Family Newsletter August 2014

Our last newsletter went out the door about four months ago, time to send you an update. Heartfelt thanks go out to all of you for your interest, support and prayers! We really need that. In contrast to other years, we didn’t on furlough this year. Apparently my inventory from last summers purchases I made in the Netherlands fell far short. The ‘hagelslag’ and ‘droppies’ are long gone, as a matter of fact the underwear and shoes are too. As a result of the poor quality of local products, we have become faithful customers of the local stores. Shoes hardly last one month. At least we support the local economy!

Moses recovered from malaria, thank you for your prayers. He has a very playful imagination, so much that he has a little notebook to jot down all his yet undeveloped ideas, so he can realize them another day. Obed is much more interested in what other (bigger) kids do and in sports. He bikes to the basketball park every day with a ball in a bag hanging from the bike handle, where he will score as many points as he can without stopping. They are such precious boys. They also come with me regularly to ‘help’ in their own way. They will carry bags of bread, pass out coloring pictures, or… make bricks! At the moment we have 50.000 baked bricks to be used for Nyenyezi Ministry building. For more info: http://molenaarsinmalawi.blogspot.com/2014/08/nyenyezi-ministry.html We thank the Lord and the New Jersey HRC for a special donation towards this ministry, last month!

Building the clay brick tunnel kiln

In Juli our family went on a week long holiday through northern Malawi. We visited several Dutch mission families and enjoyed the refreshing and unique dutch ‘gezelligheid’. We went on many jungle treks, climbed up rocky slopes to find waterfalls, saw plateaus and visited historical mission sites. It also happened to be the coolest week of the year… so we enjoyed amazing campfires in the evenings to stay warm. Now the temperatures are warming up with an average of 30 degrees Celsius. More info on our trip: http://molenaarsinmalawi.blogspot.com/2014/07/rhodas-journal.html

In the meantime, we are reasonably settled in our new digs. Living right on the campus of ABC is especially nice for the children. They felt very locked up inside the walls of our previous compound. The ‘ABC village’ presently consists of about 8 Malawi families, 4 American, 2 South African, one Australian and of course now also one Dutch family. There are also about 150 boarding College students. Last May, 66 college students graduated as well as 17 students earning their Masters degrees. Cees has already been able to accept a large number of new students, after an interview with each one of them. The Masters Program started their new school year on July 30. Cees is teaching the usual required courses as well as a class in Dogmatics. He is also responsible for organizing the teaching faculty and the finances.

The training at Logos continues steadily. The students are a pleasure to teach. We admire the church leaders who work so willingly in very poor circumstances. Their ‘flock’ are consumed with the need to survive. For example, the congregation of pastor Emmanuel consists of 70% widows. He visits them on a weekly basis in their rickety huts and every Tuesday he leads a Bible study. His salary consists of a small bag of corn kernels, and it makes him happy. For him this is not work to be rewarded, but purely out of love for the King whom he serves! More on Logos: http://molenaarsinmalawi.blogspot.com/2014/05/towards-christ.html

Our work revolves around investing in the local people. One example is Faithful, a sixteen year old girl that I have mentored. Last month she completed her exams and her desire is to become a doctor. Graduation has already taken place, even though the results of her exams will not be returned until January, which means that she cannot carry on with her studies in the meantime, so I am trying to find a suitable task to keep her occupied for the next six months, hoping that she will then be accepted at university.

I have just finished my first week being the 5^th grade teacher of the ABC Christian Academy. Every teacher may choose and develop a theme for their class. I have chosen “Globetrotters” as our theme. That will give plenty of opportunity for expanding the horizons with a variety of activities for the children. I enjoy the interaction with the students as we go through our curriculum. I appreciate your prayers as fulltime teaching at the academy is a big commitment in addition to the responsibilities I had already.  

Joas is preparing himself for departure to the Rift Valley Academy in Kenya, on August 28. In the meantime he is attempting to complete as many challenges as possible, such as climbing mountains and camping in a little tent at the top, catching and taming snakes or building airplanes from wood.

Last but not least: we are very happy to have Barb VanVught from HRC NewJersey here to help teaching at the academy! It was special to have 'uncle' John with us for a week as well!

 We hope this newsletter has given a satisfactory update of our work and life here in Malawi. We often think of many of you also. We know we all need the same thing, to be a salt and a light in the world around us, wherever that may be. Let us keep on praying for one another!

Heartfelt greetings from Cees, Mirjam, Joas, Rhode, Obed and Moses