Glimpses of a Weekend in Nkhoma

"I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth."
Psalm 121:1-2


The LORD, the One who made heaven and earth - who placed the stars in the heavens, who put the clouds in the sky, who created the land we step on, who breathed into man the breath of life - is the mighty, powerful, faithful, and compassionate One who attends to the needs of His own.

This mighty LORD, the God who made heaven and earth, the Holy one, provided a way for sinners to have sweet communion with Him through the gift of His, precious, perfect Son, Jesus Christ.

I lift my eyes to the hills, and am reminded of the Maker of those hills. All the help I need is given to me by Him through the person of His Son Jesus Christ, Savior and Friend of Sinners. . .

This weekend some of the ABCCA teachers went camping with the high school students in Nkhoma, a little less than an hour's drive from the academy. We enjoyed spending the weekend in the middle of the hills, surrounded by His creation.

We hiked up His mountains. . .

Met friends. . . .

Were reminded that He owns the cattle on a thousand hills. . .

Enjoyed being satisfied in Him and all that He is for us in Christ Jesus. . .

"Your steadfast love, O LORD, extends to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds.
Your righteousness is like the mountains of God; your judgements are like the great deep; man and beast you save, O LORD. "

"How precious is your steadfast love, O God! The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of delights. For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light." Psalm 36:5-9

Thank You, Lord, for Your Word.

The unfolding of your words gives light;
it imparts understanding to the simple.
Psalm 119:130

Thankful
for the Word of God.

I was so humbled to learn that the village we have been teaching in has only four Bibles.
My heart broke. . . Four Bibles for the entire village. At this point I don't know how many people live in the village, but I do know that we have had around seventy children participating in Saturday Bible lessons. Four Bibles for more than seventy people!

The solution seemed so easy. The village just needed some more Bibles! Then the people could feed their hungry souls and fill themselves with every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD. It seemed like a good plan to me. . . until I realized that the majority of the village is illiterate.

This has been so hard to swallow as I think about all the times that I'm constantly being convicted and exhorted and strengthened and encouraged and comforted by the Word of God. We are told that it is pure, it convicts, it sustains, it remains, and hearing comes through it. . .

"The words of the LORD are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times." (Psalm 12:6)

"The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." (Hebrews 4:12)

"And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD." (Deuteronomy 8:3)

"The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever." (Isaiah 40:8)

"So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." (Romans 10:17)

Pray
that we would love God's Word more and more and never take it for granted.
for those who don't have Bibles and/or who don't know how to read.
for arrangements being made for those in the village to attend reading lessons.
that God would be exalted above the heavens, and that His glory would be over all the earth!

-----

A puritan prayer from the Valley of Vision:

O God of Truth,
I thank thee for the holy Scriptures,
their precepts, promises, directions, light.
In them may I learn more of Christ,
be enabled to retain his truth
and have grace to follow it.
Help me to lift up the gates of my soul that he may come in
and show me himself when I search the Scriptures,
for I have no lines to fathom its depths,
no wings to soar to its heights.
By his aid may I be enabled to explore all its truths,
love them with all my heart,
embrace them with all my power,
engraft them into my life.
Bless to my soul all grains of truth garnered from thy Word;
may they take deep root,
be refreshed by heavenly dew,
be ripened by heavenly rays,
be harvested to my joy and thy praise.
Help me to gain profit by what I read,
as treasure beyond all treasure,
a fountain which can replenish my dry heart,
its waters flowing through me as a perennial river
on-drawn by the Holy Spirit.
Enable me to distil from its pages faithful prayer
that grasps the arm of thy omnipotence,
achieves wonders, obtains blessings,
and draws down streams of mercy.
From it show me how my words have often been unfaithful to thee,
injurious to my fellow-men,
empty of grace, full of folly,
dishonouring to my calling.
Then write thy own words upon my heart and inscribe them on my lips;
So shall all glory be to thee in my reading of thy Word!

-----
Mom, forgive me for all the fights I had with you when you wanted me to read more in grade school. Thanks for not letting me win. Now I've seen firsthand why you always said reading was a privilege. I'll tell my kids the same thing, too, someday.

