the sniffles make everyone nervous. And one of his symptoms was feeling gaspy for air. That’s scary on the wife. It turned out to be a cold, which meant days of low appetite, low energy, and those sniffles. We are learning he cannot over-do with impunity. Gradually he got his energy back. He never missed a meeting, but he left one early to get to bed.

God is good! He is faithful! And He tells us to talk of all His wondrous ways! So that’s what I’m trying to do, share some of what He brought us through.

“Who can utter the mighty acts of God? Who can show forth all his praise?” Psalm 106:2 I’m mentioning a few little things, but the big important things are more hidden. “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation.” Luke 17:20.

We saw people come forward to make professions of faith, and heard prayers prayed. I wondered sometimes why it was Paul who had to come so far. Was he the only one who could do these things? I think almost every pastor we worked with commented on his strength and continued service for the Lord at age 72. Was this what the Lord wanted people to see? So much goes on that we don’t have a clue about. We don’t know all that went on for the Kingdom, but we like what we know.

So now we’re on the return journey. We got a Covid test in Kampala, and headed south into Tanzania after the negative result came back. We had a few adventures in Tanzania, praying each night to find accommodation, and the Lord leading us to places night after night. Our GPS failed us a bit in Tanzania, taking us in exactly the wrong direction, with some idea of going through Kigali, Rwanda to get to Dodoma! It was disheartening when we learned how much time we had lost (about 2 hours), and after that we didn’t trust our GyPSy so much.

When we got to the border of Namibia this morning, we had hopes of quickly getting across the border and buzzing along toward Cape Town. We did the Zambia exit without too much trouble, but immediately on the Namibian side we had a problem. Our Covid tests were more than 72 hours old, and we had to get fresh ones. They told us it might take EIGHT days because of Christmas and the weekend, to get results back!

Finally we learned of a private option that should be much quicker. We got the test this morning, and hope to get the results on Christmas day. Until then, we wait in a hotel room, getting caught up on our blog, letters, and other work while we wait.

I wanted to cry as we began to realize how delayed we were going to be. We had hoped to come squeaking into Cape Town Christmas night, but now we might not even be able to start that way. I prayed one of those profound prayers that our Lord must hear a lot, “Help, Lord!” and the tears went away. He took the sting out of the disappointment.

Both of us confided to each other this morning, that the moment we felt the air conditioning in our room was the moment we thought we could last two days and two nights while we wait for that negative test. The heat is intense with very high humidity, so A/C felt like a necessity. 🎵 All I want for Christmas is a negative test🎵 😊

That's it for myself, but I'm praying for so much more. So many friends and family are hurting because of Covid. The Lord knows. He is in charge. I'm seeking His help for them.

Pictures below: 1. A truck crash involving 3 semi's that cost us 2 hours, but was a great place to pass out tracts. 2. The statue commemerating the completion of the whole Bible translated into Gweru. 3. Paul looking pale. :-)

Shooting in the dark

Paul's been pondering his spiritual journey, and noting something.  He didn't have a lot of mentors.  He had very few one-on-one chats with the men who influenced his walk with the Lord.  He didn't meet for coffee or have accountability partners.  He never went for therapy.

Even with his pastor/missionary dad, there wasn't much one on one.  Paul was fourth of six kids, and teaching was generally delivered to them as a group.

In pondering this, we're seeing a good, seriously encouraging side to this.  Paul has been walking with the Lord since he was 15, with some ups and downs at the beginning, true, but with steady progress and growth.  How?  It's worth knowing because we'd love to replicate him.  We'd love to have hundreds and thousands of Christians who devote their full lives to reaching others with the GOOD NEWS of Jesus, boldly.  Day after day, year after year, on four continents, in season out of season.


In his pondering, he made a list of men who influenced his life.  Besides his mom and dad, there were missionaries, preachers and Bible college teachers.  Most of them didn't know that their teaching was life changing for him.  But their discipling of him was at a distance, not personal.  Biographies of missionaries and evangelists were helpful to him, but, of course, that teaching was not personal.

Gallup, our eye candy, shown with 2 books that influenced Paul's walk and mind  Deeper Experiences of Famous Christians and Pilgrim's Progress.  Don't you love Gallup's cross-eared look? 

His mom did spend personal time in training him, especially getting him started in Bible reading each day and seeing that all six children had their own Bible reading each morning before doing other things.  He spent (and spends) a lot of time in the Bible.  That has been the BIG help in his life and ministry.

