Awesome kids!

Some of our favorite faces from the village!

Even the kids come to our lessons at the church in Mphanda village. They sit very attentively.

Layers for increased income and food production!

We have enjoyed watching our 50 baby chicks growing.

They are growing beautiful feathers and becoming bigger and bigger each day. In about 5 more months they will begin to lay eggs. Hopefully the egg business will supplement our orphan program.

Preparing for the Famine of 2008

Due to the poor rainfall this year in Malawi, many families were unprepared. They did not harvest enough maize to feed their families until the next harvest. Beginning in about October, families will not be able to purchase maize. They will struggle to find enough food to survive. November begins the planting season. The rains will begin then and end in about April. After that they will harvest their maize. IDES awarded us $35,000 to purchase maize, beans and baby formula (for babies of mothers with HIV/AIDS). Beginning the end of October we will begin to increase the orphan feedings, and deliver bags of maize and beans to families where the parents are suffering from AIDS. This month we began providing baby formula for 8 mothers with AIDS so they may stop breastfeeding their infants. The HIV virus can be passed through mother's milk to the baby. Praise God with us for His wonderful provision.

Struggling, but determined!

I can do it!

Orphan boy with his blanket

This little boy warmed our hearts at the orphan care program last week. He was smiling, waving and probably would have gone home with us, no problem. He loved his new blanket and was barely big enough and strong enough to carry it, but he wouldn't allow anyone else to take it from him. What a joy we had in serving Jesus that day!

What a sweet boy!

The house we stayed in at the village

Larry preparing to preach in the village

Thankful for the Lord's provision!

This past weekend we traveled to a remote village to do a "seminar." I (Mandy) was teaching the group of ladies from Proverbs 31 and realized that even though I tried to speak on a level they could understand, they really couldn't understand. This is because there were no Bibles in the churches there. They lacked even some basic teaching from Scripture. Six churches were represented and there may have been only one pastor out of all of them with a torn up Bible. I was about to burst into tears and it was one of those times I had to totally rely on God for strength to continue. Fortunately I had a Malawian pastor's wife with me who had a Bible and knew more than the average Malawian woman about the Bible. She was able to step in for me and answer their questions in a way for them to understand. I promised the ladies that we would be getting Bibles into the hands of the pastors as soon as possible. Little did I know that one of the pastors who accompanied us had brought 12 Bibles that he had left over from a box we had given him. Another pastor who also accompanied us had brought 12 hymn books which they also so desperately needed. It was so uplifting to see how happy those six pastors were to receive these new Bibles - two for each church. We were told that they spent the entire night preaching and singing their praises to God. They didn't go to bed the entire night! Praise God for His provision!