When I arrived here our storerooms were a bit of mess. It made it difficult to find the right tools and parts that we needed. So, one of my biggest projects since I've been here has simply been to reorganise some of our stuff here on the compound. I have spent most of this week building shelves for our storeroom so that I can actually find the tools I need for my work. I am becoming quite the shelf builder - I have built about 9 shelves total since I've been here. Today I finally finished putting them together and getting our stuff neatly put on them. It is nice to find some organization in which to work! After we got everything put on the shelves there was some extra room so we set up our ping pong table which has been stored for a long time. The guys I work with were very excited - it made a loong days work worth all the effort. Here are some pics of a few of the guys.

Flight day in pictures

Stuck in the mud on the way to check the airstrip at 6am.

(please note - the IV plug for wake move-in team)

Morning.

Sad old donkey by the side of the road - Eyor anyone?

Waiting for the plane.

Plane Landing

Loading the DC3.

The DC3 taking off.

Lift off!!

After driving back and finishing up some work here at the compound my day is almost done....gotta go cook up some grub.

Tomorrow is flight day ...which means getting up at 5am to go check out the airstrip. At least the sunrise is great!

The far side of the sea...

Recently I have spent some time reading Ps. 139. It has always been one of my favorite passages of scripture and I have often taken great comfort in the promises that are found there. In particular verses 7-10 have been a great comfort to me:
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
As someone who has settled and resettled on “the far side of the sea” many times during my life these words have special meaning to me. Now, more than ever before, I find myself clinging to these words – His right hand will hold me fast. There are times, living here, when I have become lonely and wonder what I am doing here. It can be frustrating learning a new language and customs and building new relationships. And still, in the midst of any doubts and questions about what I am doing here I am reminded that my King knows where I am – I cannot flee from his Spirit!
I have also been reminded lately that my citizenship is a heavenly one and that I am here to work for an eternal kingdom, not one that is fleeting. It is often so easy to become preoccupied with how things appear on the outside by worldly standards. I can easily see what my hands have built or done but the real question is not about what I can see but rather about what I have built or done for the Kingdom. I want to be building an eternal reward, not an earthly one. Today I was reading in Philippians and was particularly challenged by chapter 3 where Paul talks about considering everything garbage compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ. He considered everything a loss compared to knowing and following King Jesus. And he goes on to say that he was pressing on toward the heavenly prize that awaited him. Chapter 3 ends with the following:
But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
It is exciting for me to think that my citizenship is an eternal one. One that is not constrained by human lines drawn on a map or by the color of my skin. It is a citizenship given to me by the King of Kings – an undeserving gift which certainly demands a willingness to give up this earthly life but a gift that cannot be stripped away. I long for that better country – the heavenly one (Heb 11).
As I get to know people here, I long to be a part of building the Eternal Kingdom, and not just an earthly one. Each day I have the opportunity to work with people who need more than just the material help that I am able to offer – pray that “I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” (Phil 1:20)

Backyard relics..

This pic is a little small - but it is of the moon ...maybe not so interesting. Just east of us lies Ethiopia - only about 2 miles away, so the moon rises over Ethiopia.

Below are some pics our our "backyard relics". These two old machines are just outside our compound and are left over from the war here.

Flight Day

Every other Thursday we have a flight day in which we receive supplies that we need from Nairobi, Kenya. The day begins at about 5am for me as it is necessary for someone to go and check the airstrip and make sure that it is landable. During the rainy season our dirt airstrip can be quite muddy and we don't want the plane to get stuck or have other trouble on our airstrip. So, at 5am I get up and go to check the strip and then give an update to our pilots in Kenya letting them know how it looks. This week it started to rain at about 6am after I had checked the strip so someone had to go out again and check it at 10:30 after the rain had stopped to make sure that it was still ok. The airstrip is only about 2km away but it takes at least 20 minutes to get there because of the road, which has many large mud hole in it. Two weeks ago we actually got stuck on our way to the airstrip which caused some stress on our part. This week we didn't have any trouble getting there and the plane arrived at about 1pm. Flight day is always kind of exciting because people are coming and going from breaks and we get new food and supplies. It can also be somewhat stressful as communication over the radio with the pilots can be frustrating. We also have to take fuel to the plane on most flight days and so it takes a lot of effort to load up the fuel. The two pictures are of loading up the fuel at our compound and then fueling the plane at the airstrip. (I've also added a picture of the tank stand that I built for our water collection. The tank holds 1000ltrs and it only took about 3 rains to fill it. I then put a runoff pipe into another large tank and it was full a couple of days later. When it rains it pores!!)