He mentioned his sister, Faith.  She launched their whole family into a nursing home ministry that still goes on today, more than 50 years later.  She also set the example for the five siblings of memorizing hundreds of Bible verses well enough to quote them all together accurately.  Faith was his partner when his dad sent them out two by two to speak in public schools in South Carolina.  They sang together while she played the accordion, and then he would preach with chalk art. She was a big help to him. 

Jesus said, "The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation...for the Kingdom of God is within you"  (Luke 17:20-21).

I find this so comforting!  We are sowers of the seed.  But the seed falls on different kinds of soil.  We read it in family Bible reading today, which inspired this writing.   :-)   Jesus said, "So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground;  And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how" (Mark 4:26,27). 

We don't know what is going on in people's hearts.  We'll be able to tell eventually by their fruits, but we give out the seed (the Word of God) to people, not knowing if they are "good soil" or "rocky" or what.  It takes time to see the "Fruit".  The Doings.

So how does this comfort me?  Because we have so, so many unknowns in our work.  Paul can give out the Word to 1000 people a day, many days.  Many of those people will give a word or a sign that they want to follow Jesus.  Yeah!  That's hopeful!  But because we don't see the heart, we don't know what's going on "underground" as the farmer can't see the seed while it's underground.

That doesn't mean nothing is happening!  The kingdom of God does not come with observation.  Later we'll know some, but I think we'll learn the most about what we helped in, someday in Heaven.

We'd like to do more, to follow up more, to get more feedback, but there is only so much time and strength.  It's OK not to know everything.  God does His work even in the dark.      

That stinks!

 Look what my sister Wendy found in the trash can on Monday morning after the Sunday baptism/picnic at the camp!!!!

She came to the bottom of the stairs, and whisper yelled, "Hey, Vic, do you wanna have an adventure?"  I yelled for Josh who has the good camera, and we went out to meet Jimmy the Skunk. (Anyone besides me read Thornton Burgess's books about animals, including Jimmy the Skunk?  I loved them when I was about 7).

 This skunk had made himself very easy to catch.  We just put the lid on the trash can, and put him in the truck.  We took him to a shooting range/sand pit about 2 miles from our camp. 

 This sign made us giggle.  We were pretty sure it didn't pertain to skunks.
Rush hour traffic went by (three or four cars) and I'm sure they all thought we were wicked trash dumpers. 

And there you have it!  The dramatic release, with the aid of a water ski rope.

So now you know what we do for fun in Maine.  And we didn't even get squirted.  I think we can hang out our shingle as "Skunk Removal Experts".  


"The beast of the field shall honour me...."   (Isaiah 43:20a)  

40 Days from SA to Malawi and Back

Things I want to remember from our first trip to Malawi:

Crossing the border was peaceful.  We could have saved a few minutes if we had done insurance at the same time as waiting for our visas.

Our first hotel room.  Neon red walls, with a mosaic of broken mirrors and tiles.  Very dim light-bulb. Cassava for breakfast, and chicken gizzards. Paul was pleased to eat mine and Josh's too.

Our visit to the Malawi Museum. Kinda wanted to donate some time there.  It looks neglected.

Lots of long walks passing out tracts, and most people being so excited to get them. I wrote about it in our prayer letter, and said I wished we had a GoPro (just talking, not hinting) and a lady in Indiana wrote to say she had one she never used, and wanted to give it to us.  (Stop, do cartwheel.  Mentally only, you understand.)  

Kids and a lady who stopped on their way into church to admire themselves in the side of our clean (! for once!) Jeep.  The kids had a good time dancing, the lady admired her sparkly shoes.


Josh got a new camera for his birthday in May.  All of these photos are from his camera, and he took most of them.  You can tell which ones he didn't take as he didn't take the ones he is in, with one exception.  I'm thankful he's getting another talent/skill down.

Huh?  You say I have a fidget spinner in my ear?  

Wish I could do that.  

 One of the perks of this trip was seeing so many friends along the way, like the Frews who have been friends since 2006.  Back then, we had more kids than they did, but they have gotten ahead of us.

 We participated in FIVE weddings on this 40 day trip!  Joe and Blessing's was the one we got the most involved in.  They are planning to come visit us in Cape Town in December.

 We stayed with the Beamen's in Chipata, Zambia, but we didn't get a picture of them, just their hedgehog, Lucy.

 Crossing the Zambezi River between Botswana and Zambia on a ferry is a limited time offer.  They're building a big ol' bridge that will take some of the fun out of this crossing.  Paul said this is my 25th Anniversary Cruise.

Crossing the Zambezi will lose some of its romance when the bridge is finished, but for the sake of these poor guys in the big trucks, I'll be glad for the bridge.  They are backed up for THREE KILOMETERS!  We measured.  Waiting for their turn to cross.  It can take them a week.  I'm guessing fresh milk doesn't cross this border often.

