baptism sunday

Just wanted to share a few pictures from yesterday. We drove to a church in a village about an hour north of Mango for the baptism of 5 people. The pictures above show us walking from the church to the pond, a man giving his testimony before being baptized, his wife being baptized and a little boy who walked along with us.

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The tall man pictured above is the first believer in this particular village. In giving his testimony he explained how he had lived his life in darkness but now he has light because he knows and believes the truth! His wife gave a similar testimony! This couple has donated a piece of their land and a small church has been built in this village.
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This church plant is a result of a Togolese pastor who led this man to the Lord about 5 years ago and then continued to have a Bible study with him. This man's wife accepted the Lord and then 3 other folks from the same village believed as well. There are more who have believed but these are the first 5 to step out and publicly identify themselves with Christ!

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What a blessing to see the fruit of the labor of a faithful Togolese pastor! And what a privilege to be there yesterday to catch a glimpse of what the Lord is doing even in a remote village in northern Togo!

our little corner of the world...

This is our room. It has a bed and a bathroom but you'll notice the most important feature....an air conditioner! And it works too! When it is running it sounds like all the parts inside are bouncing around but it puts out cool air so I don't care how much noise it makes!

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This is the view of our room from the front door.

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This is our bathroom. We also have a sink but I chose to focus on the toilet in the shower. It's actually a bidet (bih-day) but I think it's way funnier to refer to it as a toilet in the shower. It's a nuisance to have in the shower but it might be useful as extra seating if someone came to visit us.
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This is the road that runs along the front of our place. The pinkish color wall on the left side of the picture is our wall. The little structure you see in the picture is the closest store to us. They sell little cans of tomato paste and soap balls (among other things, I'm sure). Very convenient.

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Just another view of the neighborhood.
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This is still the road in front of our place - beyond the little store, heading toward the main road.
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And these are children in Tsiko (where the southern hospital is). Cute!

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So there you have it! A little introduction to where we are in Mango. Come see us sometime!

made it to mango...

We made it to Mango, Togo last Monday (December 13th, I believe) and now have our internet set up so I thought I'd let you know we are here! I'll post some pictures soon. This internet is very slow and won't allow us to make a skype call even if we only use the audio. :( But hopefully some pictures will do for now!
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Well, the calendar says that today is Christmas Eve so I will trust that the calendar is correct. The work team is at the site working and will be back 2 hours early this evening so that we can celebrate with the rest of the Mango team. We will have a ham dinner and watch a Christmas movie if we have electricity. If the power is out we can always sing some Christmas carols! :)
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Tomorrow, we are going to a team member's house for Christmas breakfast and then another team member is having an open house for anyone who wants to come starting at 2pm. Some of the Togolese have a skit to perform so that should be fun to watch. Sunday morning we are driving about an hour north of Mango to a church for baptism Sunday. We'll eat lunch there in the village and then head back sometime in the afternoon. Should be an exciting day!
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One of the interesting things about celebrating Christmas in Togo is that you have to be pretty creative with gifts. Kevin asked me if I had any spare change this morning as he was leaving for work. I gave him the equivalent of about 60 cents and he headed out the door.
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I'm pretty sure I'm getting a watermelon for Christmas.