Dear Prayer Supporters,
New Year Greetings to each one of you!!! It’s so hard to believe that we are almost half way into the month of January! Where does the time go??? I like the quote… “Only one life, twill soon be past… only what’s done for Christ will last!” May we live our lives for Christ every moment of the day! We are excited about what all God has in store for us in this next year!
It seems like we are only able to get an update out every 2 months instead of every month these days! J And I doubt very much that our lives will slow down any in the near future with a new baby on the way! We have only 1 ½ weeks till the due date! Everything is going well with the pregnancy and we are all ready to meet this new little one! The doctor has wanted to see us every week in this last month… and with public transportation the trip there and back gets more and more difficult the bigger I get! So Lord willing we plan to go to Accra next week and stay there until the baby comes.
We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends in Accra! Uncle Ross & Aunt Cynthia came down from Tamale and celebrated with us and Irvin & Mattie Rudolph! We had a lovely time of fellowship and yummy food! It was a blessing to share the things we are thankful for! And to reflect on all God has done for us in the past year!
The weekend after we came home from Accra we had the Nugbulibi Church come to Sogakope and share in our service. I think that was the first time most of them had been to our church and it was good to have a bigger crowd than just our family and Bro. Samuel’s family! The Nugbilubi church consist of children and young people. As of yet we don’t have any parents or adults that attend regularly! But Praise God for the earnest young people we do have! So for the ones that came to Sogakope for church were Mary [18], and Emafa [14] out of the girls and then there were 5 young boys ranging in age from 14-7. We had a fellowship meal afterward of rice, red stew, and fish. It was a real blessing and we hope to do it again in the future!
Since coming back from Accra in Nov. Chad had been working every morning Mon- Fri. in a friends welding shop! He really enjoys the work and the language exposer it gives him! I think it gives him a connection with others in town as well! He has also been called on to help with some mechanics since there is a mechanic shop right beside the welding shop. He really enjoys getting out and doing some physical work! He has stopped working since the New Year in order to get some things ready before my mom comes and this baby! And once things settled down again he will resume again! I have noticed that he is able to hear the language much more than I am able… just because he is hearing it around him everyday! So that has been really exciting for him as he discovers new words and phrases!
Christmas day turned out a little different than we had planned! On our way home from church Chace was riding on the back of Anna’s bike and got his foot caught in the bike spokes! It twisted it pretty good and peeled the skin off the back of his heel! It was all swollen till Anna got home with him… and he was screaming uncontrollably!!! It took both Chad and I about ½ hr. to get him calmed down! He kept saying, “Owie, owie, big!” Thankfully his ankle was not broken and by that evening he was putting pressure on it and running by the next day! We had a fellowship meal at our house for the whole church.... Jollof rice, fried chicken, coleslaw, and Christmas cookies and candy! Everyone enjoyed the meal… once we got Chace to quiet down! Sis. Eunice wasn’t able to come because of some things that she needed to do in the house, but we sent a plate of food home for her! It was a blessing to share together with the body of Christ that God has blessed us with! Later in the afternoon our wash girl, Patience, came and gave us a live chicken as a Christmas present! So since we didn’t have a cage to put it in Chad butchered it right away! We put it in the freezer to make groundnut soup with… the local chickens add soooo much flavor to the soups! Then we will eat it with Bankou! We really enjoy the bankou and we eat it once to twice a week with various stews/soups! It is the main staple for the Ewe’s and some claim they haven’t eaten till they eat bankou! They like to eat it at 7-8pm so it sits on their stomachs all night and makes them feel full! J
We have been blessed as we look back on God’s bountiful blessing in the past year! We have experienced exceptionally good health for the most part! Elayna did have a bout of Malaria right before Thanksgiving but she responded to the medication very well and was herself again by the 3rd day! We have been making progress with the language… slowly but surely! And we have been blessed with many dear friends and neighbors that we have come in contact with! One of our dear friends just had a baby boy… by C-section! The mother and baby are doing very well… something you don’t take for granted in this culture! Just last week a mother that had delivered by C-section died the day after the surgery! Nobody knows why? Did she get an infection? Did they puncture something when delivering the baby? Who knows but now there is another little infant without a mommy!
Please continue to pray:
For Liz and the birth of our little one
That we will continue to learn the language, esp. be able to hear what the people are saying
Our health… right now is our cold season so some of us have been fighting the sniffles and coughs!
Striving to be more like Jesus! Chad & Elizabeth Martin
