Our team from Rancho del Rey Chuch just finished their second day of work here in the village of Tonj with the Dinka people. We are all doing very well. I will give you the highlights: Getting here, our 28 hours of flying went relatively well, as well as can be expected from 28 hours of sitting on a plane. Nobody got sick, so Praise the Lord for that! Dennis, Cody and Thadd are working their butts off making bricks for the new medical clinic. Sweat is literally pouring off of them all morning long! But they work with happy hearts and joyful spirits. Cody led worship for us last night around a camp fire after dinner. He did a great job. The girls, Christie, Skylar, Marli and Annabelle, helped with an outreach medical clinic to the village of Maloy today. Among other things, the chief of a neighboring village asked Mike Yordt, who was with them, if he would let him have all three available girls (Christie is already married) for 1,000 cows. Mike said no, but perhaps a little reluctantly, as 1,000 cows is an outrageous price in Sudan. I have been teaching the pastors, Sabet is translating for me and as ever, he is doing an incredible job. It is a smaller group this time, but this allows us more time for questions. They are definitely growing in their understanding of the Word. On the first day, when they came into class, I asked them, instead of sitting at desks while I teach, to show me how respected men in their culture discuss important things. They told me that they sit around in a circle on the floor. So, I had them remove the desks from the classroom and we sat on the floor together for a few minutes. I told them that they are pastors just like me. I have come to teach them, but they are servants of God too and that we will learn from each other. As they were getting up to put the desks back, one of the pastors, named Moses, said in Dinka, “You know, Abuna Marial (Pastor Matt), he’s almost a Dinka.” I think that is probably the best compliment I have ever received!! As ever, the work in the medical clinic goes on. A woman brought in her baby girl two nights ago. She also had a baby boy that they took to the witch doctor, but he only got worse and died that night. Because of this, they finally decided to come to the clinic. This kind of thing is a regular occurence in a culture that is steeped in animism, or the worship of spirits. This is part of the reason that the work here is so important. It is a battle of worldviews, where the gospel of Jesus must be shown to be the true path to spiritual life. This afternoon we went into the city of Tonj to do a basketball outreach. We had the little kids do drills on the only basketball court for probably 200 miles. It is a sorry looking court, but we made the best of it. We even played against a team of young men from the village. We lost because we are out of shape. We told everyone to come back tomorrow and bring their friends because we want to do another camp with them, teaching them more and also tell them about the church in the compound and introduce them to Jesus. So, if you have some time today, please pray for our outreach tomorrow. It will begin at 4:00 pm Sudan time, which will be about 5:00 am your time, Friday morning. Thanks so much for your prayer. As always, it is a totally different world here. Everybody on the team is doing extremely well and we have been able to be a blessing to the people from RdR who are now working here full time. We feel your love and your prayers. God is good and he is doing amazing things. Thank you for your support and love. We will be home soon, so keep praying for us. May God bless you richly today! You will be hearing from other team members on this blog in the following days. -Pastor Matt
Category Archives: Rancho Del Rey Church
Final Blog!
Construction of New Medical Clinic Building
Hello everyone,
It’s our last night in Tonj! Can’t believe our African adventure is drawing to a close.
Today after the girls worked in the medical clinic and the boys worked with the pastors, something really fun happened: we heard our chartered MAF plane fly overhead!! We all cheered when the plane went by because first, it was loaded with MUCH needed medical supplies and personal items (and a team of two new short-term American missionaries) and second… well, you don’t hear many planes flying overhead in Tonj, so you cheer when something like that happens!!
After greeting our friends, we began unloading and unpacking the huge number of boxes and action packers that had arrived. It was like Christmas morning as we ripped open the boxes: Amoxicillin! Multivitamins! Paracetomol! The clinic pharmacy’s drug stash has been running on fumes for days, so it was awesome to know that the meds would now be replenished.
Another exciting event happened today: the guys erected the first trusses on the NEW medical clinic building! Wow, what a milestone event for the compound. It’s exciting to walk around the area where the rest of the clinic will be built. God is going to do BIG things here!
