Christmas Season 2010

Hello everyone;
Hope you’ve had a great start to 2011.
Some recent Burundi happenings:
The pre-Christmas season was easier this year because we knew better what to expect, and by far the bigger reason is that we know a lot more people and were with them a lot over Christmas. A brief run down of what it looked like:
Astrid organized a cookie exchange with some expats. Interesting how the biggest challenge is not which delectable treat to settle on based on preference, but on availability of ingredients. Choices are very limited.
Our school Christmas program was again very good. The absolute best thing is that so many Muslim and Hindu families come to watch their children. I am repeatedly reminded what it says in Isa 55: 10-11: “As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”
Dec. 24 - morning.  A family member sent $400.00 for Sabe Village, so after consulting with Honda and Libby  (the friends that are the hands and feet of Jesus in that awful place) it was quickly decided where exactly the money would go. Last year we had the honor and privilege to help them with the distribution of some Christmas goodies to the children of Sabe. This year, however, they had no idea how this would be possible due to a lack of funds. Well, with this $400 we bought 20 crates of Fanta, 1200 “doughnuts”  (pieces of deep fried dough), and a big box of lollipops. What a joy to see these kids come running to meet you!! With distended bellies and skin covering their fragile limbs the thought crosses your mind that the money could perhaps be used to buy nutritious beans instead, but when you see the sheer delight of those little ones receiving an “extra”, it just changes everything. We were able to bless about 600 children that morning.
Dec. 24 - afternoon.  Straight from Sabe Village we headed to the beach down the street to meet our precious Canadian friend Ali, together with Deo and his kids. (Remember Divine that died of cancer in late July? Deo is the husband. We met Deo and Divine through Ali ) We spent a great afternoon enjoying each others company. Those kids are great; they really felt the loneliness of Christmas without their mom.
Dec. 24 - evening - As is our tradition, we opened some gifts. Another wonderful friend, Olivia, went home to Colorado in Nov., and she offered to bring back some stuff for us, so we took this opportunity to ask her to bring some items for Christmas for Colton. He was so surprised!!! So much fun to watch his reaction.
Dec. 25 - Christmas day - morning.  After breakfast Colton opened a few small gifts. At 9:00 am we again went to CRIB to watch all the kids rip into their presents. Every year they have all their presents flown in from England - so this is a sight to behold as they dive into the gifts. After helping the kids with figuring out how this game or that ‘thing’ works, installing batteries, Isaac setting up the soccer nets they received, etc., Dave and Sheena (England), who are the house parents at CRIB, invited us and the other guests in for tea.
Home for Christmas lunch - not your typical Christmas spread. We had vegetable beef soup and flour tortillias. We just simply couldn’t cough up $167.21 US for a 3 kilo turkey. (I almost went cross-eyed when I saw that price!!!)
Dec. 25 - afternoon til evening.  Olivia, together with the wonderful folks that live with her, invited us, Travis and Astrid, Ali, Deo and his kids, and a few other people over. Felt so blessed to have these people in our lives.
Dec. 26 -  Ali over all day, Tim and Jeannette -  friends from South Africa - dropped in, as well as Astrid with a visitor of theirs.
Dec. 27 - Dec 29.  Astrid, co-founder of Sozo Ministries (see my fb likes) had asked if we wanted to part take in a three day church leader training seminar that Sozo was doing. Isaac is not on the school holiday schedule and therefore had to work, but Colton and I attended, and are now qualified to train and teach PowerClubs with Kids in Ministry International.
We again witnessed a beautiful working of the Holy Spirit during this seminar as God became very real to one of the attendees and had a super encounter with the Almighty. During a teaching on the Holy Spirit, she for the first time was filled with the Holy Spirit. At first she said that she thought she was having a heart attack - it was so powerful, and also foreign to her. I immediately whispered to Colton, “spiritual warfare, pray.” One pastor, Colton and myself quickly went over to her and started to pray for her. Within moments the power of God was so heavy on her…. I sat with her for about two hours and prayed as the Lord was “on” her. What a joy to see some of the fruit that God did in that time.
The seminar was in a one room mud and brick church, dirt floor, tin roof, walls only partially completed due to a lack of funds. We had wonderful respite from the heat, as it rained all three days for a majority of the time. Astrid and the translator where often drowned out by the absolutely beautiful sound of the rain hammering on the tin roof. We just gathered around them closely and continued. Colton helped with worship on African drum and guitar. There were no doors, so we had an audience for most of the three days; by the third day they didn’t just stay in the very back, sitting on the partially completed wall, but came in and sat on the wooden planks. We surrounded the people and prayed into their lives; man, I’m telling you - that’s life!!!
On the third day in the afternoon we went out into the neighborhood and did an actual PowerClub. We had 4 groups; Colton and my group, together with a few local pastors and other locals from Bujumbura had about 100 kids and adults combined that attended. We just walked around for about 5  minutes and our entourage just grew out of curiosity.  It’s very rare to see mzungus in that part of town - it’s very poor and incredibly crowded. So the mzungu factor, I believe, played a huge factor in being able to see about 85 adults/kids come to Jesus!!!!! Curiosity leading to salvation - love it!!
These were long days - Astrid picked us up at about 8:00 am or sooner, and the latest we got home was well past 6:00 pm. Tired but so pumped to see God move so powerfully.
Dec. 31 - New Years Day.  Months ago some of us already started talking about going down to Makamba province for New Years. This is where Travis and Astrid are starting a children’s village for orphans, and they are in the process of acquiring land right on the lake for this mission and vision that God has given them. They are not 4 km, as I said earlier on a Facebook entry, but only 2 km. away from the Tanzanian border. They’ve rented a small house in the village that serves as the field office and 10 of us flooded their tiny compound with 4 tents; 5 in total with their existing one.
The villagers are all returning genocide refugees from Tanzania. They have almost nothing; literally. It’s not uncommon to see children naked up country, apart from a rag that serves as a shirt, but in this area there were so many children with no clothes or just a rag for a shirt. Many, if not most or all, had ever seen a mzungu before. (About a month ago Pastor Ray told us that there are probably no more than 200 mzungus in this country of 9,000,000)
When we were leaving and had to stop on the road due to one of the vehicles having trouble, we were completely surrounded by faces. At one point I counted and there were 11 looking in my side window alone!!!! The ’front’ row literally had their faces pasted against  the window. If you don’t think that’s possible, experiment with some friends. We often have 5 - 6 at any or a few of our windows, but that felt a little claustrophobic.
We had 24/7 soldier security. Three, armed with their AK-47’s at night, and 1 or 2 during the day, on top of other security. When Travis and Astrid (Withrow) are at the house this is the norm.
The Withrow’s left on Sat., but the rest of us stayed till Sun., the 2nd.  Isaac, Colton, myself, Ali, and 4 other  friends decided to hike to Tanzania. We were escorted by two armed soldiers, the border chief, the town chief and others. And of course our entourage of curious mzungu watchers grew as we went along.
The scenery was beautiful; the dirt road turned path turned trail was right along Lake Tanganyika, surrounded by huge mountains. We were allowed to take only very limited pictures because we crossed the border without visas, and the border chief seemed a little jumpy when I asked if I was allowed to take pictures. We received very warm welcomes everywhere we went - immigration office, police “station” etc., but no photos. HAHA!!
Enough for today.