Recap:
We woke up early (as they do every Saturday) and started making bricks at about 7:30am. We worked till about 11:30. Holy cow this is such hard work…. but this church IS GETTING BUILT! I’m blessed to get to invest sweat and hard work in this Church with these Men of God.
This next paragraph is for those that supported me. I really want you to know where some of your money is going. When I got here, I asked JJ to let me know of some needs that he knew of among the community. He pointed one out to me today. There is a young man that I’ve come to love. I’ve invested many hours in coaching him on guitar. He is an orphan and he sleeps on the concrete floor of his aunts house. Let me re-emphasise that last sentence. He sleeps ON THE CONCRETE floor… not on a mattress on the floor. JJ just gave him a thin mattress the other day that he found for him. That made his day! Can you imagine? Today, I was building bricks with this young man, and we (JJ and I) noticed that his clothes were falling off of him, ripped, or didn’t fit. JJ brought him aside and asked him what clothes he had right now other than what he had on. His answer: 1 school shirt, 1 school pants, 1 pair of flip flops, 1 pair of underwear, 1 undershirt. He also asked how he was eating. The guys response: I’m eating… I have some tapioca and nuts (that’s what I call it… it’s like an extremely bland non nutritious tapioca powder that you mix with water to make a paste and has some ground up nuts in it). Let me re-emphasise something that JJ said the other day to me. ”They really know you love them when you’ve met one of their deepest needs: food, clothing, and education.” My eyes were welling up as I talked to JJ privately about this young man. I can’t imagine myself in his shoes…scratch that…. his one pair of flip flops. Sigh… So I was able to give him about $27.00 in his currency today. This is what that bought him: a few good meals, a new school shirt, khaki pants (also for school), 5 pair of underwear, and a few undershirts. $27.00 has never gone so far! If you would be interested in giving to need (DIRECTLY, not through an organization), please let me know, I’d be happy to help connect you to one of these young men.
Later, we went to a hotel in a neighboring town where you can pay a few bucks and cool off in their pool. This felt great after hours of brick making in the hot sun.
We came back and went to soccer. Young men in the community come to the church property every saturday evening to play soccer in the field out back. It’s a great opportunity for relationships.
After that, we had another late night guitar lesson. I introduced the song “Rise and Sing” to them today. They went NUTZ! They loved it. I love worshiping with these guys at the end of each evening session.
I’m off to bed. Gotta get up early. Goodnight.
For more info on this ministry, visit: www.togopalms.org
For pics from today, visit: http://www.facebook.com/BryanTabb
