It's hard to believe that Carl and Shawn's time here in Mozambique has drawn to an end.  It has been an amazing week with God's faithfulness taking center stage.  Today was our third full day working in the studio building and I have to admit that I am just blown away at how much has been accomplished in this short time.  Shawn has been wowing our Mozambican brothers with all the fancy things he is doing with the plumbing.  We often find the workers just wandering around looking at the copper saying "Yeah...this guy is good".  If it weren't for us running out of a few parts, I think the whole plumbing system would be done.  It has been fun seeing it come together.  Carl has had his hands full with the somewhat confusing(sorry about that) electrical system layout.  He persevered though and all of the wiring for the building is complete!  I am still amazed and just so happy with all that has been accomplished.  We continued to stay pretty injury free although Shawn's finger did spring a small leak earlier today and my dad somehow managed to get a nice pinch from the ladder.  We all have a few scraped knuckles and hammer tenderized fingers, but God is good and there have been no mishaps.  Today we were also able to enjoy a nice traditional Mozambican meal.  Sergio's wife made us a feast of rice, shema(corn meal mush), matsavo(pumpkin leave stew) and fried mackerel in some type of sauce.  It was excellent, although there were a couple of people who were not big fans of the fish staring back at them.  All good things though must come to an end and this is it for Shawn and Carl.  Early tomorrow morning we are leaving Xai-Xai bound for Kruger national park and then on to Johannesburg.  I think we can all say that we have seen God's amazing faithfulness during this past week.  There was a time earlier this week where we had pretty much given up hope of ever even making it to Xai-Xai, let along getting any work done.  We were reminded though that God is able, and he can do amazing deeds.  Here we are now at the end of the week just praising him for opening the roads and holding off the hurricane.  We are so thankful.  We just want to thank you for all the prayers through this week and ask that you continue to pray as we travel in the next two days and as Shawn and Carl make the long flight back.

What an amazing God we serve!  I think that all of us here are being blown away by how the Lord had taken a situation that seemed to hopeless just a few days ago and has turned it into an amazing testimony of His power.  Today was our second full day on site and things are progressing amazingly well.  The drain system is fully installed, , most of the copper on the ground floor is in, nearly all of the wiring is finished on the first floor and a good portion is done on the second floor also.  We have put in a couple of long days, but God is really doing something here.  So far we have had no serious injuries.  Besides my dad somehow managing to hit is leg with a hammer and the occasional scuffed knuckle, we have been pretty well unscathed.  We are very thankful for that.  Also, even with this storm raging just off the coast, we can see God at work.  There has been a category 4 hurricane spinning around only 200 miles from us, but other than a little wind, we haven't been effected.  When you look at the radar you can see rain spinning out hundreds of miles on every side except the side towards us.  It is really amazing.  I keep expecting to get lashed by rain and high winds, but God is faithful and we have been able to work unhindered by the weather.  It also looks like the hurricane will continue on its current path which will lead it away from us.  We are so thankful for that.  There were times earlier in the week where I thought we may have to evacuate because of the storm.  God is good though and we are still here doing the work.  We have one more full day left to work on the building so we are praying for some multiplied time tomorrow to get done what we hope to get done. Thank you all for your continued prayers

It has been a great first full day on the jobsite!  After taking a few minutes to go check out the Indian ocean early this morning, we got out to the studio earlier.  There was not much time wasted today as I think we are all feeling a bit of urgency because of the delay.  It was an extremely productive day on the job though.  Shawn kept us crusing on the plumbing side of things while Carl and I did our best not to get too confused on the wire pulling end of things.  It all went very well though and right now pretty much all of the PVC drain system is installed and a pretty good portion of the copper is soldered on too.  We also ran the wiring for nearly all of the plugs and a about half of the lights on the first floor.  We could only do so much before we started getting in the way of the plasterers.  We also had another bonus surprise today when the electric company people came to set up our electric poles.  Now we are just waiting for a final inspection and then, Lord willing, we will be able to ge connected to the grid next week!  I think now that we are actually here and working, a bit of the stress is gone.  We've had a great time and lots of memories have already been made.  Today we laughed quite a lot because we all ended up with sand in the oddest places.  The wind has been really gusty here because we are just catching the edge of that cyclone so it was like working in a sand-blaster.  Every time you turned towards the wind you ended up with a face full of flying sand.  We thought with all the sand and cement that was blowing around today, we may need to chisel our eyes open in the morning.  It really has been an amazingly productive day though.  I am so thankful for Shawn, Carl and my parents for being willing to help us on this project.  We could not do it without them.  Please continue to pray safety as we work and good rest during the nights.  Also, continue to pray that the cyclone would remain on it's current path and not threaten land again.  Blessings to you!