 I love, love, love when our kids get involved in ministry too!  Of course, they've been involved since day one. They've been hauled around the world, winning people even as babies, and helping their parents be more winsome, but now they're getting right up there, teaching the liquor bottle lesson full of verses of what God says about alcohol in the Bible.
I suppose I should mention how glad I am that Paul's in the ministry too.  I sort of take that for granted. Of course he is!   I can't imagine him any other way.

 Visiting a tea plantation was maybe not supposed to be the most exciting trip in the world, maybe educational was more what we had in mind, but I think none of us will forget skidding and sliding down through the tea fields, getting lost, and finally coming out miles and miles from where we went in.  It was cool, for sure.  Josh liked the skidding parts even, Paul and I, not so much.  We haven't actually tried the tea yet.

 The unsung member of our team is Gypsy, our GPS.  Though she botched it that time, never giving us a hint of cows blocking the road ahead.

 Paul got drafted into a singing group's photo session.  We're curious if he'll get into the printed version on their CD they're making.  It was a Christian group of singers, very nice, that we met beside the road one Sunday.

 We made a brief stop at Malawi's beloved pottery place, Dedza for the Dedza mountains around it.  It would have been a nice place to have lunch, but we pressed on.    

 It was mouse season in Malawi, so mouse "bouquets" were for sale beside the road.  About $.05 per mouse.  Yum, yum.  OK, we didn't try any, just felt brave to have taken the photo.  And we tipped the boys selling them because we got their hopes up when we stopped for the picture.

 Road hazards!  I'm so thankful we never hit any animals this time except little birds.

 And then there were other road hazards.  Speed traps.  This one was intricate, in Botswana, and I got trapped.  Sniff.

 But Botswana is still the best country I know for seeing wildlife from the road.  We saw elephants too, but they got upstaged as you'll see in a bit.

 Mac Mac Falls delighted us, particularly in that we didn't know it was coming, and therefore had the thrill of discovery.

 There we are!  This was one of the coolest touristy things we've ever done, and we almost didn't get to do it.  We went to an elephant encounter, which does not include (the more expensive) elephant ride, but they let us ride the elephants "just back to the stables" and took our pictures, and it was wonderful!  and the price was right.

 I think the guides saw Paul and immediately matched us with Temba, the biggest of the 6 Elephants at Elephant Whispers.

 These are amazing animals!  and therefore their Creator must be AMAZING too.  Just logic.

We saw a lot of fires.  Smoky by day...

wild by night.  

 On the way back we stayed a few days at Back to the Bible Mission.  We loved it!

 Their campus is off in the hills near Barberton, South Africa, and they call it a "preacher factory."

The road continues, we move on, always on a mission, trying to draw others to Christ.

Beautiful Botswana

People who think the world is too crowded ought
to take a drive through Botswana.  You can go far without seeing any people or houses or anything manmade except the road and the telephone poles.  But we were thrilled to see 13 elephants, 19 giraffes, a kudu with a full rack and his family, zebras, and gorgeous birds. 

But first you have to get there. 

The ferry crossing is not long for this world.  A bridge is in the works, so this will soon be only historical way of crossing the Zambezi. 

That's our muddy Jeep coming off behind the 18 wheeler.  He had been waiting 2 days to cross south, where the people who are going north wait a week. 

There was a cluster of human activity at the border, and then we were out in the wilderness, driving through grass and shrub country, hoping to see game, but starting to wonder. 
Suddenly, there he was! 

This big guy with a chunk out of one ear.  He also has quite a scar on the right side of his face.  We stopped to take pictures and stare, keeping the motor running, and he just kept eating and ignored our peon selves. 

 We never got over the shock and delight of seeing these giants right along Botswana roads.  It sure gives you a thrill! 

 Suddenly we were in a giraffe section, and had to slow down to let some cross the road. 

 
Please excuse the butterflies splatted on our windshield. 

 A rare view of a wild kudu.  Picture taken by Josh.  Actually, he took most of these as I was driving. 

 Is your head is in the clouds?

 We get to tell Timothy about our adventures every once in a while.  Notice the thatch roof.  I love the smell of those "bomas". 

 Can't forget the shorter members of wildlife.   This guy was chasing me (unknowingly).  He (or she?) came out from under a chair, with a headband of dust stuck on just so, and dust trailing from his hind leg, and headed for my toes.  I moved. 

 To put him (must be a him; looks like a him) into perspective...

The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof.   Phew, doesn't He like variety?  and color!