Lon and Val Garber - Distributed in Namibia

July, 2005

LON’S MINISTRY NEWS

We are in the midst of our busy season in Namibia. We arrived back home in early June and a few weeks later the Central Florida summer mission team arrived. So we have been busy re-connecting with our normal ministry assignments while at the same time spending time and ministering with the team. But the most important news I want to share with you is what God has been saying to me lately in terms of my ministry message. For the past year, I have been teaching churches what God has been teaching me about faith. We have built a solid foundation there and now God is building in me a challenge to now encourage churches to begin moving out into their communities: to put their faith in action as God leads them to demonstrate His love to their neighbors. Just as the children of Israel took possession of the Promised Land, so are we to take possession of the promises He has given us for healing and transformation of our communities. So my preaching, teaching and training sessions have taken on the note of challenge to move our confident beliefs into committed actions. These actions will vary as God speaks to the leaders of each congregation. It is rewarding to see the eagerness on the faces of people who are willing to take these important next steps.

We have an update on the property issue. To refresh your memory, the municipality of Okahandja owns the Vyf Rand (informal settlement) land on which we want to build a church/ pre-school building. They have set a price of $N 55,000 for the property (approximately 1 acre), more than three times its true market value. They have repeatedly denied Pastor Thomas’ requests to lower the price. When we were in the States, we met a man whose solution to the problem was, “Then why don’t we buy a nearby farm and move the camp off of municipal property.” That was a solution we had not even considered. Maybe God thinks bigger than we do. So we began praying about it and asked Pastor Thomas to start looking for land outside, but close to the camp.

We have been looking longingly for two years at a piece of property next to the camp. It is 19 times the size of the property the church currently occupies. Last year, someone else bought it and has been using it as a tavern. We hought: “Great, a tavern is the last thing this poor community needs.” So every time we’d drive by, we prayed that the tavern would close. While we were in America, our prayer was answered. It closed. And now the tavern owner wants to sell the property. We are praying for God’s guidance as to what we should do. It is 16 acres (6.3 hectares). It has a main building that could serve as both a church and a pre-school (4518 sq. ft.) and 4 residential living units. The entire property is surrounded by a tall security fence. It has access to electricity and water and also has a well. The owner is asking $US 88,000 for the land and buildings, but will probably take less. Bible Baptist Church could use the property to provide a wide array of social services to the community as well as offer low-cost permanent housing for dozens of families. The educational and skills training possibilities make our heads spin. Please pray with us that God will give us wisdom as to how to proceed. This property has the potential to be God’s tool for transforming an entire community of 3000 residents.

VAL’S MINISTRY NEWS
Since our return to Namibia, Val has made significant strides in the export portion of the Work of Our Hands project. This week we shipped our first shipment to Germany and our second shipment to the United States. These are very important steps in the growth of the project since the Namibian marketplace is much too small to sustain future growth. We want to give a special thanks to all of you who purchased merchandise while we were in the States. We will be sending additional shipments to the U.S. whenever we find visitors willing to transport it for us. Anyone who is willing to host a Work of Our Hands home party should contact either Judy Tillman (407) 682-8710 or Lynn Brumback (407) 767-5683.

We are extremely proud of Magdelena, who is the first Work of our Hands lady to open her own savings account. This tangible step demonstrates hope to others that their lives can change for the better. Hildegard, one of the bead ladies, told Val the other day: “We thought of you often while you were gone, especially when we were hungry.” Please pray that God would continue to provide marketing outlets and opportunities for their craftsmanship.

PERSONAL NOTES
As well as hosting several team members, we also have Val’s father and his wife visiting us for the month of July. It is exciting to show them our adopted land and introduce them to our new friends and ministries. They are also being a blessing to us in many practical ways. Having their assistance as well as their companionship has been very refreshing to us. Lon asked Val’s dad what he had seen in Namibia that made an impression on him and that our newsletter readers might want to know. His immediate reply: “I was most impressed by the smiles on the ladies’ faces whenever Val comes around and the smiles on the faces of the pastors and leaders when Lon shows up.”

Bo (dog) and Panda (cat) seem very happy that their chief servants (Val and Lon) have returned home and Bo loves the Kong toy we imported for him from the U.S (Golden, CO). It is his constant companion. He especially loves it when we fill the interior with peanut butter. But the best news is that his puppy exuberance is settling down a bit as he matures. Now he greets us calmly in the morning with a wagging tail rather than his previous all-out enthusiastic and slobbery assault on our bodies. He is growing into a delightful companion and watchdog.

Our work permits expire on 15 August. We submitted are applications for renewal in mid-June and are now awaiting a decision. Please pray once again with us that God will grant us favor with the Ministry of Home Affairs.

CHURCH DISTRIBUTED UPDATE
Lon is considering hosting a Pastor’s Conference for a group of 30 Baptist churches in either September or October. It is an excellent opportunity to expand the distributed church network here in Namibia. The conference will probably held in Rundu, along the northern border. Please pray for wisdom concerning the development of this key ministry opportunity.

Lon has also been invited to conduct another Pastor’s Conference in Kinshasa, (Democratic Republic of the Congo). This conference will be attended by over 500 pastors. We are praying for the funds needed to feed the pastors for the 5-day conference. Once the funds are secured, we will schedule the conference.

ON THE HOMEFRONT
One of our objectives for our recent trip to America was to develop an American market for Work of our Hands products. God graciously answered our prayers in two significant ways. First, we sold almost our entire stock while we were in the States. Praise God. But even more importantly, God has given us a wonderful business team to handle the marketing and business aspects of the American market. Bill and Judy Tillman and Larry and Lynn Brumback have volunteered to manage the stateside aspects of the business. Words cannot express how much of a blessing this is to the whole endeavor.

We are so grateful to Debbie Upp who worked diligently on Val’s Work of our Hands website for the two weeks she stayed with us recently. She will be installing the updates on Northland’s webserver in a few weeks. Once installed, you will be able to order Work of our Hands merchandise online. Visit our website at:

http://nacd.northlandcc.net/LonNVal/home1.asp

From the home page, click on the link for Work of our Hands.

FINANCIAL SUMMARY
Our ministry in Namibia is a walk of faith. God supplies our financial needs according to His riches and glory. He channels that blessing through our friends and faithful supporters. It takes approximately $US 48,750 in donations per year to supply our living and ministry expenses.

$ 26,602 YTD Love Offerings
$ 24,375 YTD Budgeted Need
-----------
$ 2,227 Balance of Ministry Account

Praise God for his provision

IMPORTANT NOTE: When giving through Northland, make sure you designate “Lon and Val Garber” on your envelope or attached note. Otherwise, your donation may not be credited properly to our account. Thanks so much.

PRAYER POINTS
**Praise – for our safe return as well as all the supplies that came with us and other team members

**Praise – for progress in our ministries while we were gone. We left our work in faithful hands and God blessed.

**Pray – for the renewal of our work permits for another year

**Pray – for guidance concerning the purchase of the church property

**Pray – Val needs a Namibian Assistant (as in yesterday); pray for the right person!

**Pray – for wisdom in the planning of both of the upcoming pastors’ conferences

February, 2005

Chronicles of Namibia
Lon and Val Garber on Assignment
February 2005

LON’S MINISTRY NEWS

Lon’s teaching, preaching, training schedule continues to keep him busy. We would like to give you just one example of how ministry grows in Africa. The other day, an Owambo friend, Johannes, traveled with Lon to Windhoek for a full day of appointments, meetings and teaching times. We had an hour to spare between appointments so we spent it under a tree in Zoo Park. Lon used the time to review his notes for the class he was teaching in the evening. Meanwhile Johannes struck up a conversation with another Owambo man sitting nearby. Lon can recognize enough Oshiwambo to figure out that they were talking about him and about the Lord. Then Johannes introduced Lon to Sebedeus, a pastor of a small nameless church in Hakahana, a poor township on the outskirts of Windhoek. He immediately invited Lon to come and teach his congregation. That is how ministry happens over here. You just sit under a tree and it comes to you.

In December, Lon taught at YFC's annual summer camp. He asked YFC leadership if they would please provide a emerging young adult teacher to co-teach with him. That man was Alex Chongo and he is a Zambian. What a blessing he has turned out to be. Their relationship has continued after camp as Lon further mentors and teaches with this emerging young leader. Alex has a rather unique gift. No matter what biblical principle you are trying to teach, Alex will develop an illustration for it that involves cars. He loves cars.

VAL’S MINISTRY NEWS

Our neighbors for many years, Roy and Ginny Nelson and Bud Abt have been here helping us build a craft space in the squatter's camp for Val and her ladies. The ladies have been working in the church tent, but in the summer time it is just too hot to work there (105-115 degrees). So we have been busy building a better space. We have been working from 8 in the morning until 8 in the evening and then falling into bed dead tired. No time for emails or newsletters. January's newsletter disappeared into the exhaustion pit. Thanks for understanding and thanks too for all of you who wrote to let us know you missed hearing from us. It would be discouraging to miss a month and not have anyone notice.

