Author name: Lois Gillespie

“Such knowledge is too wonderful for me!”

“In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength.”
Isaiah 30:15

This morning as I was reading one author’s commentary on Isaiah 30:15, I had to disagree. For this author, the idea of ‘resting’ created the image of a fly ‘lighting down’ so it could be smacked. The author did go on to say that that’s not what is meant here, but I already knew that. The image created in my mind is one of God waiting for us to ‘light down’ so that He can hug us and love on us. I guess this image is fresh in my mind because of the very special time I’ve recently spent with my granddaughters. My heart still yearns for the times when Summer would stop long enough to let me hug her. Is that how God feels? Is that why Isaiah goes on in the same chapter to say that “He rises to show you compassion.”? Imagine that! We know that God doesn’t sleep, but if He did, His excitement at getting up each day would be the possible chance that I would light down long enough to allow Him to once again show me His love! As David exclaimed in Psalms 139:6, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me…”

I praise God for travel safety as I traveled alone to the states last month without Bob, for the time with my family and the opportunity to personally welcome baby Hannah to our family, and for the chance to connect with many of you. I am back at Sahel Academy and busily catching up on many things that were waiting for me. We praise the Lord that Sahel technology ran smoothly while I was away. Many thanks to those who were available to cover for me in the Computer Lab and for any possible emergencies (which didn’t happen).

It seems that we’re running without any margin this year at Sahel in many areas. First of all, two staff members who were to join us have not arrived. For one of them, her arrival date has been postponed until next school year. The other staff member, our math teacher, is still raising support. We need him. Local missionaries are covering some of His classes; Bob has also picked up an extra class. As you can imagine, this puts a strain on the other ministries/classes to which these willing people are called. Please pray that God would supply what is lacking: both in getting this young man to the field, and in the extra strength that is needed by those who are filling the gap until he arrives.

Second of all, our electrical power problems continue. When we do have power from the local electrical company, it is often insufficient to power everything on campus, and almost always is below the voltage that is ‘healthy’ for our equipment. While a new transformer has been put in place, we are still waiting for the paperwork that lets us flip the switch to see if this will solve our problems. It’s been more than a year since the beginning steps of this project. The work itself hasn’t been that time-consuming, but the waiting for ‘official permission’ between each step has been long and very discouraging. Just as Isaiah encouraged above, we are trying to ‘rest’ and see what God will do. Please pray with us for God’s intervention and ‘show of love’ in this situation.

Pray also for one of our co-workers who will be returning to the US soon in order to be closer to better medical care for her high-risk pregnancy. While she is taking some of their children with her, the rest are remaining here on the field with dad. This lady fills so many crucial roles, one of which is overseeing our national French school for about 600 elementary Nigerien children. Her caring and involved leadership are making a difference in this ministry. Please pray that this influence will continue as she tries to guide and direct at a distance through e-mail and long-distance communication. Also pray for dad as he takes charge at home and also continues in the studio ministry without his partner for these few months. Pray for the health of mom and the new baby, and for the children who will all be missing a parent for these few months.

We can’t thank you enough for your prayers. Knowing that you are praying encourages us in ways that you cannot imagine. While our financial support level as been slowly falling due to both the economy in the US and here in Niger, we’ve seen God meet our needs in ways that we cannot imagine. We look forward in anticipation to what God will do in the future through our partnership.

Spring: At Last!

Spring is here, and while you’re thinking of flowers and green grass, for us it’s the hottest part of the year in what is called the hottest capital city in the world.  Thursday night, when I was once again showing a video out my front gate at the request of our neighbors, I could not keep the projector running because of the heat. With the use of 3 ice packs, one on bottom and 1 on each side, I was finally able to keep the projector cool enough to show the video. When our rains finally come, we will see some relief from the heat.

The heat is not the only thing that makes it difficult to live in a third world country.  For Lois and I, it has been another long year at school and we’re now approaching the end when perseverance is needed to help us all finish well. Perhaps like lots of you, we wonder if what we’re doing is really that important.  We would love to be with family and live where it is easier. It  is during these times that we often examine why we are here.

As I was teaching WWII history, this analogy came to mind: During WWII, a small town wanted their tax money to really count for something in the war, so they requested that their taxes go specifically to frontline soldiers.  The answer to their request stated that it takes 9 support personnel to keep one man on the frontline, and that everyone is just as important to the cause as the frontline soldier. 

Here on the field, it may not be a 9 to 1 ratio, but the support team is just as important to the mission as the frontline missionary.  Someone has to be an administrator; pilots and mechanics are needed,  Bible translators must carry on.  Most of those serving on the field have children that need education.  If it were not for the teachers, the entire infrastructure would collapse and the mission would fail. This week, AFN (Armed Forces television Network which we occasionally watch at the American club), talked about the love and support that military children provide to their parents. It was a reminder to us that as we minister to MK’s, we are ministering to their parents. With all the love they have to give, missionary children are part of “the frontline support” for your missionaries. So when we are hot, tired, lonely, or discouraged, we try to remember once again the vital importance of the role God has called us to fill here in Niamey. 

