“My car has been broken down much of the time,” said Boaz Church, “but how else would I stop and meet so many broken families and hungry hearts along the way? Just like the man whose blindness was for God’s glory when Jesus healed him, we give God glory in our trials.”

More than 20 people had gathered for Wednesday-night prayer meeting in Palm Village. The utter sincerity of Boaz’ testimony was reflected in their faces. I think I saw some of the glow of Jesus, too. After Boaz finished speaking, we ended with a few minutes of sharing and prayer.

Emma and I got to know this precious group a little more as the night went on. We found out who had come with their spouses (which is hard to tell since men and women sit on opposite sides of the room), and whose spouses had refused to come and were in need of prayer.
On a break from language class in the capital, we had come to spend a little time getting acquainted with our target location. It is about 40 minutes’ drive from the home of the Church family, but they make frequent visits on Sabbaths, Wednesday nights, clinic days and English-teaching days.

On our drive back to the capital, the road followed the winding river. We counted 17 Buddhist temples, 15 mosques and 13 Quranic schools in an hour and a half of slow driving on the narrow, broken roads. There were large, beautiful mosques with pointed arches and exquisite moldings, and there were simple prayer houses. The tiered roofs of Buddhist temples could be seen towering above the trees every few miles. After an hour and a half we quit counting the places of false worship that seemed to dot the landscape in every direction. We drove all day and saw only one Christian church—one we made a special detour to visit because my parents planted it many years ago.

Thank-you to everyone who is faithfully supporting our work and giving us the honor of being here to help raise up a brand-new church among the Great River people. We wish you could have been there at that prayer meeting on Wednesday night. We met in a room with no furniture, no running water, and one light bulb. But on every face was a restless longing to know their Savior.

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