But after much hard work, Roy, Bud and Ginny completed the "Namibian Craft Training Center" before they left, and it looks and more importantly feels wonderful. It forms a shaded breezeway along the eastern side of the old church building (away from the hot afternoon sun) with floor to ceiling lockable cabinets along one wall. And a sink, with water (a major luxury in the camp)! Skylights bathe the space with marvelous light. Artists crave light. It stays cool all day long. Everyone craves cool breezes. Well, cool as defined by Lon. Val says it is bearable. We have widely different internal thermometers. Can you spell H-O-T F-L-A-S-H-E-S? The ends of the new training area are wire mesh to keep the breeze blowing and on one end is a wire gate so Pastor Thomas can park his combi (van) inside at night, securing the gate with a big ole' honkin' padlock. He parked his last combi beside the house and it was stolen in the night even though it didn't run. They just pushed it off silently so as not to disturb the sleeping children.
Roy and Bud developed a very flexible and functional design for the structure. The wall that separates the church preschool area and the training area now has removable panels instead of a fixed wall, so the panels can be detached to make a really big work space or meeting space. Look closely and you can see the seams along the left wall in the photo to the right. It was quite a challenge finding supplies and tools. We bought stuff in Windhoek, Okahandja and Swakopmund and still had to do a lot of "make-do" when the appropriate construction materials were not available. Lon was reduced to begging when the only place to find materials was a wholesaler who did not normally sell to the public. His main job was keeping Roy and Bud supplied so they could remain productive. The building got built and Lon met a lot of new people around town. He spent the major part of most days hunting and foraging for tools, hardware, wood and zinc (tin) panels. He also learned a great deal about making 10-12 foot panels fit in a 6 foot loading space.

PERSONAL NOTES

The other night Bo (our puppy, isn't he cute?) wandered over to say hi to the bull terrier across the street and discovered that it did not have Bo's friendly, outgoing disposition. Bo just wanted to be friends. So he stuck his nose through the iron gate. Bad move. The bull terrier, who I have since named Mr. Nasty, has the disposition of a drill sergeant with hemorrhoids. Mr. Nasty considered Bo's offer of friendship an invasion of privacy and latched onto Bo's nose. And when a bull terrier latches onto something, it doesn't let go. And the harder you try to get away, the more he rips your lips off. Meanwhile, Bo was not enjoying this meet and greet a whole lot and couldn't figure out whether to growl or cry so he did quite a lot of both.

You basically have two "extraction" strategies open to you. Thankfully Mr. Nasty's owners knew both:
1. put your fingers over the terrier's nostrils so it can't breathe. Then it will let go. Easier said than done. When the owner tried it, she just got herself bit. How that happened I'm not sure since the terrier never let go of Bo's cheek. Maybe Bo bit her in desperation.
2. dump hot water over Mr. Nasty's head. The daughter tried that. It worked. He let go momentarily and I pulled Bo to safety. The iron gate was always between them so only Bo's nose (nice ring to that don't you think?) was ever in jeopardy.

Bo's face was amazingly still intact. I was afraid that I would be picking up pieces and rushing him to the vet for reconstructive surgery. He had pierce marks on his cheek but otherwise no damage, except to his pride. His cheek is still a little swollen but it doesn't look infected. I'd like to think he's learned a lesson about the cruel world and that not everyone wants to be his friend, but only time will tell. So far, he has steered clear of the neighbour's gate. I'm just glad Mr. Nasty didn't get ahold of Bo's throat. When I told our daughter Jenny about Bo's Big Adventure, she wrote and told us that there was a third option but Val says I'm not allowed to tell you what it was. Suffice it to say that if option three ever became necessary, I'd just buy Bo a really nice tombstone.

In a recent newsletter, I published our new phone number. Good move. But unfortunately I did not give you the correct number. Bad Move. Here is the correct address and phone number:

P.O. Box 1514
Okahandja, Namibia
011-264-62-504971 (from U.S.)
062-504971 (from Namibia)

If you decide to bless us with a phone call (and we hope you do; we miss you), bless yourself first by purchasing a pre-paid calling card with cheap rates for Namibia. Calling from your home phone is much more expensive. Don't do it; you won't like the results.

One more housekeeping item. Lon's email address has changed to Lon.Garber@northlandchurch.net
The only difference is that we changed the "cc" to "church." Val's remains the same; valgarber@iway.na

CHURCH DISTRIBUTED UPDATE

Once every three or four months, we have a meeting of all ministries that are part of Northland's distributed ministry network here in Namibia. The purpose of the meeting is to become more involved in each other's ministries, which further strengthens the network. This meeting was initiated by Nan Parker in July 2004. Thanks Nan, your loving efforts are still bearing fruit. With each new meeting, we are becoming more and more inter-connected. The format of the meeting is very loose. We just start talking about what we are doing in our various ministries and exciting things begin to happen. We share personal connections that may help us in our various ministry projects. We plan joint ministry activities. We pray with each other. We minister to one another. We begin to meet more and more after the meeting and the net result is that God's kingdom in Namibia becomes stronger and more connected. It is so encouraging to watch this happen. I wish everyone of you could witness it. We are building God's kingdom and realizing that it is one kingdom, rather than a bunch of feudal estates all positioning for territory.

The Bible Baptist Church in the Vyf Rand Camp has acquired enough funds to build a wonderful pre-school building in the camp, but they must purchase the land before building can begin. The municipality has set a price for the land that is many times in excess of the true market value of the land. They have set a price based on what they hope the land will become someday, without recognizing that today it is still a squatter's area. Many other municipalities in Namibia donate land for church use. We have petitioned the town council to pass a special resolution to donate the land based on the many community development projects currently hosted by the church. We are now awaiting their decision. We have met with the regional governor and he has promised to intercede with the municipality on our behalf. We now ask all of you to join the intercession effort with your prayers.

ON THE HOMEFRONT

Richard Hanna and Calvin Synder are currently developing a teaching series that they will use in Burma later this year and hopefully in Namibia as well. I have reviewed the material and it is excellent. Richard continues to be a source of personal inspiration to the teacher in me and we are both sounding boards for each other's teaching. Calvin and I taught together in the Life Training Center for many years. Thank you, Richard and Calvin, for all that you have added to my life over the past decades of teaching together.

Thanks Roy, Bud and Ginny for all your hard work and for your constant companionship over these last weeks. Thanks, Cecilia, for letting us borrow your blessed husband. It was so wonderful having close friends stay, play and work with us for the glory of God. And now our guest flat is awaiting the rest of you. Just don't all come at once.

Speaking of the homefront, we are planning our annual return trip to the States from mid-April until mid-May. We will be in Orlando during the third week in April and again during the second week in May. In between, we will be visiting churches and relatives in other places. We hope to spend time with many of you then, but it will be impossible to spend personal time with all of you. And yet, we really want to share with you from our heart things that just can't be shared in newsletters. We are therefore hoping that some of you will be willing to host a ministry gathering (at Northland or in your home) where we can share with you all that God is doing in, through and with us as we share our gifts with the Namibian people. If you are willing to help, just email us and we will help get you all together. And once again, we will need access to a vehicle for times when we are in Orlando. Let us know if you can help make us mobile during our visit.

FINANCIAL SUMMARY

We ended our year approximately $10,000 below our projected support level. The shortfall has been absorbed by a surplus in prior years, but our incoming support dollars need to increase in 2005. We are confident that if we remain faithful to our calling, God will lay it on the hearts of many of you to invest $25 a month in our ministry. You can contribute through Northland, A Church Distributed by designating your gift for the ministry of Lon and Val Garber. If that is not possible, let us know your desire and we will make other arrangements.

We have not yet received detailed accounting information for 2005 donors. We will keep you posted as soon as we receive the information. And in the meantime, thanks to all of you who faithfully support us each month. When we find out who you are, we will thank you personally.

PRAYER AND PRAISE POINTS

·PRAISE - for the beautiful Namibian Craft Training Centre. It has water and a sink, lots of lockable storage, cool breezes in the heat of the day and lots of light. Praise God, what a blessing.
·PRAISE - wonderful summer rains. Rain is never taken from granted in this hot, desert climate.
·PRAISE - for American friends who came and blessed us so much with their love.
·PRAISE - that God has given me another godly young man to mentor in ministry.
·PRAYER - marketing help for Val. We now have more products than places to sell them !
·PRAYER - for God to send the right ladies for the new project Val has in mind.
·PRAYER - for the exchange rate to start going up. The buying power of the American dollar has been cut in half in the few years since we decided to move to Namiba
·PRAYER - for favor with the municipality of Okahandja concerning the purchase of the land on which to build a pre-school, church, parsonage and a more permanent craft training centre.
·PRAYER - traveling safety when we return to the States in April
·PRAYER - for bargain airfares.
·PRAYER - it's not too soon to begin praying for the renewal of our work permits in August 2005.

