Bwanabob

3/13/2006

Dear Friends,

I returned from Sudan on Monday this week and what an experience it was. We were trying to take in all the supplies needed to start a small Bible Institute in the village of Chukudum in Eastern Equatoria, Sudan. I guess you could say we had Bible Institute in a Truck! We were hauling everything from spoons to tin roofing, a hand powered maize grinder to lessons on the book of Matthew, 100 pounds of nails to blankets. We had taken most of the seats out of our Landcruiser so there would be room for 150 sheets of tin roofing, table tops, blackboards and benches. All of that was laid on the floor of the Land Cruiser Wagon, everything else was piled inside or tied on top.

We traveled safely, but were delayed a day in Lokichokio trying to get the proper paperwork to cross the border with all of the stuff. We left the Kenya side of the border last Thursday and traveled to the New Sudan border checkpoint 20km away. On reaching there we were told that we didn’t have the right paperwork to cross with all the things we were carrying. After about 4 hours at the border we thought we were given permission to cross the border when one official told us to “just go.” Well, as we were leaving the guards at the border stopped us and demanded to see a stamp on our bill of lading, it wasn’t there. We were promptly told that we were under arrest! Honestly, I wasn’t too upset, at the time I believed this would all be sorted out in a few more hours. Little did I know it would take 24 hours. One of our group went back to Kenya to try to get more paper work, which couldn’t be obtained without special receipts for everything we were carrying and a couple of days to process the new documents. Long story short, we slept at the border, were serenaded to sleep by SPLA soldiers blasting away with a Kalishnakov, “just to make sure it worked.”

The following morning after a lot of waiting and scowls from the customs officials, we were allowed to proceed with no more documentation than what we had arrived with the day before. A whole day, gone. We did have time to witness to the border officials and pass out a few materials and try to explain to the SPLA officials that there were other churches besides Episcopal and Catholic.

The rest of the trip was uneventful except for a landmine going off in the bush near Chukudum, thankfully it was triggered by a brush fire.

We have been given a nice area to build the Bible Institute buildings in Chukudum, the only problems may be that it is a bit far from water and there are a few land mines around, but most everyone knows where they are.

Please pray for Missionary Gitau as he starts teaching in Sudan in April. South Sudan is in a very difficult transition stage right now. There is serious hatred between tribes in South Sudan, to the point that most won’t even mix with other tribes at church. The new government leaders are former military commanders who often don’t have the right mindset to develop a community, yet there are many people ready to hear about Jesus and learn the Bible and I firmly believe that the only one who can change South Sudan is Jesus, the Prince of Peace.

The thing I feared the most in South Sudan was getting stuck in the bush when the rains began. While we were there a “dust fog” blew in from the Sahara, the locals called it Harmatan. They said it was a sure sign of rain to come in a week or two and sure as anything we have gotten some really nice rains here in Turkana a week later. The rain is greatly needed there in Sudan as well as here in Kenya and I’m thankful that the Lord allowed us the time to get everything into there before the rain began.

Do pray for the small Bible Institute that will begin classes in Chukudum in April. I know they will have to start slowly because of language problems, but after meeting some of the young men who will attend I’m confident they will learn the Word of God. Gitau still needs to finish the buildings, but I’m confident that there are enough young men willing to attend classes with him that together they will get everything done.

Please pray for one of the young men named Julius who we hope will be a student. He has been a faithful Christian and is eager to learn the Bible. The family of Julius is now in grave danger. Julius’s father, for some reason, was shooting his Kalishnakov randomly into the bush near their home and accidentally killed a neighbor. The family of the man who was killed immediately burned all of Julius’s family’s houses and took their cattle. The family of the man who was killed wants to kill anyone from Julius’s family to finalize the matter, this is a normal, yet tragic part of Didinga culture. They need Jesus.

Here on the Turkana side of things we have finished putting a roof on the church at Kanamkamere in Lodwar and are working to build a building for the Church in Loki. We have plenty to do and are thankful for God giving us the means and ability to do His work.

Please pray for all of our pastors here in Turkana. An incident has started between one of our Bible Institute graduates and his pastor, most of the other pastors are siding with the young man. I have urged the issue be settled in the local church with the rest of us only giving advice or counsel when asked. Pray everyone would seek to honor the Lord in this matter.

The pictures are of Julius, the young man who’s family is in danger, and some youths who helped assemble the desks and benches for the Bible Institute. The other picture is the beginnings of one of the buildings for the Bible Institute in the bush outside of Chukudum.

In Christ, Bob Clark