"Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you planned for us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare." - Psalm 40:5

March was an exciting month for our little church at Mphosi. If you remember in my last post I mentioned that the community leaders had not given us permission to build a new church structure. The good news is that in March, the community leaders came to the land and gave their blessing on the building! Now the church is able to continue the building process.

During the meeting, various individuals stood up to say a word of appreciation or blessing to the church. 

The building in the background is the current church structure where the church has met for years.  The ladies at our church made food over the fire for all the guests. 

This cinder block is where the community leaders marked the edge of the church property. 

The church building had already been started, but we were waiting for the official blessing from the community leaders to keep building.

I have been keeping busy with my outpatient nursing job - still working a bunch of hours there. After talking with some friends and assessing my work situation, I've decided to start working part time next month. I'm hoping to work 3 days a week instead of the current 5 days/week.

Mapile and I also had the joy of having some dear friends visit with us in March. Brandon and Joy came for one week, and we really enjoyed our time together. We went to a local game park, Mlilwane, and spent an afternoon swimming in the pool there. We had taken a volleyball with us, and we had at least 10 other people who joined us for playing volleyball in the pool! It was also refreshing to have a chance to catch up with friends, have a good excuse to go out to eat, and just do fun things together.

Hanging out with Brandon and Joy in our apartment. We made yummy food together, which was pretty exciting.

Easter services were held here at the Bible College for the whole Wesleyan church. They started the services on Thursday evening before Easter, and the services kept on happening until the main service on Sunday morning. Many people came to the college and "camped" here - sleeping in the dining hall and the chapel in order to attend all the services. Unfortunately, I had to work that whole week and weekend, so I don't have any fun pictures to show of that.

Some really exciting news for me is that I started a Bible study with some missionary ladies in Manzini this past week. The study is called "Wonder Struck," and it came at a really good time for me. I have been praying for something to help me grow spiritually, and I wanted to be able to meet with other ladies, so this was a wonderful answer to prayer for me. We met for the first time this past Tuesday, and we will continue to meet for the next 7 weeks or so.

I guess that's all of the big news. As far as small news goes, I killed my first chicken today. A lady at the Bible College gave us a chicken to help celebrate Mapile finishing his undergrad theology degree at Hebron in South Africa (which also happened this month - Mapile's paperwork got graded and he has a degree now!)... so she gave us a "home chicken" to celebrate.

Starting work

We got two "home chickens" from a visit to some of our church members.

February 15th was Mapile and my 6 month wedding anniversary. I don’t know how the days keep flying by, but it seems like the longer we are married, the faster it goes.

February started a lot of new things for Mapile and I. School opened up at the Bible College, so Mapile has been busy with all the things that come with his responsibilities as a staff member like teaching, doing the librarian work, helping plan social and sport activities, and anything else that he is asked to help with. We also have a discipleship group with several of the students from the Bible College that meet at our house on Wednesday evenings. We are excited about our discipleship group because we have often talked about wanting to have a Bible study in our home, and now we have a great opportunity to do that. It’s really nice to have the student’s back on campus. Mapile likes to play soccer and volleyball with the guys on Wednesday afternoons, and occasionally in the evenings. Also, the Bible College has a ping pong table and a pool table, which has been a great way to hang out and play games together.

I started working on February 2^nd at a private clinic in Manzini that’s about a 30 minute drive from where we stay. I work in the outpatient/ER department. Most of the time I sit in my little triage room, and when the patients check in at reception I can see their names pop up on my computer, so then I get to call them in to take their vital signs. You might think that’s an easy task, until you call people’s names like, “Nonhlanhla Ndlangamandla,”or worse, a name with a “c” or “x,” which makes the clicking noise. I have to break social norms sometimes and use first names because I’m too intimidated to try the last names. Other times both names are so intimidating that I just have to take a deep breath and try my best to pronounce it phonetically. 

When we have emergency cases, we have a little casualty room where we see to them. We also use that room to prepare patients that the doctors are admitting or to give patients IV/IM injections.

In the four weeks I have worked, I sure have learned a lot of things. Healthcare is really different here, and I don’t even know where to begin telling you about all the differences. It’s certainly a big learning curve, but the Lord has helped me in countless ways. It’s certainly different working at a private clinic because we only see patients who have insurance, or who can pay cash for our medical care. While it is somewhat hard to work for a business, I keep feeling like the Lord is telling me that this is a training ground, where I am learning so much about healthcare in Swaziland. I believe that the stuff I am learning at this clinic will be so helpful for our future. I work from 7am-5pm, and around 190 hours per month.

In the car going to work on my first day at the new job. 

Mapile and I continue to pastor the small Wesleyan church at Mphosi. We have been working on getting a building for the church because now the church is made from wooden poles and corrugated iron. We haven’t made much progress on the building though, because the community leaders in the area haven’t given the final decision to let us go ahead and build yet. So we keep waiting and praying for the go-ahead to keep building so that the church can have a real building. With all of the responsibilities that Mapile has at the school, we have decided to resign from pastoring at the Mphosi church. However, since there is still no other pastors available now to take Mapile's place, we plan to stay with the church until another pastor is found. 