December, 2004

Chronicles of namibia
Lon and Val Garber on Assignment
December 2004

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year (English)
frohe Weihnachten und ein gesegnetes neues Jahr (German)
geseënde Kersfees en 'n gelukkige nuwe jaar (Afrikaans)
okilisimesa nayimuyambekelwe no ndula yipe yinelawo (Oshiwambo)
joyeux Noël et bonne année (French)
buon Natale e felice anno nuovo (Italian)
חג מולד שמח ושנה טובה (Hebrew)
feliz Navidad y próspero año Nuevo (Spanish)
Boas Festas e Feliz Ano Novo; Feliz Natal (Brazilian Portuguese)
Shenoraavor Nor Dari yev Pari Gaghand (Armenian)
Pozdrevlyayu s prazdnikom Rozhdestva is Novim Godom; Hristos Razdajetsja (Russian)
Kung His Hsin Nien bing Chu Shen Tan (Mandarin Chinese)
Nollaig Shona Dhuit; Nodlig mhaith chugnat (Irish)
En frehlicher Grischtdaag un en hallich Nei Yaahr! (Pennsylvania German – Lon’s roots)
Sinifesela Ukhisimusi Omuhle Nonyaka Omusha Onempumelelo (Zulu)
Siniqwenelela Ikrisimesi EmnandI Nonyaka Omtsha Ozele Iintsikelelo Namathamsanqa (Khosa)

...to all of our friends and family all around the globe. I think we’ve covered all of the languages that you speak. Did I leave any out? May God richly bless you in the coming year as He has blessed us this year.

LON’S MINISTRY NEWS
During the Christmas season, Namibians traditionally take a long holiday and therefore all ministry activities in the country slow down considerably. It is therefore a time for Lon and Val to recharge our batteries, gather strength for the new year and take time to read some of the books we intended to read earlier but never seemed to have the time.

So instead of giving you ministry news this month, I would like to tell you some sad stories about a few of my friends. The first is about Johannes Kayimbe. He and his wife Pelgrina were two of my students during my first trip to Namibia in October, 2001. Pelgrina had just given birth to their first child and so they brought their new son to the training as well. Johannes was a quiet student, but his eyes told you that he was soaking up the teaching and learning a lot. Johannes is also a story of hope for the future. He is the son of a Kavango chief, but he decided to devote his future to serving the Lord of Lords instead of ruling over his tribal territory. Raising support for ministry in Namibia is difficult for Namibians because it is a foreign concept in this culture. And yet Johannes had successfully done it and served as a positive example to others that it is possible. Early this year, Johannes talked to me about taking a ministry sabbatical after 7 years of faithful service to Youth for Christ in Rundu. He told me that he was tired and needed to seek new direction from God for his ministry. But before he could take his sabbatical, he died of AIDS in September. He contracted the virus shortly before becoming a Christian and carried it silently for many years. Sadly, his wife and young boy have also tested positive for HIV. This is the tragedy of AIDS. It is not only killing godless people who are openly practicing sexual promiscuity. It is killing faithful Christian servants who made a few bad choices before giving their life to Christ.

I’d also like you to meet Isaac. Isaac is a big man. He dwarfs me when he interprets my teachings into Luchazi at Omgumlambasha Baptist Church. But he is also a gentle man in his mid-twenties. He has a smile that is a mile wide and he shows it often. But his smile also covers much sadness. When he failed to come to my weekly Bible study one evening in early November, the others informed me that he had just received news of his brother’s death. So after the study concluded, we all went to Isaac’s house to sit with him and comfort and pray for his family. Most of the time is spent in silence and you realize the power of presence: just being there is far more important than consoling words. Yet since I am the “pastor from America” I am always asked to say a few words and pray aloud for the family. I am honoured and humbled to do so. But this night, the local pastor leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Pasta Lon, please now speak sermon.” I am unaccustomed to preaching impromptu funeral sermons, but the Holy Spirit is not. So that night I preached a funeral message for Isaac’s brother, whom I have never met. Somehow, it is easier to realize how compassionate God is for our deep sorrows when you are grieving with people on a dirt plot outside a homemade shack in the dark of night since no one in the neighbourhood has electricity. As we grieved together, Isaac told us that just after he received word of his brother’s death in Luderitz, he then received a call that another brother had just died in Rundu. Two brothers died the same day within hours of each other. Earlier this year, two of his sisters died and his brother-in-law. He has lost 4 siblings and a brother-in-law this year alone. All were young and all probably died of AIDS. AIDS is no longer a distant news story or statistic to us. It is killing our friends and their families.

VAL’S MINISTRY NEWS
Once again we are in need of a moved mountain! A huge part our work here, is located in the Five Rand Squatter’s camp here in Okahandja . Val works with ladies teaching craft skills, and Lon teaches a Bible study. Pastor Thomas and his wife have worked there for 10 years now. There have been dreams of building a preschool, church, and craft building on the site for years and years, but there has been delay after delay. First there was the wait for the municipality to survey the land and establish plots (otherwise we might build, only to find it was someone else’s property J). Then plans had to be drawn up. Of course the matter of $$ has always been an issue, but recently, thru private donations, we have raised enough (we thought) to at least begin the preschool building. (The existing preschool building becomes the Val’s craft school after the new school gets built).

Next we found that the city would not allow the building to start until the land was purchased, but they told us don’t worry it will be cheap! (ha ha) Finally after many delays and meetings, the city set the price. $55,000 N or about $10,000 US dollars. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! This is about what we have raised to build with. If we buy the land (which is actually worthless, since who else wants to buy land in a squatter’s camp?) then we once again have no $$ to build with. It seems the city has dreams of turning Five Rand into a “real” town, and so, they are pricing the land as if it already had the value of developed property. The problem is, no one there has money to actually build or buy the land (except the bar/club owners). Drinking is a real problem in Five Rand as people try to drown the despair of poverty . Also, the bar owners give credit, and on pay day, people often owe their whole pay check to the bar. It is reminiscent of a modern-day Grapes of Wrath.

We were told that our only recourse was to write a letter to the town council asking for an exception to be made. The council does not meet until late January (after we had hoped to begin building). Please, please pray for a breakthrough! See prayer points below.

PERSONAL NOTES
We had an absolutely wonderful time with our daughters, Jenny and Jamie, who were here during the last two weeks in November. For Thanksgiving dinner, we feasted on kudu, gemsbok, crocodile, zebra and ostrich. There was not a turkey anywhere in sight. When we weren’t eating African game, we were visiting them in the wild. We spent a few days in the Etosha Game Reserve and were able to see lions, elephant, rhino, giraffe, zebra, kudu, oryx, impala, warthog, jackal, mongoose, dassie, springbok, steenbok wildebeest, kori bustards, and secretary birds. But our favorite animal encounter was with the female lion we met while she was about to cross the track we were traveling. Instead she decided to run with us about 10 feet to the side of our truck, all the time wondering if she could manage to drag all four of us home to Leo for his breakfast. Here is a photo of her after she slowed down and we had recovered enough to find our camera.

Last month I incorrectly listed our new home phone number. I gave the old area code instead of the new one. So here it is again:

011-264-62-504971 (from U.S.)
062-504971 (from Namibia)

CHURCH DISTRIBUTED UPDATE
The pre-school building project in Vyf Rand (Five Rand) camp is building bridges between four different churches and cultures. Northland, a church in Pisgah, Alabama, Khomas Community Church in Windhoek and Bible Baptist Church in Okahandja are joining hands to build a pre-school building for disadvantaged children in this poverty-ridden area near our home in Okahandja. This school gives two essential gifts to these precious children in this squatter’s area: English and a knowledge of Jesus Christ. This is a wonderful example of the distributed church in action.

ON THE HOMEFRONT
We are so excited that Roy and Ginny Nelson and Bud Abt are coming to visit us in late January. This will be the third ministry construction project we’ve worked on together: Northland renovation, construction of Camp ToKnowHim in northern Alabama and now Vyf Rand Pre-school here in Okahandja.

And today Nan Parker and Larry Sherman arrive to spend Christmas in Namibia and to help us plan for Northland’s involvement in Namibian expressions of the distributed church in 2005. We are looking forward to seeing them again and sharing this Christmas season with some of our American friends. It is very encouraging to receive visitors that remind us of all of you back home.

FINANCIAL SUMMARY
We want to keep you abreast concerning how God is supplying our financial needs for our work here in Namibia. Northland has sent us out as their representatives and graciously supplies 25% of our support base and wonderful friends like you supply the remaining 75% that enables us to remain as Namibia’s link in the church distributed. So here is a recap in U.S. dollars so far for 2004:

YTD Love Offerings: $ 25,464
YTD Budgeted Need: 37,812
Balance of Ministry Account: $ - 12,348

We are still hoping that God will place it on some of your hearts to help reduce this deficit.

PRAYER AND PRAISE POINTS
- Praise God for our wonderful time with our daughters.
- Praise God that he is continuing to provide more marketing outlets for Work of our Hands products
- Pray that the devil not be the only one with land in Five Rand.
- Pray that the town council will actually get our request on the agenda for their first meeting in January.
- Pray for mercy and favour with the town council,
- Pray for wisdom that we know if this is a sign we should look for land near, but not in Five Rand Camp. If we must actually buy worthless land (valuable to us, but absolutely no resale value once ‘s purchased) then
- Pray God provides the money so that we can also build!

November, 2004

Chronicles of Namibia
Lon and Val Garber on Assignment
We are trying to simplify our newsletter format to minimize the size requirements and formatting problems encountered by various email providers. Toward that end, we will post photographs on our internet site instead of including them in the newsletter itself.