Well… since this is our team’s final blog, we wanted to briefly share some of our trip highlights:
–Hearing “Yar!” (Stacie) and “Maquay!” (Mike) as we stepped out of the plane in Tonj. We were also greeted by a crowd of 50-75 smiling faces cheering “Cheebak!! Cheebak!!” And yes, who could forget Mark (one of the long-term American missionaries currently at the compound) standing there in his BVDs with cow dung ashes on his face (like those from the cattle camp) and doing an African victory dance!?
–Tiffany’s Florence Nightengale effect on the male wound care patients… just ask her about her numerous marriage proposals, especially from one eager patient who had to return day after day to get his dressings changed!
–For Alicia and Sheena: the great honor of helping to deliver a baby… on their first day in the clinic! (P.S. No other babies born at the clinic since then! Guess that was our one and only one all week).
–For Tim and Mike: the privilege of teaching the pastors about the Old Testament… and of course answering their thought-provoking questions.
–At our outreach events, laughing with the kids (and their parents) as we taught them the hand movements to our various silly praise songs.
–Hearing (and pretending to understand and sing along!) African praise songs during morning devotions and at church.
–For Sheena and Alicia: Jumping, dancing and singing in the dark with 2 dozen African kids while at an outreach. We didn’t know exactly what they were saying, but it was clear they were praising God!
–At morning devotion time, being challenged by fellow teammates to follow Christ with all our hearts.
–The two snakes. Enough said.
–For Alicia: the privilege of sharing her testimony and giving the Gospel presentation to a local tribe.
–Watching the Jesus film (in Dinka) on a makeshift outdoor screen, in two different remote African villages, surrounded by 100-200 locals wearing glow sticks as bracelets!
–Trying to sleep while donkeys brayed, people shouted outside, people drove by playing LOUD Arabic disco music, local dogs had vicious nightly brawls, the Army marched outside doing practice drills and chants, cows mooed, people played their drums, howling animals of some sort, and of course, one extremely obnoxious rooster repeatedly crowed his obnoxious chant (and NOT just at the sunrise).
–Of course, the crazy Indiana Jones-ish three hour ride (each way) to the Cuibet outreach and all our adventures (and conversation) on our journey.
–Sitting down at breakfast, lunch and dinner to a yummy meal cooked by the one and only Huggins! Let’s just say there may be starvation in Africa, but no one on our team starved while here!!
–The almost daily rainstorms (sometimes with lightening and thunder!) which deliciously cooled off the compound’s sweltering heat at night (usually…)
–Sharing our rooms with uninvited guests (lizards, frogs, bats, rats, spiders, spiders and more spiders). Alicia and Tim alone counted 35 Daddy Longlegs spiders in their room one night, and those were only the ones they could see!).
And of course, the great honor of sharing Christ with our words and our actions each day.
We look forward to telling you more stories when we see you in person!!
In God’s Service, Mike, Amy, Tim, Alicia, Tiffany, Sheena and Stacie
P.S. Don’t forget that we’re leaving two of our team members behind here
–Stacie and Sheena! They still covet your prayers… and will have even MORE Sudan stories to tell when they return! Thanks for remembering to pray for them!
Mike’s Blog!
Well it’s Thursday and everyone is still alive and no one has gotten sick or was carried off by any animals or bugs. We do have to deal with the plague of frogs, lots of them, which doesn’t bother Tim or myself but all the girls have us on frog watch.
Today started with Suzy’s great devo on trusting in God. Tim started the day by doing devo with the pastors. They are going through Exodus then helping with various projects around the compound it was my turn to teach in 2nd Samuel and help out with projects after noon. The girls worked in the medical clinic i think they fit right in. Amy and Suzy had a dork out session with all the bookkeeping it lasted until 8pm and they loved it! Around noon it started to rain, there was lighting and thunder and it cooled off the day so we were very happy. Around 4:30pm we left for an outreach in one of the villages but no one was there because of the rain so we went to the near by lepers colony.
So that is it for now, I know it’s short but to be true to my nature I, keep-it short and sweet.
Please pray for the town it seems that we re having a bad case of malaria and we had to order more meds to fly in on the plane that picks us up.