"And I Will Give You a New Heart"

Ezekiel 36:25-27
I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Hallelujah for the power of God that saves sinners - the power found in the gospel of Jesus Christ!!!
Yesterday God gave me the opportunity to meet some of the people living in one of the villages just a half hour by car from the academy. The chief of this particular village accepted Jesus Christ as His Lord and Savior very recently!
When passing through villages in Malawi it is very common to see gule wamkulu. These are people who perform ritualistic dances that are associated with the religion from the traditional Chewa tribe. They wander about in scary masks and animal skins and/or lots of rags. I haven't tried to take any pictures of them because I hear they may get quite angry. If you google "gule wamkulu" I'm sure you could find some pictures online though.
The chief of the village who just recently came to Christ told the gule wamkulu that this practice would no longer be accepted in the village! And now there is a church in the same place where the gule wamkulu used to perform the ritualistic dances! I love to see the way that God changes peoples' hearts! I love to see how He can transform a whole people group and give them new hearts - hearts of flesh that beat for His glory!!
The people are very new believers and have very many questions. Polygamy is very common in the villages, and this was last week's big Sunday morning topic. If they are Christians, would they need to give up polygamy? And if they did, how would the women be able to take care of the children?
They also want their children to know about Jesus and said they would love for people to come teach their children about the truths of the Bible! Two of the academy teachers, I, and two of the Chichewa-speaking college students from ABC will now, Lord willing, go to their village each Saturday to teach the children more and more about the salvation we have in Christ Jesus!
We met with these precious children yesterday! There were over fifty who greeted us when we arrived. Many of them have never seen an American, so some of them were very scared of us! Others just stared at us with wide eyes. And one little boy plopped himself right into my lap. :) We sang, listened to a Bible story, went through the wonderful message of the gospel. . . Many of the mothers stayed to sing and listen, too!
I am so thankful to God for this opportunity! I thank Him for letting me witness His amazing work and unstoppable power from the gospel of Jesus Christ being displayed in this village! Please pray that God's name would be glorified in this village, in our lessons with the children, in us!
I cannot stop thinking about all the small villages. . . not just in Malawi, but in all of Africa, and all over the world! ALL the villages that need Jesus -some of which have never even heard the name which is above every name! Pray that God would display His power and glory throughout the whole earth!

His Saving Work

I was reading from Don't Waste Your Life this morning, and this caught my attention:

We Will Not Know Him Fully Outside His Mission
For its own soul the church needs to be involved in missions. We will not know God in his full majesty until we know him moving triumphantly among the nations. We will not admire and praise him as we ought until we see him gathering a company of worshipers for himself from every people group on earth - including all the Muslim and Hindu and Buddhist peoples. Nothing enlarges our vision of God's triumphant grace like the scope of his saving work in history. What a story it is! "I will remember the deeds of the LORD; yes, I will remember your wonders of old. I will ponder all your work, and meditate on your mighty deeds" (Psalm 77:11-12). "Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his excellent greatness!" (Psalm 150:2). "Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and let all the peoples extol him" (Romans 15:11, quoting Psalm 117:1)

Please pray with me that we would know God moving triumphantly among the nations and see Him gathering a company of worshipers for Himself from every people group on earth. May His name be glorified!



But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!" (Romans 10:14-15)

"The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest." (Luke 10:2)

Cookies for Christ

Romans 10:1
Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.





















I love the freedom that we have in Christ to serve Him! Not having to be enslaved to what's "normal". . . not having to be in bondage to what other people think. . . pure freedom to do His will! Freedom to do crazy things for Christ!

It is my prayer that God would place upon the hearts of my students a burden to do anything for Christ! May He place in their hearts compassion for souls - for those who are spiritually destitute. Outside the compound walls are people who need food, who need clothes, who need so much. . . but the one overriding need is a Savior. They need a Savior who will save them from their sins, who will declare them as righteous before a holy God. They need the joy, peace, love, forgiveness, mercy, and hope that can only be found in and through Him. . . They need to know Him and rest in all He has promised His children through Christ. They need the true joy that only comes from doing what man was created to do - to glorify Him and enjoy Him. When it all comes down to it, they need one thing - they need Jesus.