LON’S MINISTRY NEWS
In conjunction with developing written lessons for our Pastors Bible Correspondence Course, on Monday evenings, I am test teaching those lessons to the next generation leaders of two churches in the Okahandja area: Bible Baptist Church in the Vyf Rand (Five Rand) informal settlement and the Full Gospel Church in the Nau Aib neighborhood (the old location during former apartheid times). We have completed the first six lessons of a 48 lesson course of study. It contains 24 O.T. lessons, 12 N.T. lessons and 12 lessons on basic Christian theology. It is a two hour study including a question and answer time at the end of each session. The Q & A time ends when I can no longer see the expressions on their faces as we interact. It is an evening class and there is no electricity at the church tent. This week, we studied the life of Jacob and what we learn about his character from his two names, Jacob (“He who follows after”) and Israel (“He who struggles with God”).

On Wednesday evenings I am teaching a Bible study on Christian financial principles at the Omgulambasha Baptist Church in the Omgulambasha informal settlement, just north of Windhoek. CROWN Ministries has graciously given me permission to use the CROWN study as a basis for this teaching. The Scriptures are the same, but I adapt the teaching heavily to make it relevant to an African context and more specifically to a poor Kavango audience. It is such a joy to watch them get excited about what God’s word says about money and its proper use. Last night’s study was on giving and the benefits that accrue to the person who gives to others from an attitude of love.

Two weekends each month, we travel to Swakopmund where I preach and conduct leadership training for their elders. I also make myself available for pastoral counsel since they do not have a pastor. The church offered to hire me as their pastor, but we declined since God has a much larger mission for us to accomplish in our African ministry. I have, however, offered to mentor pastoral interns that they designate in order to train a Namibian person to fill the role of pastor in this young congregation. Through the end of 2005, I am preaching on the topic of faith and how it is practically applied in our lives. We are marching through the Bible looking at positive and negative examples of faith (or lack of it) in action.

I am also cultivating a relationship with another church in town, the Swakopmund Christian Centre. I will also soon begin a training program for their leaders and on occasion I will preach in their Sunday evening service.

In my recent trip to the Congo, God provided the opportunity to train 85 pastors from the Kinshasa area. In between teaching times, I toured the city and learned some things about life in a city of 8 million people. Due in part to the recent war, the population of Kinshasa has doubled in the last 8 years. One of the things I learned was how many Congolese can fit into a 1960’s vintage VW bus. The answer: 28 plus those who hang onto the outside. This is standard public transportation in an overcrowded city. I look forward to my next trip in January when I will stay for a week and train 500 pastors.

One of my goals in Namibia is to connect with each other, all of the churches and ministries that have independent relationships with Northland. Part of the vision for the church distributed is an interdependent network of churches and ministries working, serving and worshiping together. Toward that end, Nan Parker brought all of the ministries together in July for a joint meeting. I recently facilitated the second such meeting, which will now be a quarterly event. It was exciting to see these ministries reporting and dreaming and praying together. Even more exciting was the experience of seeing them begin to plan ways that they can assist each other in ministry.

God is moving mightily at Khomas Community Church, a church in a Windhoek neighborhood that Northland helped plant several years ago. Patrick Britz, the new senior pastor, reports the following:

We as a church just had a wonderful spiritual revival in our church and community. We revived our small group ministry and we had 16 couples who served as hosts (small group leaders), 70% of them are continuing until early December. Close to 35 people gave their hearts to the Lord and we are busy with follow-up. Four of our hosts are helping with the follow-up of young believers. Lon gave us excellent materials for follow-up and discovering your spiritual life.

God is busy accomplishing many other things in and through our ministry, but I’d like to close this report with a story I call “The Cattle Baron.” Little did I think that one of my ministry roles in Namibia would be to help enterprising young adults develop business plans for entrepreneurial efforts they want to launch in order to provide funds for ministry. But this past Sunday afternoon, I sat down with Linus Albertus and helped him write his first business plan for a cattle business he hopes to launch in northern Namibia. Together we outlined his business strategy, established a mark-up percentage, identified needed equipment costs, the monthly fixed cost of running the business, weekly variable costs and most importantly how much money he needs in order to launch this endeavor. He now knows an exact figure for his start-up costs and the monthly sales target he must reach to make his plans succeed. The bottom line: he must sell 6 cows a month to achieve his immediate financial goals. His motivation? He wants to marry Donisa Shilongo and provide a home for them to live in. I keep you posted on his progress.

VAL’S MINISTRY NEWS
Well, ain’t it just like life, after cooling our heels for what seemed like forever waiting for our work permits, since our return to Namibia, we have been meeting ourselves coming and going. Besides the time and hassles of moving, ministry opportunities are blossoming everywhere.

One of my first priorities upon our return was to redesign the papier-mâché bowls to a more rustic “African” look as requested by the Namibian Craft Center in Windhoek. After doing so, they placed a large order with promises of more to come. The website will contain a photo of the new designs. We are also selling the new designs wholesale to a very nice gift shop in Swakopmund. The bead project is also going well and we were able to sell about 20 items to a different gift shop in Swakopmund.

The literacy effort in Five Rand however, needs your prayers. After an enthusiastic beginning, with great initial results, Isabella’s students are falling away. (After all, would you have gone to school as a child or teenager if you weren’t made to go?) Many students lack the discipline of working toward long term goals, especially when there is hard work and no $ involved. Pray for Isabella to be encouraged by the Lord. She goes faithfully to teach, walking 3 kilometers there and 3 kilometers back in the heat of summer, to find from 6 to 0 students showing up for class.

Our new home/ministry center hosted it’s first ladies retreat the first week of October. Because of long distances in Namibia, weekly classes are not always possible. We therefore condensed the eight weeks of HEALING PAST EMOTIONAL HURTS into a week-long seminar. Seven ladies attended with five staying the week in our guest flat and guest room. For the first time, I taught this class with no drop outs (they couldn’t get away J ) It was a great success, and I have requests to do another class soon. See the website for a group photo.

If you want an idea of Namibian lifestyles, check out the options one has for ironing in Namibia. I took this photo recently of an in-store display. (See web site after Nov 21st)
PERSONAL NOTES
We have completed our move to Okahandja and have mostly settled into our new home and ministry center. . For those we may have missed our earlier notice, our new address/phone numbers are as follows:

P.O. Box 1514
Okahandja, Namibia
011-264-61-504971 (from U.S.)
061-504971 (from Namibia)

We have a new Namibian family member. His name is Mambo. He is an S.P.C.A special so we are not sure the breed. We think he has some shepherd in him. More than a pet and family member, he is also a watchdog since we do not have a security system protecting our new home.

Lon was involved in an auto accident in late September and we just got our bakkie (pickup truck) back from the panel beaters (body shop) this past week. So we were without the use of our only vehicle for 6 weeks. But God is good and enabled us to continue our ministry activities with the loving help of friends who loaned us vehicles, use of the Intercape bus and occasional walking. We were so excited to be re-united with our Isuzu yesterday. No, Lon was not seriously hurt, but as the emergency room doctor was patching up the gash in his head, he said to Lon: “This cut is not too bad, I just can’t stop the bleeding.” Just one more thing you don’t want to hear a doctor say while you are laying on operating table.

We also want to thank you all for your ongoing offerings of love, support and prayer. We feel your presence and love in our lives all the time. We hope that you also feel more connected to the African or American church (depending on your vantage point) because of our presence here.

CHURCH DISTRIBUTED UPDATE
We would like to share from time to time small examples of the distributed church in action. Lon’s recent trip to the Congo demonstrates the global church connected. He began interacting with his host pastor via email over a year ago, due to a relationship he had established with Jim Laird, Northland’s new director of Distributed Ministries. Jim’s connection with Pastor Mushadi came through our longstanding relationship with Youth for Christ Namibia and more recently Christ’s Hope International. Pastor Mushadi is a board member for CHI. And now Pastor Mushadi has provided an opportunity for Northland to be involved in training a network of over 500 pastors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This is the distributed church, “linking global communities for ministry and worship everywhere, every day.”

ON THE HOMEFRONT
We would like to thank our faithful friend Hazel Sun, who provides wonderful support for our ministry from the States. Not only was she a godsend to us when we sold our home in America, but she continues to help us with stateside financial assistance and she regularly sends us news and magazine articles she knows will be of interest to us

We would also like to thank J.T. and LeDonna Almon for the many ways they assist us every day. They graciously supply us with a guest flat when we return to the Orlando area. They manage our stateside mail and help us in many other ways, including tutoring us in the care and maintenance of our new ministry center pool. That’s right God supplied us with a pool. The only suitable home available in Okahandja when we had to find a home and move within 13 days, came equipped with a small pool. It is a wonderful respite from the hot summer heat and we are making it available for local ministries, such as CHI to use as well.

Please take a moment and join us in a prayer of thanksgiving for Hazel and J.T. and LeDonna and a prayer of blessing on all of their endeavors. We are eternally grateful for their friendship, support and faithful assistance.

