October 2005

Vol. 5, No. 5

Hello Everyone,

No baby news to report at this moment, but we did see the doctor on Friday, and we believe that Aïchatou will have the baby very, very soon. The official due date was October 19, but that came and passed. After spending last week in Michigan, I (Tom) am home and have no travel plans for the near future so that I will now certainly be home for the baby. Aïchatou is doing quite fine and has only experienced the normal discomforts that come with any pregnancy. We’ll have the baby at Mahaska Regional Hospital. Please remember us in your prayers.

This last month has been busy, as you can imagine. Aïchatou, Marie-Florence, and I traveled together for 10 days in northwest Iowa (Sioux Center and Rock Valley) where we spoke to seven groups during that period. We stayed at the RCA Mission House in Orange City between September 24 and October 4. That’s a house especially available for longer missionary and church-worker visits. We found time to visit a pumpkin farm and even managed to take in a movie (“Just Like Heaven”) with Marie while we were there. At 18 months she wasn’t ready to watch a full-length film, but we cheated by bringing a portable DVD player, which allowed her to watch her Baby Einstein DVDs in the theater!

Marie was glad to finally return home after all that time away. Her vocabulary is growing rapidly, and she’s willing to try to pronounce almost any word she hears. We’re not sure how well she’ll adapt to a new baby, as she is very attached to her mother, and we wonder if she’ll be willing to share mama with a new baby. Marie has been able to play with her cousins (my sister’s three girls), and we hope that she won’t mind staying there for some time when the baby comes.

I made a trip to Michigan by myself last week and spoke to Faith Reformed in Zeeland and First Reformed in South Holland, Illinois, on the way back to Iowa. I also attended the Mission Services Unit of the Reformed Church in America as the visiting missionary representative. That was very interesting, as I was able to participate in some of the policy discussions that affect the future of RCA mission.

Unfortunately, we learned that churches are not supporting missionaries as they once did, and denominational missionaries are losing out to parachurch ministries, volunteer mission teams, and even new church plants! The world is changing, and the denomination has some real challenges ahead of it as missions evolve.

Later, I had a chance to visit World Missions and Pastor Sani (who will run the Maradi recording studio in partnership with Words of Hope). They are distributing a talking Bible that has the whole New Testament in Hausa recorded on one long-playing cassette tape inside a sealed cassette player that resembles a Bible. They are very interested in helping us get a shipment of those to Niger for the use by EERN’s evangelists. Each one costs about $50 and includes a small solar panel (since there’s little electricity in rural Niger).

Also in Michigan, I met with my PhD advisor, and I copied lots of articles for my dissertation. It is going to be a real race against time to get a proposal written before we leave in January. Things are slowing down with the baby coming, but I still have a lot to do. My topic will focus on North-South (developed countries-developing countries) partnerships in faith-based development. My advisor, Jim Bingen, has been exceptionally good to work with.

I think that’s about all to say until the really big news arrives in a few days!

Prayer and praise

• Pray for Aïchatou and her delivery. Pray that our baby will be born healthy and happy.
• Give praise that the recording studio at Maradi is finished! It still needs office and technical equipment and a staff must be selected. Pray for Pastor Sani, who will leave Grand Rapids and Words of Hope and return to Niger in early November to start the next phase of daily Christian broadcasting in Niger.
• Pray for future meetings with partners for our work in Niger. I’m having meetings in the next few months with a representative from FARMS International (an NGO that specializes in microcredit). Pray also for the Talking Bibles project with World Missions and for assistance with development activities from some other ministries.
• Give thanks for some additional gifts for replacing my laptop computer. I’m not sure where things stand exactly, but I know we’re getting closer.

In Christ,

Tom, Aïchatou and Marie-Florence

The 2005 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 316