One of the little kids at church snoozing up in the front of the church during the service. 

In other news, Mapile got his driving license this month! It was quite an interesting and difficult process. There is no written test that he had to take, but he had to go to the police station and have an oral test with a police officer. He passed the oral test and the driving test on the first try, which many people are not able to do! It's been really exciting for him to be able to drive, and I'm certainly enjoying not always having to be the one who drives us everywhere. 

We had these two stay with us for a week back in January. Sithembiso, the little guy next to me, is one of Mapile's cousins. Skuta, the one next to Mapile, is a friend of ours who is still finishing high school. 

I came home from work the other day and stopped to remember how beautiful this place is where we live. This picture does absolutely no justice to the view out of my front door... but it's all I have for now to share with you all. 

We really appreciate your prayers. The pace of our lives has picked up a lot. I'm certainly not accustomed to working this much, and I've felt quite exhausted. I think part of it is that the transition from having no job for over 6 months, to working 50 hours a week is really tough. The Lord continues to be faithful to us in so many ways. We continue to be so thankful for His presence in our lives. A few weeks ago we prayed that the Lord would give us opportunities to share about Him with others. Soon after we prayed that, Mapile had an opportunity to share about Christ with a lady who was at his driving school. Then I also had an opportunity to share God's plan of salvation with one of my coworkers. 

"Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords: His love endures forever." - Psalm 136:1-2.
We are so thankful that the Lord does not change - He is the same, and His faithful love endures forever. 

Visiting Uganda

“Praise the Lord! Yes, give praise, O servants of the Lord. Praise the name of the Lord! Blessed be the name of the Lord now and forever. Everywhere – from east to west – praise the name of the Lord. For the Lord is high above the nations; his glory is higher than the heavens. Who can be compared with the Lord our God, who is enthroned on high? He stoops to look down on heaven and on earth. He lifts the poor from the dust and the needy from the garbage dump. He sets them among princes, even the princes of his own people! He gives the childless woman a family, making her a happy mother. Praise the Lord!” – Psalm 112: 1-9 NLT

Wow, so much has happened over the last 4 weeks! Mapile and I had a wonderful time with my parents and my cousin in Uganda. It was our first time to go to Uganda, and we enjoyed experiencing lots of new things together. The best part for me was just having time to spend with my family… drinking tea with my mother and playing games as a family. Those are things that I miss so much when I’m away from family, so I certainly soaked up those opportunities.

The first week we were in Uganda we spent in Kampala. We did Christmas shopping, went out to eat, played games in the hotel, spent a day with the Metz family (missionaries to Uganda - from my home church in Marion, IN), and we picked up my cousin Rebecca from the airport on our last day there. From the airport we took a small bus that mom and dad had rented to Busia. Busia is a border town that lies between Uganda and Kenya. There are no big grocery stores there, just small little shops along the road, but you can buy everything that you need at those shops. Mom and Dad’s house is about a 25 minute walk from the town, and that walk feels a lot longer when the sun is beating down on you.

The Central View Hotel we stayed at in Kampala

Out to eat Ethiopian food

I loved seeing where Mom and Dad live. Mom has been writing to me about different people and places since they moved to Uganda in August. It was so cool to have faces to go with all the names, and to see the places that Mom and Dad frequent on a regular basis.

The neighbors, Purity and Valeria, standing on Mom and Dad's front porch 

We spent Christmas day at church. The day looked very much like a normal African Sunday church service, except that we all ate a meal together at the end of the service. Also, during the first part of the service my mom, my cousin Rebecca, and I got to share the first “sermon.” It’s really like Sunday school, except that you stand in front of the whole congregation and share in a more formal setting. We were asked to “preach” the first sermon about two days before Christmas, and we agreed to do it together. We talked about the gifts that the wise men brought to Jesus, and the spiritual significance of each. After a time of worship together, Mapile preached the main sermon. It was neat to see Mapile jumping into the ministry opportunities that he was given in Uganda. He preached twice at the local Wesleyan Church, and both times the Lord really used him to share challenging messages. Mapile also had the opportunity to help Dad teach an Old Testament class to 15 Ugandan pastors.

Mapile teaching class with his interpreter, Tom

On New Years Day our nephew, Caleb Jonathan Cromer, was born in Marion, Indiana! It was so fun to be with Mom and Dad when we got the news that my brother and sister-in-law had a baby. Mom and I had really hoped that we could be together to hear the news, so it was a big blessing for us. 

We headed back to Swaziland on January 2^nd.

Since we’ve been back we’ve been settling into life here. Mapile is now on staff at the Bible College, so he’s been busy in staff meetings, library work, preparing for classes, and such. He’s also going to driving school, which is so exciting since we have a car now! 