FINANCIAL SUMMARY
We want to keep you abreast concerning how God is supplying our financial needs for our work here in Namibia. Northland has sent us out as their representatives and graciously supplies 25% of our support base and wonderful friends like you supply the remaining 75% that enables us to remain as Namibia’s link in the church distributed. So here is a recap in U.S. dollars for 2004:

YTD Love Offerings: $ 19,509
YTD Budgeted Need: 34,375
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Balance of Ministry Account: $ 14,563 -

PRAYER AND PRAISE POINTS
- Praise God for our support partners who faithfully pray for us and those who provide financial support.
- Pray that God would raise up more monthly support to address our 2004 deficit and improve the value of the U.S. dollar so the money we have can stretch further.
- Isabella’s literacy class as explained above
- Pray that we will have the discipline to say NO to worthy requests when our schedules get too full.
- Pray for discernment in knowing which ministry possibilities to say YES to.
- Pray for wisdom and sensitivity for Lon as he continues to train young African leaders
- Pray for growth and maturity for Val’s ladies as she trains them in business and life skills
- Thanksgiving and blessings for our friends Hazel, J.T. and LeDonna
- Thanksgiving for the fixing of our bakkie (an essential ministry tool) at a reasonable fee.
- We are so thankful that God continues to provide the opportunity for us to live and minister in this country we have grown to love.

October, 2004

Church Distributed in Action:
Update on Lon and Val in Namibia

By Distributed Pastor Lon Garber

Everything is going wonderfully. We are settling into our new home, and we are getting back involved in our ministry connections in Namibia. I have resumed my weekly Bible study in the Babilon squatters’ camp. I have been teaching a weekly Bible study at Omgulambasha Baptist Church #2 since last October. This church is closely associated with the Bible Baptist Church in Vyf Rand squatters’ camp near Okahandja. Both congregations are from the Kavango tribe, whose tribal homeland is in the northeast part of the country along the Kavango River. They are the woodcarvers of the country.

Last week I started a series on finances. I will be teaching them from the Scripture verses used in the Crown Financial material. Each week I will teach a biblical financial principle and help them learn a verse in English. Last week I taught the principle that God owns everything. During the study, I asked the question: “Does God love rich people more than poor people because He gives them more money?” A student named Mateas responded with the following answer:

No, God rather watches what we do with the money He has given us. If we spend it selfishly, He is disappointed with us. If we are generous and share it with others, He is pleased. His pleasure is not determined by how much He gives us; it is determined by how we spend whatever He gives us.

The distributed church continues to spread its wings. In October I will be traveling to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to lead a retreat for 50 pastors in Kinshasa and to plan a follow-up retreat for January that will be attended by 500 pastors. God is good.

One Sunday in July 2003, after worshiping at Pastor Thomas Mbundu’s Bible Baptist Church (Vyf Rand, Okahandja) with Rebekah Richey’s mission team, visiting Pastor Mathias Nsamba introduced himself to me and said: “Pastor Thomas has much help from Americans in this church. There is no one helping our church in Babilon. Will you come help us too?” So we began forming a relationship with them. We visited him and his wife, Sirrka, in their humble home made of corrugated metal combined in the fashion of a patchwork quilt. Sirrka runs a small preschool that is attached to their home. I was taken by the simple plaque on their wall, which reads: “We may be poor, but we are rich in the Lord.” As is my custom (I think I learned it from Joel before leaving for Namibia), I asked them: “How can I best help your church?” Mathias replied: “Come teach us the Bible. We love the Lord, but we don’t know much about the Bible.” So that is what I have been doing.

My two star students are the pastors themselves. They have no training as pastors, just a willingness to lead and serve. I began by teaching them my Panoramic Tour of the Bible course. I felt it would be an excellent backdrop for everything else I would teach them from the Bible. It would give them context and an ability to see how it all fits together. Each week my assistant, George Steinbach, would go with me. It was the third time he had been through the same material. George has a true servant’s heart. He is very shy and therefore likes to serve quietly, behind the scenes. And yet, a small voice within me whispered that he yearned to be a teacher. So one day I asked him if he would ever like to teach a portion of one of my lessons. To my surprise, he eagerly agreed to teach the next lesson himself. So the next week, he taught the whole lesson and did a wonderful job. So I became his teaching mentor, and he taught several more lessons under my direction. As a result, when we had to leave Namibia in February, George continued and finished teaching the course on his own. Isn’t God good? And now George has moved on to serve the Lord in Botswana with Youth for Christ there. A major part of his new job: teaching. God is very good! That is why I love to mentor.

The Democratic Republic of Congo
The invitation came from Pastor Mushadi Ntambue. He is a friend of Jos Holzhausen, and Jos has traveled many times to the Congo to minister with him in Kinshasa. Jim Laird met him through Jos. Jim Laird then asked me to make contact with Mushadi from Namibia, so we began an e-mail relationship. My first opportunity to meet Mushadi came in April, when we were both in Orlando. We met at Northland and planned these two trips. Each year in January, 500 pastors from around the country gather from a week-long retreat to gather vision and encouragement for the year from each other. Pastor Mushadi invited me to come and be their speaker for 2005. To plan and prepare for that retreat, a group of 50 pastors will meet in October. I am going there this month to lead a weekend mini-retreat for the planning pastors and to help them decide on a theme and teaching topics for the January retreat.

February, 2004

We are overwhelmed by your prayers and words of support and encouragement. We have received several hundred personal emails from you this past weekend, from all over the world. Many of you have forwarded our request for prayer to your own prayer networks. We have heard from friends in Australia, Italy, Germany, England, Ireland, South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and the United States. Email is such a wonderful prayer tool. We had friends who published our letter on their prayer networks who in turn had members publish it on other networks. You prayed for us in worship services at Northland and in other churches in Florida and Ohio (that we know of).

So when we woke up this morning we were at total peace with our situation, and expectantly looking forward to what God would do. I knew that you all were still praying fervently for us. Last night Manus drove 200 miles across the desert to be with us today. Sylvia drove 60 miles from Rehoboth. George stayed home from work to be with us. So supported by your prayers and my close, close friends I called the man in Immigration who held our passports and our immediate future in his hands. His name is Kosmos. I made an appointment to talk to him about our situation. We left Val at home, so in case they arrested or detained me, she would still be free to call the embassy, the Marines and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And of course, all of you.

The first thing Kosmos did when I arrived in his office was hand me a gospel tract and say, "this is a gift for you." Government officials can do that in Namibia. I was only tempted for a second to ask him if he would help me become a Christian. I mean, could he possibly arrest or deport someone he had just led to Christ? But I resisted the temptation. Before I had a chance to thank God for placing me in the hands of a Christian immigration agent, Kosmos turned me over to another agent and left. Mr. Kapolo, however, turned out to be equally as nice and very helpful.

Having tried many times to describe our complicated story of approval and denial, I realized how hard it was for an official to understand all of those details verbally. So I had prepared a short summary of what had transpired since we arrived in Namibia a little over a year ago. I was also a little afraid that if I told the story orally, I would again fall back on my powers of persuasion rather than rest in God's arms. So rather than try and convince him orally, I just handed him the short historical description of the facts from our perspective and asked him to read it. He read it thoroughly, asked a few questions and excused himself. 15 minutes later he returned and gave me our passports back, said there were no problems, but that we would have to submit new applications for work permits. To do so, we would need to leave the country while they were being processed. He gave us as much time as we need to prepare to leave. That in itself was a miracle. Three days is the maximum length of time they normally give someone with a passport problem.

He did not stamp an order to leave the country in our passports. We will call him once we are ready and he will notify the border control agents to let us leave the country without detaining us. This is a true blessing since a close friend of ours was arrested at the border this past weekend because of a passport problem. The fact that he did not stamp our passports with an order to leave the country is an added blessing. That stamp would have caused us a problem and lengthy explanations whenever we would cross the border in the future.

Upon departure, we will submit our new applications. We will stay in South Africa while we await a decision concerning our new applications. For reasons too numerous to mention in this brief praise report, we are confident that our new applications will be approved in due time. If the time extends from weeks to months, we will return to the States and await the decision in both Florida and Colorado.

After cordially answering all my questions, he returned our passports and wished us a pleasant day. Manus, Sylvia and I left the building quickly without our feet ever touching the ground. George was anxiously awaiting us at the entrance and we celebrated on the sidewalk with a prayer of thanksgiving. God is so good.

What have we learned in the past few weeks about God and faith? We exhausted all known ways to try and impact a positive resolution to our problem. We had used every contact we could find (literally dozens of people tried to help us) and at the end, we were powerless to effect an approval or even to discover our true status. We finally turned the whole situation over to God in our helplessness and He acted powerfully on our behalf. We are, of course are now wondering why we delayed so long. As one close German friend told me recently, you have placed yourselves totally in the hands of God and now you are completely out of the hands of the officials. That wisdom proved very true today.

