Youth Group Car Wash

Saturday morning most of the Nampula youth group piled over to the MAF hanger to clean cars inside and out and change oil. Why? Well, it all started with Thomas :) 

Thomas had been reading "Do Hard Things" (a great book by the way), and decided he wanted to do something "hard". So he asked the youth group what they thought of doing a car wash and changing oil to raise money from to give to an orphanage here in town. We all thought it was a grand idea and were ready to do it whenever the day came. 

Which brings us to Saturday morning when we all came to the MAF hanger. The day had come and we were all ready to work :)

The MAF hanger. Thomas' dad is an MAF pilot. 

Annie and Esther. We had all brought treats so that while people were waiting for their cars they could snack :)

Andrew Iseminger. Happy to be there! :D

Riley sweeping out a place on the ground so that they could lay there when they changed oil. 

How many men and boys does it take to change one car's oil? ;) Just kidding, Dad and Mr. LePoidevin were explaining how to change oil. 

Thomas giving it a whir. 

Dad showing Elijah and Riley different stuff.

Esther and I helped scrub down the car mats. 

Andrew and Andrew. Shocking! ;) 

Damarise used my video camera to catch some of the fun we had :) Thank you Damarise!

Making our car sparkling clean!

How many people can fit under a car? :)

Greasing car joints... ( i think that's what it is )

Yes, we all got a bit wet ;) 

We had so much fun scrubbing cars down! :)

All the girls who were there :) 

Sarah was drenched and cooold! 

An MAF plane. 

Andrew and Thomas. Happy happy happy! 

Ian got a wee bit dirty changing oil ;)

Annie and I vacuuming rugs. 

My beautiful older sister, Damarise.

Riley and Kent changing oil. 

Eww... look at those oily hands! They were hard at work! 

Some of the cleaning tools. 

What's in the vacuum? 

Riley and Andrew checking out a plane's engine. 

A row of cars :) 

Fixing up Mr. DJ's car. 

"Scrub a Dub Dub"

Aw, Esther and Sarah are nice and clean! :)

Andrew

Thomas, Andrew and Ian :) They worked hard! 

Damarise and Gracie :)

All the girls again... sitting on each other's knees. :)

Ohh it was so cool! Damarise, Esther and I went out onto the tarmac while an LAM plane was taking off and we were waving to the plane and the pilot waved back :) We were so happy :) haha. Then when we were done cleaning all the cars everyone went onto the tarmac to wave to people getting off an LAM plane :)

When we finished at the airport Kent, Damarise, Andrew, Gracie, Sarah, Ian and I headed over to the Zwart's place to wash their car. 

They had some beautiful flowers! 

After a looong, but definitely fun day, we headed back home... with a bit of a sunburn and great memories :)

Giving!

During our vacation, we spent five days in Pretoria with some friends (the Stolks). We had only met them once (We've only been to South Africa once, the ten days when we first got here... to Africa) But,they opened up their homes to us with loving arms! They were so giving! They wanted to give us everything we've missed while being in Mozambique, like fast food:), shopping at malls etc. 

While there, our car was acting up. You remember how our car was acting up even before we left Nampula. Praise the Lord, it started working and we were able to drive it down to South Africa. Well, when we got to Pretoria, Dad wanted the car to get worked on and see if maybe a mechanic could figure out what was wrong with the car. It just so happened that the week we were there it was South Africa's week almost all full of holidays! So, the shop was closed till Monday, and on Monday, we were hoping to be in Kruger. Well, Uncle Steve said that he would take it in Monday and we could use his car. His four month old car!!! WOAH! We were in shock and gratitude! We got to drive their car to Kruger and all around Kruger. It was a lot nice, cause all of our luggage could fit in the back of the truck so we didn't have to unpack things off the roof of our car like we would have with our other car. When we got back from our trip, Uncle Steve said that he and some men from his school had all pitched in to help pay for the work done on our car. We were, once again, in appreciation of all they did!!! God is so good!

Anyways, the reason I'm sharing this is because I thought it was a cool example of what John says in  1 John 2:17- 

"The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever."

They gave! They knew, that in the end, it wasn't the earthly treasures like a new car, computer, or  GPS... that mattered, all those things are going to pass away soon. It was doing the will of God. Showing His love to others around them. It was amazing to see! Here they are opening up their home for our family and we've only spent a day with them... once, and that was a year and a half ago! Then they took us shopping, fed us, talked with us:), and let us feel at home! They showed true hospitality and it's an example we can all learn from! :) 

Thank you so much Stolks for being so hospitable and generous to us!!

Nothing is to difficult for Thee

Our car started to have problems again. Dad was working on it all day with a mechanic, and they're really not quite sure what is wrong. Uh oh! We are now starting to replan how we will be getting down to South Africa! And definitely praying hard that our car will start working!!! Tonight as I began to pray about our car a song that I just learned recently popped into my head.

"Ah Lord God, Thou hast made the heavens
And the earth by Thy great power
Ah Lord God, Thou hast made the heavens
And the earth by Thine outstretched arm.
Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Nothing is too difficult for Thee
Great and mighty God
Great in counsel and mighty in deed

Nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing
Nothing is too difficult for Thee"

And I was reminded that nothing is to difficult for God! He has everything planned out! He knows what is happening! He is in control!!! It was a wonderful reminder!

"Jesus looked at them and said, 'With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.'"-Matthew 10:27

Car Trouble...

Thursday, our car started to make some weird noises. Dad thought it sounded like the transmission, so he called up a friend's mecaninc (Marques) and Marques came over and wasn't sure what was wrong so he said he would come back Saturday. Today, Marques came by and him and Dad spent the whole day looking/working on the car. They were praying that it wasn't the transmission, but they were both pretty sure that it was. They started planning how they would get it out and down to South Africa and back in time for our trip to South Africa. It wasn't looking good. After a while, Dad called a mecanic friend(Mr. Bradd) of his that he had met in Maputo. Mr. Bradd said that Dad should try changing his oils before he deals with the transmission. Well, God is good! Dad and Marques changed the oil and drove the car around and there was no noise. It ran smoothly!!! Thank you Lord!!!