It was rather amazing the way it worked out.  Dorothy has been looking for a job for more than a month now.  And a week  ago Jim decided to hire her.  She is thrilled, overjoyed, ecstatic, and in general delighted to be working for us.  And then today it happened.  A man who is working for the U.S. Embassy phoned asking if she would like a job.  He had phoned five others before her whose names were on their list.  Everybody had already found a job.  So I asked him if he needed help finding a domestique.  He was happy to have our help.  We told him about a friend of Dorothy's from her village.  The lady is here in town and looking for work.  She has worked for Americans in the past.  Has done childcare.  Has cooked American cuisine.  She is so overjoyed she can hardly stand it.  She told Dorothy not to sleep tonight.  Spend the night in prayer.  She has her interview in the morning.  We are so very happy for her.  She will earn between 80 and 100,000 F which is between $160 and $200 per month.  Normal domestiques earn $80.  We are praying with  her, but will manage to sleep, too.

I went into town this morning to pick up some money that had been wired to us.  Friday is pay day.  Actually I only went part way into town to Money Gram.  Sadly the lady said she could not give me the funds.  She sent me to the main office on Avinida Kennedy downtown.  So I went there.  The office was crowded.  Only one lady was taking care of customers.  People were getting annoyed with having to wait f-o-r-e-v-e-r.  After an hour and a half it was finally my turn.  Had no problem getting the funds when she got around to waiting on me.  Have no idea what the original problem was.  What can I say?  We live in Cameroon.

The life they were living to the max came screeching to a halt the instant their one and only beloved ball went flying over Shiloh's wall and disappeared from view.  Three anxious children scampered off and came to a screeching halt at our gate where they began frantically ringing our bell.  Dorothy went to the gate to ask what they wanted.  Their tale of woe came tumbling out with a plea to return their ball to them.  She went off to search and came back empty handed.  They plead and plead with her until she finally opened the gate and let the oldest boy inside.  He ran directly to the shrub when it had come to rest and scooped up his treasured ball.  What a relief!  The lost was found.

Dorothy reported back to us that these boys are from  Bamenda.  Yaounde is filing up with children and whole families from Bamenda.   Though a long ways from home and their old life, children always find a way to have some fun.

Down for day four.  Day two for Jim. We met in the library mid morning for church.  Listened to a Tony Evans sermon on line.  Couldn't get back in bed fast enough.  Just can't  get my strength back.  That's my main symptom.  

Dorothy is running Shiloh.  Four individuals came in today.  She will be doing breakfast in the morning.  What would we ever do without her???

Better today, but not back to normal yet.  Sadly Jim is coming down with malaria this evening.  He's taken some medication and gone to bed.  Where would we be, what would we do, if we didn't have Dorothy living at Shiloh with us?  She's a God's send at this time and every day.

In the middle of the night last night I started feeling bad.  This morning I got up, took a shower, and vomited.  Then I went straight back to bed.  Only because our pastor friend is here, I went down for breakfast.  I had a couple sips of tea and a spoonful of yogurt.  We visited with the pastor for awhile and then I excused myself and returned to bed where I have been all the rest of the day. I've felt better and worse off and on as the day progressed.  I hope to be back to normal soon.

We have been waiting all day long for Pastor Eugene to arrive.  He took the night bus out of Bamenda last night and should have come into the city this morning.  We finally got word that his bus broke down part way down.  They have spent the day along side the road waiting on repairs.  And just now he has texted us with the message that he is just coming into the city.  The guard will give him his room and we will see him in the morning.  I'm sure he will have a story to tell.

We went into town today and bought drums.  Two of them.  For Eyene.  The church registered a complaint through Damien yesterday.  We had taken our instruments back to Shiloh after the Bible Conference.  We found two really nice drums that you play with the hands.  And we found three shakers which we think they will really like.  We are going out on Saturday to fill in for Damien.  His Uncle died and he has family obligations.  Jim will preach and Guy will translate into Bulu which is a close cousin to Manguisa.  Dorothy will do the cooking and I will be decorative!  We're looking forward to a good time.

After breakfast we told her that we wanted to hire her to work full time for us.  We talked it over and realized that this was what God was leading us to do.  She cried and kept praising God for His great goodness to her.  She told us that she only wanted to work for strong believers and the money was not important. We told her she could keep right on living at Shiloh, moving in and out of rooms as necessary for the needs of our clients.  She is so thrilled.  We love her dearly.  Dorothy Ngo has been a great blessing to us.  She's a hard worker.  You only have to tell her once and she catches on to what you want quickly.  Because of her I do not need to go away for three nights and four days every month.  I am just fine staying right here at Shiloh.  The money we will save will cover most of her salary.  She helps us enormously with all the work after Joseph goes home at 6 a.m. and before the team arrives at 8 a.m. and then again after the team leaves at 4 p.m. and before Joseph arrives at 6 p.m.  Just that alone makes her worth her weight in gold.   While we were not looking to hire anybody else, clearly God has given her to us.  She's a dear.

Her two nieces came to visit today.  They too have come down from Bamenda area for the safety of their families.  Dorothy's Aunt and their mother died in March.  Right after the funeral the husband of one of the girls fled for his life, running off into the forest.  They were in an area where the Ambazonian fighters were staying and it was assumed that any man in that area was one of them.  The government military was coming through and killing every man from that area on sight.  And so he ran.  He has phoned his wife once since leaving, but it has been a long time since she has heard from him. He left her with their fifteen year old son, their eight year old twin sons, and their five year old triplets, two sons and a daughter.  For safety sake she has come down here now.  She does not know when she will see her husband, or frankly, if he is still alive.  Her rent has been paid for seven months.  They are eating the food they carried down here with them.  She is trying to find a job of some kind, but she has no marketable skills.  We gave her a large bag of food.  Dorothy was deeply touched.