One more interesting observation about how God has worked in our lives. It is virtually impossible to actually have a face-to-face conversation with someone inside the Home Affairs bureaucracy. They don't answer their phones, they don't return calls and you can't get past the front door unless they leave word at the guard station that they are expecting you. Even then it is difficult because they don't answer their phones for the guard to announce you either and so the guard tells you that, even though you are expected, they are not available. The only way to contact them is to know someone who knows their private cell phone number. However, once they confiscated our passports, they suddenly wanted to talk to us. So what I had been trying to accomplish for months became a reality in a matter of minutes this morning. At times the road to God's safety must first pass through the gauntlet of danger. It's a trust thing; God seems committed to it

December, 2003

Merry Christmas
Yes, it is the Christmas season in Namibia even though it doesn’t feel like it. It is the middle of summer and many of the things that remind us of past Christmas seasons are missing: friends and family, Christmas Eve worship, family traditions. But the most important Christmas memory is ever present in our hearts and minds: Emmanuel – God with us.

Lon just finished an Advent sermon series at Swakop River Community Church. Normally, we use Advent as a means of preparing ourselves for Christ’s coming. Instead he preached on the ways Christ prepared Himself for His own coming to Earth. Here is a synopsis.

First, He emptied Himself of His power and position as God to remind us that we are nothing in and of ourselves. Then He filled Himself with the Father. He placed Himself under the Father’s authority, did His Father’s work according to His Father’s will and in accordance with His Father’s wisdom. This reminds us that we are totally dependent on our Creator and Heavenly Father. Finally, Christ subjected Himself to the sufferings of a fallen world. That meant being misunderstood, doubted, and deserted by his friends; disrespected, challenged and attacked by His peers; and relentlessly pursued by His enemies. He suffered all that to prepare Himself to redeem us from our own suffering.

People often ask, “What kind of God could allow so much pain and suffering in the world? The answer is: the kind of God who climbed down from His throne, and came to earth to suffer WITH us and to provide a way to thereby lift us above our pain and distress. God is not in the business of removing suffering; He is in the business of redeeming it. Christ suffered the worst thing that ever happened in the history of the world and turned it into the best thing that has ever happened. Merry Christmas to all of you.

Blessed are the poor in spirit …
More and more we are being called to the poor people of Namibia. We are now working in three squatter’s camps (Windhoek, Okahandja and Swakopmund).

Val’s work in Okahandja is going very well. Finally, most of the skill training is past, and they are actually selling bowls. Both Val and the ladies were smiling from ear-to-ear when the bowls were finally ready to sell. During the training process, many naysayers tried to convince Val that the bowls would never sell to Namibians (too expensive), so Val was especially pleased when the bowls started selling almost as fast as the ladies could make them. Christmas is a wonderful selling time even in Namibia.

Now that the craftswomen are making money, lots of ladies want to make bowls; even the one’s who dropped out in the beginning. They will slowly add staff as the first ladies learn to supervise their work. The next challenge is teaching them how to handle their newly earned finances. Saving for the future is not a traditional squatter’s camp value and those who earn money are often envied and persecuted by those who have none.

Lon is teaching a weekly Bible class in another squatter’s camp just outside of Windhoek. It is exciting to watch the Bible come alive for them for the first time in their lives. One student told Lon that they had been praying for years to have someone come and explain the Bible to them in ways they could understand it. Comments like that are very motivating.

Teaching and ministering to the poor adds a whole new dimension to walking out the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Each week after the teaching, there is an opportunity to personally minister to some family in the church. One week, we visited a family whose “home” had just burned down that morning. It was just a shack built with scrap metal tacked onto wooden poles, but it was their home, their clothes and all their earthly possessions. GONE. It was a sobering sight to visit and pray for them. It really puts life into perspective and humbles you.

They didn’t have much before, but now they have nothing. But there is something unquench-able about the human spirit. When we arrived, friends were already helping rebuild a temporary shelter for the night. When our homes burn down, we move into a hotel until our insurance company provides money to rebuild a new home. In the squatter’s camp, there is no such thing as insurance. You live outside without a home until you can build another shack. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

We are also beginning to build relationships with families who live in the DRC, a squatter’s camp in Swakopmund. In Africa, you build relationship first and then you begin ministry. We are doing that now with Augustinus, a pastor of a small church in the DRC. He is also a staff member of the non-profit foundation we are joining. (See work permit article.) We hope to begin ministry in the DRC next year. DRC is an acronym for Democratic Republic of the Congo. Nobody seems to know why it’s the name of an informal settlement in Namibia.

Swakop River Community Church
We are continuing our work with Swakop River Community Church, whose slogan is “Where the river flows there is Life.” A dry riverbed “flows” beside the church; an underground river flows below it which greens the nearby foliage. It is a wonderful metaphor of life. The real life is the invisible life that flows below the surface. Lon is guiding them through their first ever Elder selection process and is preaching there on a regular basis as we build close relationships with many church members. Val is facilitating a Healing Past Emotional Hurts class with the ladies.

Khomas Community Church
Lon and Stephan are working on a project to teach Panoramic Tour of the Bible to their entire congregation. Stephan will preach on one lesson each week and during the following week, the cell groups will follow a study and discussion guide developed by Lon. Lon is busy developing the small group leader materials now.

Work Permit Status
We are mounting a new campaign that hopefully will finally produce the desired outcome. We are becoming board members of a newly forming non-profit foundation, which will provide leadership training and humanitarian services to the poor and disadvantaged population of Namibia. This organization will then apply for work permits for both Lon and Val to work for the organization. Lon will focus on training and Val on economic empowerment. The application will not reference churches or the fact that Lon is a pastor, so hopefully Home Affairs will see our activities as nation building in nature.

Daily Life
So besides teaching, and planning for the next teaching, how do we spend our days? Of course there are housework and errands wherever you live, but they are a bit more complicated in Namibia. They use clotheslines instead of dryers here. There is dust everywhere. As soon as you sweep it out the back door, it circles the house and sneaks back in the front.

Then there is shopping. Stores are open from Monday to Friday 9 to 5 and Saturday 9 to 1pm (no evening trips to Home Depot for that next-day project, or running out for the milk you forgot!) The grocery shopping has settled down to a routine now since we’ve learned about kilograms and litres, and new terms and brand names for normal grocery items. And we can find most things in one store (now that we know where to look and that we must stock up when we see something, because next time it may not be there).

Shopping for other things is still a bit of a challenge. One day the hardware store will have something, and next time they have never heard of it! We can’t buy the whole store out just in case we need something later.

And nothing is in the Yellow Pages, so when I’m looking for something, I just ask everyone I know if they have seen it and then go searching for it. Unfortunately, that takes a lot of time; however we usually also find places and things we never knew about, so all is not lost.

Windhoek seems small when you first get here, but there are so many hidden places to shop, it is quite a progressive adventure (Namibian businesses have yet to discover the power of advertising).

And just an aside on shopping - people think everything here is cheap. Not so. Food is less, and labor intensive things are less, but any electronics or imported items are out of sight, a lot more than in the U.S. and years old as far as technology goes. We can’t bring ourselves to buy a TV for instance because they are ridiculous in price. And arts and crafts supplies, IF you can find them, are about twice what they cost in the U.S.

Paying bills is quite another challenge. It is not safe to send money through the mail (either cash or checks). So you must hand deliver your bill payments.

Security is also a challenge. Theft is a significant problem. Everything must be locked all the time. Everyone lives behind electrified walls, but that does little to discourage the thieves. They are excellent climbers and electricians. You must have a security alarm (which you must show you have tested every few weeks) connected to a private armed-response service or the insurance company will deny your claim. One night Lon was up late and “surprised” a burglar trying to break into the back door. Val claims Lon’s late night studies are our best protection against theft.

If you call the police, they will commiserate with you, but they will not respond to your emergency. They will tell you, “Sorry we don’t have a car.” It can take months for them to even complete a police report for the robbery. That is why you must have a contract with a private armed response firm. They are well trained and quite responsive.

So you see, daily life is a bit different here, but we have adjusted to it nicely. We feel totally at home in Namibia and have a wonderful peace about our calling and our ministry here. We are exactly where God wants us to be doing what He has called us to do.

Language School
Val is very busy learning Oshindonga, an Oshiwambo dialect. Sixty to seventy percent of the Namibian population can speak some form of Oshiwambo. During the Spring (Fall for you) term, she took classes two nights a week at UNAM, the only university in Namibia. Val says, “It’s VERY slow going. The pronunciation is not too hard, but the grammar is almost impossible!” There are 11 classes of nouns alone, and all the pronouns change depending on the noun class. On the bright side, not many African whites here can speak it, so her feeble attempts are quite appreciated by the blacks, and sure to get a smile out of even the most dour looking.

Lon is busy learning German. Since Namibia was a German colony and still maintains close ties to Germany, much of the white population speaks German. Swakopmund is a German retirement community and favorite German tourist location. He now does his daily devotions entirely in Deutsch and has started reading German books and novels.