I am out!
Mike
Sheena’s Blog!
Hello everyone!!! This morning I woke up like every other morning here to the sounds of animals and the army/police marching. We had Peanut Butter Toast for breakfast, then went to an amazing devotion led by Stacie. She told her story of how she came to the decision to stay here for a year and how God confirmed this for her using Psalm 139 multiple times through many different people. Then it was off to the clinic for the girls and more construction and teaching of the pastors for the men. Wound care has been pretty tame since arriving here….praise God!! We have the usual Tonj wounds which are usually septic. Then over in the Mama/Baby room things are going great….they are loving the new stretchs they are getting….most exciting news today is that John-Paul thinks one of the moms that came in might be pregnant with twins!!!! Things died down in the clinic pretty early today so after lunch us girls got to have some good quality time and fellowship with Suzy!!! It was wonderful….she has so many interesting and wonderful things to share!!! Then us girlies headed to the storage to work on sorting through the medical supplies again.
Just as we were sitting down for dinner…Sabet comes in the dinning hall saying John-Paul needs help. So, Myself and Alicia go check it out. It turns out we got a young man maybe 20-25 who came in with a very high fever and has been sick for about a month….at first we thought it was malaria we even started giving him the meds for it….when John-Paul noticed his eyes and realized he has severe anemia. His anemia is so bad he is in need of a blood transfusion because he is going into congestive heart failure. Unfortunately we do not have the ability to give him a blood transfusion here so we have to get him to Wau. We are working on transportation and it looks as though we will get him there tomorrow. So please be praying for him and travel mercies. Also a grandma came in with her grandchild. The Grandma brought the child because the mom was out drinking and does so most nights and days. The child was around 3 or 4. She came in with a fever and the grandma also explained that the child has had unexplained convulsions since she was 2. So they have been taking her to a witch doctor….you can see wounds on her head and back from the witch doctor and the grandma says nothing helps. At this point in time we don’t know what is wrong with the little girl. She is staying over night in our clinic for the night.
We had a prayer meeting tonight which was extremely powerful!!! We gathered around a fire (in this heat it was kinda crazy, but nice) roasted marshmallows and just spent and hour or so just singing praise to God and praying……it was absolutly amazing! Well I guess that is it for today. Goodnight from Tonj!
Amy’s Blog!
Amy Handing Toys to Kids in Tonj
Cheebak from Tonj! This is Ayan (Amy), and this is my story so far:
It has been amazing being back in Sudan for the second time in 8 months! I never thought I would be here ONE time, let alone twice in a year, but here I am and I am enjoying seeing old friends (Sabet & Suzy) and newer, old friends from February!
I’ve been working in the pharmacy and I absolutely love it! (Yes, Matt…I am a Sudanese drug runner!) Peter, the pharmacist, has been such a great teacher, and he lets me fill all of the patient’s prescriptions (he checks them before they go to the patients, of course!). I just might consider a career switch, and if I came to Sudan, I wouldn’t even have to go to pharmacy school…..how scary is that??? Either way, I am really enjoying the work and the people.
Today, a lady asked me to pray for her headache while Peter was explaining her medicine to her! God is showing me something very unique this time around about serving on a missions trip. As a team, you may travel a long way to serve, but the “work” doesn’t always look like you thought it might when you get there. A lot of times we think of serving on a missions trip as “doing” some type of work all the time. God is showing me that for the most part, ministry is just about being with the people that you are there to serve. As a team, we have had a lot of opportunity to slow down and just fellowship with each other, with Sabet & Suzy and with all of the people that work in the compound and the clinic. What a blessing it has been for me to get to know all of these people, spending time talking with them and finding out what God is doing in their lives! This is ministry! And while “working” in the pharmacy is ministry, it is actually the icing on the cake, as far as I am concerned!
Well, it is late at night (9:00 pm, I’m a working girl!), and the lizards and frogs in my room want me to turn the light out so we can get some sleep. We pray all is well with everyone at home….we all miss you and can’t wait to share with you ALL that God is doing in and through us!
Bye for now….Amy