We made it to Xai-Xai!!!  God is so good!  I have to admit that I woke up this morning just frustrated.  I had spent hours during the night just trying to think of ways to somehow get our team to Xai-Xai to do the work we had come to do. I finally just gave up and went about trying to glean any accurate information about the state of the road from the local new stations website.  I was a little disheartened to read that while the roadwork was progressing, they didn't expect it to be open until Wednesday at the earliest.  I started thinking more about the possibility to finding a ride up to the break, wading across and then finding a lift on that side.  I have to admit that the 60 meter walk across a fast moving crocodile infested river was not something I was looking forward to.  As I was pondering this I received a call from a missionary here in Xai-Xai saying that he heard the road was open.  I was shocked and didn't believe it at first, but after a couple calls it seemed to be true.  We finally had a little skip in our step and we packed everything up and headed north.  When we arrived at the place where the road had be destroyed, we could see that the water there was still very high.  In order to open the road the workers had filled the gap with boulders and then covered that with smaller rocks so that it was a bumpy, yet easily passable spot.  We were so thankful to be able to pass and after a couple of hours we were in Xai-Xai!  God is so good.  It really seemed like it would take a miracle for our team to reach the studio this week, but our God is a miracle worker and proved it to us today!  Not only were we able to arrive in Xai-Xai, but we were able to get a half days work in too.  We have some electrical wires pulled and Shawn has a pretty good run of copper already installed.  God is so faithful and we are just so thankful for all of your faithful prayers.  I do have one other prayer request though.  I mentioned this cyclone that has been lashing the northern provinces in an earlier update.  It has since moved away from land and is now intensifying and heading straight south between Mozambique and Madagascar.  It is currently a category 4 storm and is predicted to increase to a category 5 as it spins out there over the warm water.  Most predictions have it continuing south and then swerving away from land, but all of them say there is still a slight chance it could be pushed back onto land near here.  Please pray with us that this storm would move out to sea and not threaten land here where we are already very wet and wind damaged.  Thank you again!

Day 4 and we still have yet to step foot in Xai-Xai.  We still find ourselves in Maputo waiting for the road to become passable up to Xai-Xai.  We were able to see a little bit on the news and it does appear that they are making some progress in closing the gap that has opened in the road.  The water has gone down to the point where people can wade across it in waiste deep water, so that is all positive.  With that said, we still have no idea when the road may be passable. We will just continue to wait and pray...there doesn't seem like much else we can do.  To keep ourseles from going stir crazy today we headed over to a building project being done by the Wesleyan Church of Mozambique.  Carl and Shawn installed electrical service boxes while my parents worked to prep some window frames for receiving glass.  I think it was good for everyone get at least a little work under the belt.  I felt like I spent hours on the phone today trying to find out as much information as possible about the road, and also trying to keep the buidling project going at the studio.  They are already feeling the pinch of the road closure up in Xai-Xai as cement prices begin to rise and availability becomes limited.  All of those supplies rely on open passage from Maputo, which just isn't possible right now.  We have also been reading more about the storm that is pounding the north part of Mozambique.  For nearly two days now the Cyclone Funso has stood nearly still lashing the coast of Zamezia province in the north of the country.  News reports say 12 people have died and thousands of buidlings have been destroyed.  We continue to pray for those people who are facing such difficult times.  It makes our little problem here seem pretty small.  With that said though, I think we are all getting a little bit stir crazy here.  It is just hard when you have planned and prepped so much, and then just to have something as small  60 feet of missing road stand in the way of those plans and dreams.  We do know that God is in control though and we do continue to put our hope and trust in Him.  Pleast do continue to pray with us for a speedy solution to this current delay.