Most of the white population still speaks Afrikaans although the government stresses English over Afrikaans in order to better connect Namibia with the outside world and to separate it from unpleasant apartheid memories. Many blacks are therefore less inclined to speak Afrikaans even though they understand it.
Val has been thinking for some months now that if Christ had been born in 2003, He might have chosen a squatter’s camp for his birthplace. So a few weeks ago she did a photo shoot to depict what that might look like. The result is our Christmas card to you:

When the time came, He set aside the privileges of deity, and took on the status of a slave ...
Philippians 2 (The Message)

September, 2003

Work Permit Status
After being told our work permit was approved, they lost the file and we had to resubmit everything, which required another approval which was denied again.
The bottom line is that we still don’t know what our official status is. African bureaucracy is much more frustrating than American bureaucracy. It seems you could just contact the person handling your file and get answers. It doesn’t work that way. It is almost impossible to get in contact with that person (they are locked away behind tight security and they do not answer their phone). If you are successful in contacting them, they cannot find your file. They are not computerized and seemingly have no central filing system. Over a month ago, we hired an immigration attorney to try and find out our status and he cannot find out anything either.
In spite of the uncertainty, we are at peace with the whole situation. God keeps confirming that he wants us here, He is using this situation to deepen our faith, and we are meeting many people we with which we would otherwise not come into contact. We know that God will clarify our situation in His own time and so we continue with our ministry.
Please continue to pray that God will move the hearts of those within the government to look favorably upon us.

Khomas Elder Training
Lon and Richard Hanna are nearing the end of the 12-week elder training process at Khomas Community Church. Upon its completion, several of the 15 trainees will be given the opportunity to join the existing 2 elders in providing spiritual leadership for this young congregation. Several wives have commented that they have never seen their husbands so willing and so excited about their leadership involvement in the church. Please pray that God will give the existing pastors and elders much wisdom in the selection of new elders.
This is a big step in the development of this distributed church congregation. Northland helped launch this church over three years ago and continues to provide connection and spiritual direction to this congregation. Khomas is a wonderful example of the distributed church model. Northland is helping them behind the scenes in many practical ways while still allowing this local church to develop its own character and sense of mission within its local community.
Under the leadership of Pastor Stephan Nell and, Hank and Joyce Schauer, the church recently completed a community outreach for over 1,000 children within Khomasdal, a suburb of Windhoek.

Vyf Rand Squatters Camp
Val is continuing her work with ladies in the Vyf Rand (Five Dollar) settlement. She has been busy building a relationship with these ladies. Building trust is the biggest thing, because almost every white person in their past has exploited them. So little by little, through consistency of showing up, and just being interested in them, and helping them, she is gaining their trust. A few weeks ago when she arrived in the camp, Emka (the pastor's mother-in-law, and Val’s main contact) jumped out from behind the tent door and said “Boo!” She loved it that Val jumped and screamed bloody murder! It was a relational break-through. Her playfulness was a sign of friendship and trust.
It has been a challenge to find a suitable project for the ladies. It must use raw materials that are inexpensive and readily available. Since the ladies are not used to handwork, the skill requirements must be very basic. Val has decided that papier-mache provides the best combination of suitable factors. It uses old newspapers and requires little skill in its basic construction. The ladies are doing pretty well. The decoration requires more skill and it has been a challenge as Val keeps altering designs to better fit the ladies’ skill levels. She has moved away from decorative painting to using polymer clay embellishments that can be constructed from molds.
The working conditions are another major challenge. The wind blows continually across a dusty landscape. Working inside the church tent helps a little but not completely, and it is very hot. It will get worse as our Spring moves into Summer.
Please pray for a more suitable indoor facility with electricity and for a source for polymer clay and for clear communication with the women that transcends language and culture.

Where the River Flows
Swakop River Community Church was formed about a year ago as a non-denominational church. It’s slogan is “Where the river flows, there is Life.”It is named after the Swakop River, which passes by the church. Ironically, the Swakop River is a dry riverbed. They assure us a river does flow underneath. The church has grown to the point of being ready to appoint its first elders. Lon has been preaching there about once a month since January. He also consults with the church leadership as they transition from their initial “organizing” leadership team to their first board of Elders.
From inception, this church has patterned itself after Northland. A few months ago one of the leaders showed Lon a document on baptism. “We’ve been working on this statement of how we intend to handle baptisms and would like to know what you think.” Lon read the statement and smiled. It was Northland’s statement on baptism that Lon had written several years ago. He, of course, thought the statement was brilliant.
The church also wants to formalize the relationship with Northland, which has always been there informally. They desire to become another Namibian expression of the distributed church model, with Northland officially serving as their oversight organization for training, counsel and accountability connection.
Please pray for this church as they are in the process of selecting their first set of elders and wrestling with theological and practical issues of church policy, such as the proper role of women in the life of the church.

Panoramic Tour of the Bible
Richard Hanna and Lon have taught the Panoramic Tour of the Bible seminar twice in Windhoek in the past two weeks. The first workshop was for the youth groups from several churches. The second workshop was for the adults of Khomas Community Church. Both workshops were well received by participants and Richard and Lon had a great time teaching together again.
The primary message of this teaching is that God loves us deeply and is calling us into an intimate love relationship with Him whereby we depend upon Him to meet all of our physical, emotional and spiritual needs. This is a message that is so needed in this country where poverty, disease and abuse are so prevalent. Lon is planning to repeat the seminar several times in other locations between now and the end of the year. He will also begin training pastors and other church leaders to conduct the seminar.

By the Rivers of Babilon
Okay, there are no flowing rivers in the interior of Namibia and no we didn’t misspell Babylon. Babilon is a very, very poor and crime-ridden section of northern Windhoek. Val and Lon have begun to form relationships with a pastor and evangelist of a small tin church in this neighborhood. Eventually this will lead to training opportunities, but first we must establish a healthy relationship with Petrus, Mateas and their wives. Healthy means that they must see us as a training resource rather than a conduit for receiving funds from America.
Please pray that these poor, black churches come to see us as a spiritual resource instead of a source of financial backing. That mindset is a real problem and roadblock to our effective ministry in Namibia.

Bank of America
Soon after we arrived in the country, Lon attended a pastor’s conference at Rock Lodge in Okahandja. During a mealtime, one of the ministry leaders communicated that he had been praying for access to a small airplane and pilot since his ministry occurs all over the country. He ended by saying, “but God has not answered my prayer yet.”
One of the pastors responded, “I know why God has not answered your prayer. You must do more than pray. Prayer is important, of course, but so is praying in the presence of an American.” It seemed funny at the time, but I soon discovered that it is not funny to Namibians. They are serious. They see America rather than God as their provider.
Wherever we go, when Christians hear that we are from America, they think, “Ah ha, Bank of America.” The first thing they see is a way to get money from us for their favorite ministry project. We are constantly being asked for money.
We constantly battle this mindset that just creates a higher degree of dependency on foreign influence rather than God. God is not rich in America and poor in Namibia. He is rich everywhere.
Please pray for us that we would meet this mindset with grace, but would also use it as an opportunity to teach about God’s provision.

Val Speaks Oshivambo
Well, that may be a little of an overstatement. She is taking Oshindonga (one of 11 Oshivambo dialects) at the University of Namibia. Most of the ladies at the squatters camp speak some Oshivambo. So Val is learning the basics of their language to further her ministry and relational connection to them. Very few white women in this country speak any Oshivambo, so Val gets a lot of attention when she speaks to Oshivambo people in Windhoek in their own language.
She is also building a solid relationship with her Oshivambo instructor, whose name is Ottilia. She wants to learn to how to sew and Val is going to teach her. Please pray for Ottilia’s salvation as Val builds a relationship with her.

God’s Love Spread on Bread
Pastor Thomas' wife Crystalline is running a great preschool in the Five Rand Squatter's camp for about 60 kids. It's great fun to hear them chanting "One two Buckle my shoe....." with their little African accents! I had mentioned to someone, that at lunch time, the kids all bring out their plain white bread to eat, and that's lunch. The person I had mentioned this to, has offered to pay for peanut butter to go on the bread! Cool huh!

February, 2003

2 – There is much work to be done here, work that I am able to do well. People respond so well and quickly to a servant’s heart her, especially in the north (Ovamboland). People in Windhoek, Walvis Bay and Swakopmund are a bit more skeptical. Today I built a computer center for Val by installing a desk in the hanging clothes portion of the built in closet in my Study. Now we can both be working on our computers at the same time.

5 – I met Fred Joseph today. He is anxious to have me address his elders about elder training. Nice man, very passionate. I like him. Stephan and I also made plans for conducting our Panoramic Tour of the Bible seminar at three or four locations around the country when Richard and Kaye come in June – August. Also met with Dieter today and offered to help him with his ministry plan. He was greatly relieved. He is so grateful for my help because Emmanuel is forcing him to document his plan and that freezes him. He must do it and yet he feels like he can’t do it. It must be a horrible feeling. So I am helping him and he is way beyond grateful. This is so fulfilling. I love Dieter like a brother and to help him in this way fills my heart with joy.

7 – The men on the road to Emmaus did not recognize Jesus when He met them on the road or even when He taught them. They only recognized Him when He broke bread with them. There is something magical about close fellowship around a meal that is revealing. The intimacy causes us to reveal ourselves in ways we don’t in other meetings. Even teaching doesn’t necessarily reveal your heart. God knew this when He instituted communion.

8 – Today we had a workday at His People’s (our church) new location. We are moving to the Boy Scout Center, which has been vacant for quite some time. It is in much need of clean-up, fix-up. We are moving there from a school. So there are many parallels to Northland when we moved to Skate City in 1984. Val and I were glad to help. We met Frankquit who seems to be a capable, emerging young leader. He spent a lot of time going around encouraging us worker bees, yet he still made time to work hard himself. He appears to be a natural leader.

