Sharing a Meal and More!

It was a GLORIOUS day today!!!   The women's hut awoke to about 20 monkeys playing on the roof at 5:30am this morning!!!  They were crawling all over the deck and roof having a wonderful time and we enjoyed seeing them in their natural setting.  Pastor Jim brought his guitar and we had a time of worship with our team praising God as we overlooked beautiful Lake Malawi. We then headed over to the Orphan Village at Pothawira.  We could not have asked for a better day - 100 beautiful children welcomed us with songs and love, 50 of them singing to us as they returned from school in the back of Peter's pickup truck!  Peter led us on a comprehensive tour of the property, from the medical clinic to church and school, to the chilrens' homes and the dining hall - how great to see what God has been up to over the past year!  It was a great blessing for many of our team to see this vibrant village for the first time today.  The Mizzou for Malawi team got to see first hand the fruit of their labor as the toured the school. 

After our tour, we had the great blessing of sharing lunch with the children.  Debi Wolfe humbly served us all and we sat on mats in and amongst the children in the dining hall.  We had a delicious meal of beans and rice. Prior to sharing our meal together, the kids were so excited to see us, but were a little reticent to come and interact with us.  As Pastor Jim so eloquently put it in his sermon last Sunday, there is something about sharing a meal together that makes people open to the demonstration of the Gospel.  We saw with our eyes today the application of this as the children immediately warmed to us.  We started singing songs with them and then went outside to play all day long! 

We also ceremonially presented the blankets that our Colonial Children's program made and donated to the orphan village.  It was our GREAT pleasure to hand a personal blanket to each child, write their names on them as one of their first possessions, and see their smiles as they cuddled up with their new blankets.

We are now sorting shoes and getting ready for our big program tomorrow...once again demonstrating our love for "the least of these."

Warm Heart of Africa!

It has now been 2 full days since we left the KC airport and we are now at the Safari Beach Lodge in Malawi, Africa!  We’ve been to Dallas, London, Kenya and Zambia on the way. As you can imagine, we are quite drained from our travel, but receiving a warm greeting from our friends, the Maseko Family, refreshed us! 

What a great trip we have had so far!!  We had a 10-hour layover in London and we managed to see some of the popular tourists spots before boarding our flight on Wednesday evening.  Thank you for all of your prayers related to our travel…we all arrived safely, our connections were on time, all baggage arrived and we met Pastor Peter and Emma and several of their children at the airport in Lilongwe. It was a sweet reunion!!  We did make another spectacle of ourselves at the airport with our nearly 30 pieces of luggage and then 17 of us loaded into 3 cars.  We stopped for our usual pizza lunch and made the 2 hour trek to the hotel.  Tomorrow we are off to see the children in the Pothawira Orphan Village tomorrow!

A New Chapter

Today we embark on the newest chapter of the Colonial GO Project at the Pothawira Village.  Eleven of us are traveling to Malawi for the grand opening of the village where 98 children currently live.  It should be an incredible time of celebrating God's goodness and faithfulness to the fatherless!  The team consists of Pastor Jim West, Randall Leonard, Scott and Lynn Platter, Cynthia Lewis, Meg and Lucas Leighton, Nicole Minardi, Celeste Ellis, and Chuck and Debi Wolfe.

You can also follow us on Facebook by "Liking" the Pothawira page.