I had invited my 7th-grade girls to come over this morning and make cookies at my house.
We had a blessed time. . . I let each girl have a couple cookies.

Then, we bagged up the rest with Gospel tracts and took them outside the compound!
In Malawi it is very common for men and boys especially to sell things on street corners. . . usually mice-on-a-stick, bananas, chickens, sometimes guinea pigs. . . But we didn't want to sell anything! We wanted to give passerbyers the best news that they would ever hear.
I'm sure we looked funny, which worked to our benefit because every biker or vehicle that passed by actually stopped. OK, so maybe we were the strangest things they'd seen that day, but we had with us the best thing they would hear in their entire lifetimes!
"We have a cookie for you!" Most of the people would kindly tell us that they didn't have any money. "No, no, no. . . we're not selling anything! It's a gift for you! And we also have something SO much better than this cookie - the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It's greater than anything else in the world!"
They would gladly take the cookie and the tract, thank us, and then vroom off. When all the cookies were gone we walked back to my house. . . Each girl prayed for specific people we had encountered - that God would work in their hearts and even use these tracts to do mighty things for His glory.
"Ms. Dinwiddie, we really thought you were crazy when you told us we were going to do this, but you know. . . this cookie for Christ thing is so much fun! Do you think we can come over every Saturday and pass out cookies for Christ?"
This made my day!














Please continue to pray for my students as God works in them and through them! Pray that they would have an increased desire to serve Him. Pray that they would remember the lost souls all around them. Pray for all of the people who gladly accepted our cookies and Gospel tracts - that God would do amazing things through them. And pray that His glory would be made known in all places at all times!

Do All to the Glory of God!

I Corinthians 10:31
So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

Please pray that God would use me to encourage all of my students to do math for His glory! Pray that His name would be exalted at the school, in my classroom, in the efforts of the students, in math. . . May He be known, may we be found in Him. . .

I have been so proud of my seventh graders! Many of them have struggled with math, but last week they worked very hard. . . and their tests were a pleasure to grade! We celebrated by having a cookie party after class. They liked that. :)
















God has really blessed me just in this last week alone with more and more opportunities to spend time with these students and to get to know them better. Tomorrow several of the girls will be coming over to my house to hang out. They love spending time with and getting attention from people who are older than they are. Please pray that God would help me as I serve. Pray that He would give me a heart for these kids. Pray that He would give me the grace to honor Him by loving and serving these students and sharing with them the treasure of Jesus Christ! Pray that I would know Him more and love Him more - that I would be a good example to these children, and that He would be glorified and magnified and exalted!
My prayer for these children is that they would be found in him, that they would know him, that they would become like him, and that God would break their hearts with the things that break His.

Philippians 3:7-11

But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith - that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

God is in Control!

The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps. Proverbs 16:9

Sometimes I just love the ways we are reminded of things!

Yesterday I was driving home from the market during the most difficult time to be caught on the roads. Around 5 p.m. traffic starts picking up and you not only find yourself in a long line of cars, but most of the people who have been selling produce bike or walk home on the side of the road right next to your car leaving just a few inches between them and you. In addition there are those who are still out selling mice-on-a-stick and bananas. . .and if you get too distracted watching all that's happening on the sidelines you forget to pay attention to the potholes!

I'll be honest! I'm still not completely comfortable with this stick shift stuff, and I still stall out quite frequently. . .especially on uphill stops. So, I'm in the line of cars yesterday on an incline in the traffic I've described. And I stall. And I start feeling just a little stressed.
But when I look out the window I can't help but to laugh from a joyful reminder! On the car in front of me is this bumper sticker that says RELAX in big letters. Then, underneath, God is in control.

The realization that He is in control of all things is always the best and most comforting when it meets face-to-face with the realization that we are not in control no matter how hard we may try to be! Guess we've just got to be broken to be healed!

Aren't ya grateful that He is in control of all things, including our salvation. . . that because of Jesus we have that privilege of resting, or, "relaxing" in knowing that God is in control?