The Ship is Coming!

This week the HOPE Center team started to set up beds...
Soon, these will be filled with patients! PC: KJ

I have to start with the most exciting news…the Ship is coming! After all these months of work, the Ship is on its way here and will be here very soon J We are all very excited to welcome the Africa Mercy and its crew to Cameroon for the first time. The Advance team has been full speed ahead with preparations as things like visas, license plates, containers, the container wall, final renovations, credentials, press releases, etc. get figured out and taken care of. God has continued to move mountains, with us starting a day being told something critical was denied, praying for it all day, and then at the end of the day…receiving everything that was needed! This team is full of warriors – knowing when to stop and pray and lift things up to God, but also knowing when they need to put in that extra effort and not just expect God to do it for them.

KJ running through the rain to direct the truck.

One day this past week, KJ was expecting the Advance container to be delivered to our dock space after months of waiting for it. Well day turned into night, and by the time they were going to be ready to deliver it, it was 10pm. So off we went to the port (buddy system!), for my first look at the berth that will be our home for the next 10 months. At around 10:30pm, a truck started driving toward us with a container and KJ got SO excited (I don’t even have an idea of ¼ of the work she put into getting this). Of course it was raining, so we hopped out and KJ ran through the puddles to lead the truck to where she wanted the container dropped. It was pretty perfect. This is the container that has everything needed for the set-up of the dock space, all the dock side tents, and some HOPE Center stuff. We stood there and watched the truck unload the container (some sort of hydraulic system) and I could feel the delight emanating off KJ. One step closer. 

As for the HR team, we had a really exciting task – scan every single document. Our Day Crew worked for about a week to get this done, as the rest of us focused on facilitating interviews for the HOPE Center caterer; Simply the Story training & Chaplaincy training for those who required it; start dates for the Day Crew who were helping with Dock setup and for the HOPE Center Day Crew; and a few last minute hires and personnel changes. It was interesting to hear the feedback the HOPE Center team had after meeting their Day Crew. The seemed to really like them (for the most part), although maybe they were just saying that to make me feel good! A lot of my time has been spent preparing for Day Crew Orientation once the ship arrives (the first day the Day Crew come onboard), and helping the rest of the team with various tasks. Because there’s so much to do, I’ve occasionally had to help make phone calls in French and help translate emails…always an adventure.

Our off roading adventure... :)

With such a huge influx of people in the house (we’re at 18 people now, and 8 women sharing one bathroom), even I was feeling a little overwhelmed after months of our small community. Manda and I thought this would be a good time to go on another off roading adventure, this time to test out the Land Rovers that the Ship had shipped to us. We picked some random village along a river and off we went. Well let’s just say it has been raining A LOT lately and so the road was fully mud and there were huge puddles everywhere. I’m not even sure puddle is the right word when the water goes up to the top of the tires. Sometimes Manda would turn to me with big eyes and say, my heart is pounding! It’s a good thing I know how capable a driver he is. At one point we stopped at the foot of a clay cliff face because I wanted to climb it. So I went up and explored and then came back down and right as I walked toward the car, I stepped and sank into the mud all the way to my knees. There were some locals nearby and they started laughing at me (Manda too). I did look pretty ridiculous. We thought it best to take the car to get car wash before returning it (most thorough car wash I’ve ever seen!) and I made sure to get washed off too. 

Last Sunday, one of our contacts invited me to come to a special afternoon worship service. It was led by a band of children wearing matching vests made of African fabric, and we danced and sang, in English, French and local languages, for two hours. At the end, they had a special time of prayer for various things, including the children, and the Pastor pointed me out and said he also wanted to pray for Mercy Ships. So everyone prayed for us. We’ve been hearing amazing stories like this all summer, of congregations praying for us, of groups of pastors praying for us every day, it’s just amazing. When the Pastor started talking, a young woman began to translate, and I thought, wow, she’s good, I hope we hired her. When I finally got a glimpse of her I realized, we had hired her! And the Pastor’s wife. One of the Day Crew who came all the way from Benin had been staying with this Pastor and so he was there to greet us when we arrived. Then one of his friends, another Day Crew from Benin, came and joined us as well. Then these two older ladies came up to us and said, oh, Mercy Ships! Bon soir. And I just smiled and shook their hands, not recognizing them. Jacquino laughed at me and said, you don’t recognize them? I asked if we had interviewed them and he said, yes, but we didn’t hire them. Ahhh…well that’s a little awkward. They didn’t seem too bothered though, so that was good. Everywhere we go (especially churches), we tend to run into people we interviewed. One time I was walking down the street and one of the Day Crew we had hired was sitting on the corner waiting for someone!

This is going to be the last post written while living in a house in Cameroon. By the time I write the next post, the Ship will have arrived. God has used this time to teach me a lot. I think my biggest lesson from my time here, is how much God is glorified through my weakness. It is through me having no idea what I’m doing, that God had room to come in and work and do amazing things. I’m thankful for this time and can’t wait to see what He will teach me next.

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. ~ 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

I love this picture that Sandrine took of four of our Advance Warriors in their battle gear: KJ, Caroline, Liz and Suzanne.