This month is when Northern Ghana gets huge downpours of rains and lots of wind which causes damage to roofs and floods the roads and the flood plains. The flooding blocks access roads so the villagers resort to using man powered canoes to get to market. The canoes are overfilled with people and goods; they will even carry motorcycles in the canoes which makes them unstable. This is very dangerous since many of the passengers cannot swim and no life jackets are available. A few days ago one of the fathers came to the Child Center saying that three people in his area drowned when a canoe capsized. We are not able to visit some of the congregations except during the dry season because of the flooding.
Timothy Niligrini has had a serious illness and was not able to go with us to visit some of the churches this month. I’m suspecting that he had Covid because of the weakness, fever and prolonged cough; for several weeks he stayed in his room because he was so weak. We are thankful that the Lord heard our prayers and he has his strength back.
We are planning ahead for the annual seminar that ,Lord willing, will be held at the end of November. We like to give each congregation that attends a gift that will benefit the whole church. This year we had our friend Red make frames for a bag that will be used for the collection. The utensil has a 24 inch handle and a ¼ inch metal rod loop on the end; sort of like a butterfly net. When we were in Tamale we purchased heavy drapery fabric to use for the bag. Timothy agreed to make the bags; the bags that can be removed and washed when they get dirty.
Many of congregations are in the process of remodeling or building their meeting place. We provided matching funds for the following congregations:
· Duni received money to buy cement to plaster their outside walls
· Nalongni had termite riddled doors and frames; they received 2 metal doors and frames; the congregation will provide the cement and the mason to install the doors
· Nadundo made a plea for more cement; they needed 350 additional blocks to finish the last 3 courses of blocks on their walls; we gave them money to buy 12 bags of cement, the church will mold the blocks
· Sobitido Church also needed 25 bags of cement to mold more block to finish their walls
We could not have helped these churches without the generous support of our faithful supporters; thank you so much for making all this possible!
During the month we visited the congregations at Kpamang, Duni, Kulkpeni, Nalongni, Nadundo, and Sobitido.
Even though Timothy wasn’t feeling well he was able to translate two of the lessons that we use for the monthly church leader class into the Konkomba tribe’s language of Likpakpaaln. The men were surprised and excited when we handed out the lesson in their own language at this month’s class. Timothy has agreed to translate all 12 lessons. When we finish teaching all the lessons we plan to print a booklet and give one to each of the congregations to use for their Bible classes. There are so few Bible study materials such as this in their language for the brethren to use; these lessons will be a blessing.
Thirty church leaders and evangelists attended this month’s class. The class subject was “The Man’s Responsibility to the Church”. We had a great class! I was surprised that so many men were able to attend the class. I expected the number to be down because of all the flooding. Several men had to pay extra money to get to class because of the flooding; some had to use a canoe to cross flooded areas. The men reported that 35 people had been baptized and 5 were restored to the Church this month.
Let us again extend our gratitude to all our supporters of the work; whether financially or through your prayers. We need both! The brethren that we work with send their greetings and appreciation for the support that you provide.
In His service,
Stephen and Kandie Taylor