I am still waiting on my work situation, but I'll keep you updated when I do start workin

Well, otherwise I’ll update you with some photos...

It was such a blessing to have my cousin, Rebecca, visit from Nairobi!
Rebecca and I have spent many Christmases together in Michigan with her parents,
so it was fun to spend our first Christmas together in Africa this time. 

Leaving Swaziland

At the Joburg airport on the way to Kampala

Layover in Kigali, Rwanda

Doing laundry in Mom and Dad's bathroom

We had to have back massages to deal with our sore backs after laundry

The biggest cooking pots I've seen!

At Mom and Dad's church

Passion fruit juice

Riding a "boda" in Busia - a very common mode of transportation

Adjusting to life in Swaziland

It’s hard to believe how quickly the months have gone by. Mapile and I have been married for nearly 4 months now! Much of that time has been very slow for me, as I have been waiting for my nursing registration and Swazi nursing license to be processed. The good news is that a few weeks ago my paperwork was approved! I now have what I need to legally work as a nurse here in Swaziland. Now I am in the process of looking into jobs in the area and trying to find a place that would be a good fit for me.

The past few months of waiting have been really good ones. I think that the Lord knew it was good for me to have a few months for cultural adjustment and rest after the big move and the wedding. Every day looks different here, with different visitors who show up at the door or tasks that need to be accomplished. Many days are filled with the monotonous tasks of doing laundry, sweeping the floor, cooking, doing dishes, etc. Almost every day that I am home, our sweet neighbor girl named Precious stops by the house. I started giving her sweets awhile back when she came to the house because I wanted to be the cool Auntie that lives upstairs… though now we have established a routine, so I know that when I see Precious at my front door, or in my kitchen, then I’ve got to find some kind of snack to give her. She is a great, and very cute neighbor. 

Precious

Another neighbor - Siphesithle, watching a movie with me while I made taco shells in the living room

At the end of October we had graduation at the Bible College. Mapile was the MC for the day, and 9 students graduated. Ever since then it’s been pretty quiet around here.

November flew by without many big events, though we did have several opportunities to host visitors. Mapile’s brother, Menzi, came to visit for one weekend. Another weekend we had the privilege of hosting Mapile’s Gogo for the whole weekend. While she was with us, some of Maphile’s aunts, and his uncle came to have a meal with us. In Swazi culture, the new bride in the family is called the Makoti, and she usually does most of the cooking and caring for her new family. Feeding everyone that one meal felt like a big task to me, and I’m thankful that I don’t have to cook like that all the time. 

We also went to visit Gogo and the kids who stay with her at her house several times.  

At Gogo's house

Four of the boys that stay with Gogo - Lungelo, Sethu, Bayanda, and Sithembiso

Little Fezo - the youngest of the kids who stay with Gogo

Some of our visitors - these are some of the youth from our church at Mphosi. They came to play soccer and watch a movie at our house. 

At the end of November we celebrated Thanksgiving with the missionaries on campus - the Cheney family, the Crofts, and one of the Zimbabwean students on campus. 

December has already been an eventful month. One of the biggest events was that we got a car! I could have written an entire blog on buying a car in Swaziland… but I wouldn’t want to bore you all to death with the long, confusing details of it all. It was a four day process to get all the paperwork we needed, and we spent many hours waiting in lines. Now we are so thankful to have a registered car that we can get around with! The past four months of taking public transport have taught me a lot about the huge blessing a car can be. We get to leave at the time we want to, put heavy bags in the back, and we don’t have to wait indefinitely at the bus stop to try to find a bus with empty seats going the direction we are hoping to go. Our car has also been a blessing to others even though we have had it less than a week! We’ve been able to give people lifts to where they are going, and even help out one of our friends who was stuck on the side of the road with no gas.

We are getting excited now because we are headed to Uganda on Monday to visit my parents for Christmas. We will stay there until the beginning of January and then head back here. Neither of us have ever been to Uganda, so we are looking forward to experiencing new things together.

Mapile is working on his last assignment for his degree in theology. He should be done with that assignment by the time we leave for Uganda. We are looking forward to next year, when Mapile will work for the Bible College and help fill in wherever there is a need on campus. I am also looking forward to working as a nurse in Swaziland and seeing what opportunities arise in that area for me.

Our African nativity

Mapile wearing his traditional Swazi attire for one of the Bible School Activities

Thank you for your prayers and for your encouragement! We really appreciate the way so many people faithfully pray for us. We look forward to seeing what God has in store for us as we follow hard after Him.

“Let all that I am praise the Lord; with my whole heart, I will praise his holy name. Let all that I am praise the Lord; may I never forget the good things he does for me. He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases. He redeems me from death and crowns me with love and tender mercies. He fills my life with good things. My youth is renewed like the eagle’s. The Lord gives righteousness and justice to all who are treated unfairly… The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.” – Psalm 103:1-6, 8 NLT