9 – Frankquit preached today and did a wonderful job.

10 – I had a wonderful time this morning leading Dieter through a planning session for his Fyf Rand (Five Rand) ministry. Knowing how much he dislikes planning, I tried to connect it with something he loves to do: boating at Von Bach dam. So while he paddled us around the lake in a canoe, I asked him some introductory planning questions. Mostly though, he gave me a nature talk about the animals that live in the area. There were many “Florida” birds there: herons, coots, cormorants (snake birds), and of all things pelicans, dozens of them, even though we are 200 miles inland. We also saw yellow-billed kites who love to eat termites this time of year. But today they were fishing.

The most unusual animal he pointed out was the Dassie Hyrax (Rock Dassie). This creature looks a lot like a guinea pig, kinda short, stocky and tailless; grayish-brown in color with a yellow tinge to its fur and a black patch on its back. They live in colonies and are very social. They love to sun themselves on the rocks by the shore, but that makes them vulnerable to their natural enemy, the black eagle. These birds love to attack with the sun to their back to blind their prey. However, God has graciously provided the rock dassie with a defense by giving it two pair of eyelids. The second pair acts as a sunshade so it can see while looking directly into the sun.

On the opposite side of the lake, Dieter beached the canoe and we hiked to the crest of a steep hill, which offered a breath-taking view of the lake, dam, and surrounding hills and mountains. That’s where we spent most of the morning doing our serious planning. I asked strategic questions and documented his excellent answers. He knows what God is calling him to do, he just cannot describe it in a logical, orderly way either orally or in writing. That’s where I come in. I will provide a format and document his plan. His gratitude is so encouraging. When we came back down the hill, he was beaming, a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

This evening, I went to River of Life Community Church to address the elders. I was fully aware that I “on trial” with them. Therefore, I was thrilled when the evening went far better than I had expected. I not only passed my test, I connected with them in a wonderful way. I am really looking forward to spending the next several weeks with them. They are so ready and anxious for training.

After the meeting, I met a visiting pastor from South Africa who has invited me to participate in his church’s annual leadership conference in September. It is called Integrated Agape Fellowship and he assures me that his church is true to its name.

Today was my most productive ministry day so far in Namibia. If it is a foretaste of what ministry life will be like here, I will be a very happy man indeed.

11 – This afternoon, I finally met Ron Gardiner. I have heard many good things about his passion for missions in Namibia and was delighted to confirm every good thing I’ve heard about him. I’m sure we will be doing ministry together for a long time.

12 – Today I continued refining the ministry plan with Dieter. It is so thrilling to combine his vision and passion for the squatter’s settlement at Fyf Rand with my planning and writing talents; and then to see a written plan emerge that will provide clarity, focus and direction to he and Joan’s ministry. Even more thrilling is the look on Dieter’s face as he discovers he has actually accomplished what he thought to be impossible. I feel great about how our ministry is shaping up in Namibia. The only dark cloud on the horizon is Home Affairs. Will they turn us down again? Even if they approve our work permits, will we have to leave the country before the permits take effect? God, by faith, we ask you to remove these clouds.

13 – Today had my weekly mentoring session with Stephan. We are quickly developing an effective ministry partnership. I also attended the Judea Harvest quarterly meeting. It is a gathering of pastors whose churches are meeting in large tents provided by the Judea Harvest ministry. My purpose was to network and make ministry contacts. After the meeting, six pastors were interested in meeting with me further. But the best meeting of the day was with Dawie Fourie. He is the Managing Director of Price-Waterhouse-Coopers in Namibia and probably the most influential Christian businessman in the country. What a caring, humble man of God he is. He is also the founder of Rock Lodge. My purpose was just to enable us to get to know each other better. He let me know that they are still considering me as the point man for the Namibian Dream Centers.

14 – Manus Olivier, the pastor of the Swakopmund Dutch Reformed Church and the preacher at Swakop River Community Church is staying with us for two nights while attending a conference just around the corner from our home. It has been a great time to get to know him better and feel his passion for ministry in Namibia. I will be preaching at Swakop River CC in a few weeks on their first anniversary as a church.

16 – Yesterday and today I attended the Khomas Community Church Men’s Leadership Retreat. Stephan calls the top 12 male leaders of his church the G12 and has been mentoring them for a year. They are in training to become elders. It was a great time to get to know them as we studied the WTB series, Personal Holiness in Times of Temptation. Saturday evening was an informal time around the fire and Sunday we studied and fasted and prayed. This morning was another beautiful Namibian morning: majestic sky, cool air, birds praising God in concert – all in the midst of a rugged mountainous setting. Glory be to God!

We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy, which so powerfully works within me. (COL 1:28-29)

This was what motivated Paul to rise out of bed each morning. 2000 years later, it is the same for me. Nothing has changed.

July, 2003

12 – It has been awhile since I have written. Acclimating to Africa and settling into Windhoek as our new home has been an exhilarating experience for me. Each day is a new adventure. We have bought a new pickup truck (they call them bakkies here) - a 2001 Isuzu double cab bakkie, white with canopy over the loading space. We have now moved out of our borrowed flat and are at the beach for several days. We decided that if you must stay in a hotel, it might as well be at the beach. It’s cool here and a refreshing change from the mid-day heat of summer in Windhoek. Val and I are very much at peace with ourselves and with each other now that she is beginning to actually like it here.

20 – For me Namibia represents Freshness. Where I had become stale, it is a fresh start for me. Where Americans have become complacent in their comfort and convenience, Africans are alive in their spirits and ripe for revival. Where life was ordinary in America, it has become extraordinary here. Same life, new perspective. It is not really Africa, it is me. Good things come alive in me here. God things come alive in me here. I like myself here. In June, 2001, I wrote that I wanted to be “naked and unashamed” before God – honest and comfortable with my weaknesses as well as my strengths, celebrating with God that he put within me the perfect combination of characteristics and abilities. I am rapidly approaching that goal here in Africa. I know who I am, I am comfortable being me and I want more of God in my life. More dependence upon Him, more awareness of His Spirit within me, more of His love flowing through me to a needy world around me.

22 – 3 WAYS TO BE UNCHRISTLIKE - 1) Elevate yourself above others, either by pushing yourself up or by putting them down. Both separate you from other people. 2) Distance yourself from their pain. 3) Focus on their imperfections. This reminds them of how unacceptable they are to you. Ridicule and pedantic teaching will accomplish this for you “quite effectively.” Christ was touchable, approachable and reachable. Anything that encourages others to separate themselves from you is potentially un-Christlike. Only separation that eventually leads to greater intimacy is Christlike. Christ separated Himself on the Cross that we might be reconciled with God and united with Him forever.

27 – The shipping container arrived late today. It was supposed to arrive last week but they couldn’t find a truck. It was supposed to arrive this morning but they couldn’t find the driver. It was supposed to arrive this afternoon but the driver and truck got lost. TIA – This is Africa. So we unloaded the container in the dark and rain at Hodygos. By then it was too late to load our stuff back onto a smaller truck and drive it back to Windhoek. So we spent a sleepless night outside swatting mosquitoes and waiting for morning.

28 – We loaded the Toyota Dyna with Dave and Jen Fortin’s help and headed for Windhoek. We unloaded, ate lunch and returned the truck to Hodygos. So we now have our African belongings all in one place (except for about 15 boxes which we must have missed in the unloading). Jos set the pace for speed rather than accuracy or safety. It feels so nice to have our things available again.

29 - Val is busy unpacking and beautifying as I travel north with Dieter, George and Jape. Warthogs, baboons, ostriches, cattle, goats and donkeys abound. The trip is long and tiring but uneventful. It was a valuable time to get to know Jape Van Vuuren better. He is the Director of Operation Mobilization in Namibia. He is a pleasant, easy-to-get-along-with gentle man. Along the way, we stopped in Otjiwarongo and met with Theo Borstlop, a Christian businessman, and two local pastors, Nico Kruger (AFM) and Etienne Binneman (Agape). Once we arrived in Oshakati, we met with Pastor Festus Negumbo (Four Square Gospel Church) and Pastor Johnny Heita (FSGC in Ohangwena). Festus is anxious to have us do leadership training at FSGC.

30 – This morning began with a beautiful sky, cool air, and birds singing marvelously – just like every other “mora” in Namibia. God is good. I read Phil. 2 this morning in my quiet time. It reminds me of how I must act and feel to be effective in ministry in this country. Humility is required. They have no use for haughty, know-it-all Americans who come with force and energy and then try to cram ready-made, American solutions down their throats. They need servants who will humble themselves to help and slowly build relationships, people who will be open and honest and vulnerable. We met this morning with Adriaan Grobler, a Christian businessman and elder at the Oshakati DRC, which is between pastors now. He is a committed lay minister who does a lot of his own ministry on the side. We also met with Markus and Fulla, YFC ministers who just moved back to Oshakati to do ministry there. They are old friends from my first trip to Namibia. They were students in our leadership training who have since married.

31 – The people of the north (Ovamboland) seem so open and accepting and ready for ministry assistance. Pastor Festus is very anxious to have me help him with leadership training.