Thank you for your many e-mails and requests for how you can pray for us.   Probably our requests are not much different from yours:

  • · daily physical strength
  • · patience
  • · perseverance
  • · encouragement
  • · spiritual power and strength
  • · wisdom
  • · a servant’s heart

Also, continue to pray for Boubacar. He has headed north to Timbuktu to visit family and look for a job since we’re moving to Sahel Academy campus and won’t need him anymore. He says that some of his family in Timbuktu are Christians and that he is going to make the decision to follow Jesus while he is there. Please pray that this will be so, and that Satan will once again be defeated as Boubacar proclaims that Christ is Lord

God is using your prayers…

Thank you for your many prayers, e-mails and notes of encouragement. Our hearts are warmed when we think of you thinking of us and praying for God’s work here in Niger and Sahel Academy. God is using those prayers!

Many of you continue to pray for Boubacar. On Easter Sunday, Boubacar asked me to show the Jesus film to the neighborhood again. This time I showed it in Zerma, a language that more of the people would understand.  All of them, approximately 125, were very intent on listening.  Today, Boubacar asked me for a Bible to read.  He said that he did not have school lessons so he had some extra time.  He has been confronting his family with the ideas from the Bible, and his family is a little upset. They say that he is becoming a Christian. He wanted to read the Bible so that he could talk to them more intelligently.  This next week his family is coming over and I will show the Jesus film in Tomasheq, their heart language.  Boubacar hopes that they will understand better.  He has quite the missionary fervor for a guy that isn’t yet born again. Your prayers are storming his heart, and we believe that God is going to save Him. Please continue to pray for Boubacar and for his family as they hear the story of Jesus in their heart language this week.

Many of you also prayed for someone to come and help cable the new Media Center, and your prayers were answered. Binh came from Edmonton, Alberta, to work with Lois (and Ken Golde and Bob – on occasion) for 2 weeks, running and terminating cable in the Media Center. He carried his supplies with him from Edmonton, only to have some of them held up in customs at the airport. Fortunately these were released 4 days later so the work could continue. Binh also helped work through some puzzling ‘connectivity’ issues on campus that were keeping our elementary classrooms from consistently connecting to the network. Please pray that work will continue on this addition to Sahel Academy, and that it will be ready for the 2008-2009 school year. Visit the school website at www.sahelacademy.com for a list of the staff that is needed for this next school year. Your prayers have ‘supplied’ our staff in the past (www.sahelacademy.comsahelian); we know God will use them to meet our needs 6 months from now. Please pray for these staff needs for the 2008-2008 school year.​

Bob: Over Spring Break while Lois was working with Binh at Sahel, I had an opportunity to spend a day and night with Djerigou, a pastor friend out near Baneira. I set my tent up beside their village huts and ‘slept’ to all the sounds of an African village – donkeys, goats, chickens, children, etc.; I was ‘awakened’ to the sound of the women pounding the millet.

I was impressed by their burning desire to know how to read the Bible and to teach others also. In the morning, Djerigou watched his little boy while his wife was with a group who were learning to read.   By 10:00, he went off to a class of his own to learn to read better.  In the heat of the day we rested, but as the sun went down the activity started again with the women pounding their millet for supper that evening. 

Djerigou and I went out to his field where he had dug a 30-foot well by hand and was watering small fruit trees that he had planted. The next morning we went to another village a few miles away. The people of the Baneira church have shared the gospel with this village, and after a year they have a church of 50 people.

As we were coming back, we met up with a group of 5 men from Baneira who were riding bikes out to this village to teach them to read the Bible.  It made me think of how we take reading and the Bible itself for granted.  These people have so little, yet their priority is on Jesus and His Word. Pray for these believers and their unquenchable witness and desire to know God’s Word.

Lois: I am enjoying a Bible study about the Fruit of the Spirit with some other Niamey women. This week we’re studying about God’s tenderness and His goodness. Although I ‘knew’ these stories, they’ve stirred my heart afresh this week as I’ve read again how God’s heart was moved to action by Hagar’s distress over her dying son, and how Jesus’ heart was warmed by simply spending time with the children. I’m being reminded of my priorities. It’s easy for me to get busy with equipment and school work, and ignore the hearts. Although the equipment and school work does need my attention, my heart needs the peace that comes from allowing God to use me to minister to other hearts. Actually, sometimes fixing broken computers does minister to hearts. Please pray that I’ll have wisdom to recognize how I can best minister, by fixing a computer or by “spending time with the children”. After all, they are the reason we are here in Niger at Sahel Academy.