Well...here we are....still.  It's been one of those days that is just difficult to put into words.  It has been a bit of a roller coaster, at least for me, but at the end we find ourselves right where we started...waiting.  Since we are waylaid here in Maputo I made some calls this morning and we were invited to attend the church service at Sergio's home church named Machakene.  This church service was one of those unexpected blessings.  We were welcomed with open arms and were able to enjoy a wonderful service with some amazing singing and an extremely challenging message.  The service was also a bit of a reality check, at least for me.  I woke up in the morning thinking and fretting about our situation here.  Even sitting there I found myself plumbing the depths of my imagination trying to come up with a solution to get us to Xai-Xai.  It was about that time that the pastor started talking about some of the calls he received this past week.  Like the call from a pastor of a large church about 2 hours North of Xai-Xai.  That pastor called to ask for prayers because his church, which was a very large one, was totally destroyed during the winds of the storm this past week.  Or the call from pastor that heads up a large ministry in central Mozambique.  He called to ask for prayers because in his village over 700 houses and churches had been destroyed.  Or the call from the pastor of a a church in Chokwe(about an hour from Xai-Xai) who asked for prayers because his village and church were under water.  As I listened to these stories it made me realize that our situation here that we are so pre-occupied about is nothing compared to the challenges that these brothers and sisters are facing.  We need to continue to keep our brothers and sisters in our prayers during this difficult time.  We are still having a hard time getting any firm news on our little situation here.  What we do know is that the road is still impassible.  I heard this evening that they plan on installing a temporary bridge over the washout, but any idea of timeframe for that would be grasping at straws.  We just keep praying that the Lord will overcome this situation and allow us to arrive in Xai Xai.  In the meantime we are still being well looked after here in Maputo.  We have a very comfortable place to stay with some extremely hospitable people.  In the morning we have decided to try and lend a hand at a local building project that is going on here in Maputo.  I think it will be good for all of us to get our hands a little dirty and take our minds off of our current situation.  We pray that wherever we are and in whatever circumstance the Lord puts us in, that we would shine as lights for Him.  We continue to ask for your prayers for us and especially for those who are continuing to be directly effected by the rains and floods. 

At this time I expected to be writting I had hoped to be giving you the great news that the team had safely arrived to the beautiful Xai-Xai...but God seems to have different plans for us.  Everything was going really well.  We made a safe journey from Johannesburg through the city of Nelspruit and and an extremely easy and uneventful border crossing...which was a huge answer to prayer!  We were on our way to Xai-Xai when I got a call from Sergio saying that there was a problem.  We then found out that all of the rain we received with that tropical depression earlier in the week had caused some pretty serious flooding.  That flooding has actually washed away a piece of the only passable road going north to Xai-Xai.  We didn't know the extent of what was happening at the time, but we were advised to try and find a place to stay in the capital of Mozambique(Maputo) which is about a 3 hour drive south of Xai-Xai.  I made a couple of calls and the Lord provided a great place for us to stay here in Maputo at a guesthouse on a ministry complex.  We are so thankful for that.  We unpacked and got settled in here a bit and then watched the news to get a better idea of what was happening.  I'll be honest here...when I saw the video on TV my heart sank.  There was video of a river raging through a 50 ft gap in the road that was continually being torn wider.  I think we all were sobered by the scene we were seeing especially as the reality set in that this may not just be a little delay in the travels.  We are here in Mozambique, we are safe and well supplied...but I think we are all a little heart broken to not be in Xai-Xai.  It feels like the devil is working overtime to keep us from working on the studio.  My mom just pointed out how the devil has certaily inconvenienced a lot of people to keep us from the work we feel the Lord calling us to do.  We do not doubt that satan is doing his best to discourage us, but we put our trust in the Lord because we know that He is able to do amazing things.  We would really really appreciate your prayers though.  Not just for our arrival to Xai-Xai, but also for all of those here who have been effected by the recent storms.  Thousands of people are displaced by the floods and thousands more are dealing with storm damage to their homes and schools.  Also, the road that is washed out is the only road that can be used to supply the hundreds of thousands of people who live in and around the Xai-Xai area.  We thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers

This is the first of what we hope to be many blogs from the field over the next few months.  I am happy to say that the team(Carl, Shawn and my parents) have arrived safely to Johannesburg.  Everyone is a little tired and happy to be off the plane, but overall the trip seems to have gone well.  We are thankful for the Lord's protection during the long travel! Tomorrow will be a big day for us as we load up the truck(which is going to be very very full) and head east with the destination of Xai-Xai.  It is going to be at least a 10 hour trip, with that not always so fun border crossing, so we would appreciate your prayers through the travels.  We will try to keep this updated every day to let you know how things are going so keep stopping by.

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Mozambique, a country in Southeastern Africa, is made up of approximately 20 million people who speak 39 different languages. Of all those people, only a mere 48% can read. The people of Mozambique hunger for the Word of God, and this hunger grows daily. But even if a Bible were available in one of the many languages spoken in Mozambique, less than half would even be able to read it. So, "how will they believe in Him whom they have not heard?" (Romans 10:14)

Audio Scripture Ministries (ASM) has been responding to this need for over 40 years by providing translated Scripture in audio so that all may hear in their own language. In order to better meet the huge needs of Mozambique, ASM has prayerfully decided to expand their current studio in Xai-Xai by building a new facility, greatly increasing their current operation. Would you consider joining with ASM in this endeavor? Each $10 donation will provide one of the nearly 9,000 bricks needed. Each brick brings us one step closer to reaching our goal of bringing God’s Word to the non-readers in Mozambique.

Sergio, director of current studio in Xai-Xai, pointing out location for new studio.