The other niece lives in Odza with her husband and their child.  They have been here for a few years.  She is a school teacher and he has a shop where he sells telephones.  They are doing OK.

War upsets families.  There is nothing good that comes out of war.

Romeo came to visit us just before breakfast.  He joined us at the table and then at our Sunday church service.  Ever since Dorothy came to live with us we have a small church service.  This time Jim decided to give us teaching on tithes and offerings.  It was preparation for next Sunday.  We'll be out in the village again with Dorothy and Guy for the Sunday service.  Damien has to be out of town so we are filling in.  

After our little service we put into practice the teaching Jim gave to us.  We learned that Romeo is out of food and does not have money to buy a gas bottle for his stove.  So we loaded him up with two big bags of groceries and gave him 10.000 F for the gas bottle.

She came back from her neice's place with quite a story to tell.  The three girls live in this little one room shack.  They are paying 18.000 F per month and they share a pit toilet with a whole bunch of other little shacks.  In fact their mother has insisted that they buy a little potty for the five year old to use.  The outhouse is too unclean for her.  Their only furniture is one single bed mattress on the floor.  All four of them lined up on the mattress and visited.

But the good news is the oldest has found a job already.  She is going to teach school.  It is the school the little one will attend.  Amazing!  Except when you think of all the kids that are swarming down here from Bamenda, I guess they must have a shortage of teachers.  And certainly lots of money to pay salaries with.  She will earn 45.000 F per month and all of them will live on that.  They are going to find a school for the teen on Monday.  Hopefully everyone will be able to walk to and from work/school and save on taxi fares. 

Actually with only 40.000 F per month income a small family can live.  They have 5.000 F to the excess.  Little by little they will acquire the needed things.  Maybe soon they will find a better place to live that isn't far away.  They can make a budget and gradually increase their standard of living. They are going to be OK.  They are one of the lucky ones. 

Three years ago they started coming.  At first it was just a trickle.  Then a river.  And now a flood.  Everybody is sending their kids down to Yaounde for school.  The schools in the English zone have been closed for three years.  The war broke out in part over the schools.  And our schools are brim full of children.  But still they come.

Last week it became personal.  Dorothy's nieces were sent to Yaounde to find schooling.  The one has just graduated from university and is looking for a job.  The second one is in high school and the little one is just five years old.  The girls found a room to rent a short walk from Shiloh.  Today is the first that Dorothy has had time to go visit them.  She came back with tales of them sleeping on the floor.  They are making every sacrifice for their education.  If she lands a job she will help them out.  And she has some little cousins in mind, also.  

There is no end in sight.  And no good solution just around the corner.  War is never good.  There are no real winners.  On Sunday someone's language helper was shot and killed coming out of church.  He had worked for 20 years on the New Testament.  Now it is finished and on it's way back to Cameroon from being printed in Korea.  But he won't be there for the dedication.  He'll be watching from Heaven.  

Forty-nine years ago today we gathered together with many of our friends and relatives at Grace and Truth Chapel, Portland, OR.  We stood in front of them and pledged our love to each other through sickness and health, wealth and poverty, until the end of our lives.  And then we drove off into the sunset to begin this adventure called marriage.  And here we are all these years later, still together, still working on being married.  To the very end.

We went out for dinner.  Just the two of us.  It's something you have to celebrate.  49 years comes but once in a lifetime.  Even if I died tonight and he married again tomorrow, there aren't enough years left to do 49 years again.  So we celebrated.  Ate a lovely meal.  Talked about this and that.  Reaffirmed our love to the very end. And yes, we would do it all over again if given the chance.

My friend is expecting a baby in a couple of weeks.  It's their fifth child.  They have three girls and a little boy.  And now the new baby is coming soon.  Problem is that she normally delivers at Mbingo Baptist Hospital.  But Mbingo is right in the middle of the war zone.  They asked us to pray with them that the baby will come at a peaceful moment.  Otherwise they don't know where they will go.  They have had to evacuate their house a number of times in theses last two or three months.  Now they are just staying put and trusting God to protect them.  Evacuating is hard on pregnant ladies.  They don't want to run the risk of the baby coming  early.  So we wait and watch and pray.  God is still in control.  Of all things.

We are busy, busy, busy.  Our numbers keep creeping up and up.  But we are managing.  We  ran out of water today so I rushed off to the store to buy more bottled water.  We can't run it through the water filter fast enough.  And I picked up more butter.  They eat an awful lot of butter on their morning bread.  And they are plowing through the jelly, but fortunately I have quite a supply of jelly.  It's sure a good thing we are  flexible and have tons of experience.  We take it all in stride.  

Someone is coming tomorrow to see Shiloh and book a group for a future event.  Can't show them much as the house is crawling with this group.  But they can see what they can see and that will have to suffice. 

For more than a year now I've been looking for a good used sewing machine to buy for Pastor Eugene's wife Maribel. She teaches widowed ladies in villages how to sew so they can support themselves and orphaned grand-kids they are raising.  Just found one.  It's practically brand new.  Been used a time or two.  It's a Singer but is 220V which is perfect.  And the sale price is incredible.  It comes with all sorts of sewing notions plus a supply of material.  I'm picking it up tomorrow.  And I can hardly wait to phone and tell the good news to Maribel.  She will be delighted.

We have friends who are Methodist missionaries.  They are both Africans from two different countries.  They've been here in Cameroon for a handful of years and are now being sent to another country on the continent.  They're selling a lot of their things.  One item is a older stove that still works.  The price is real good. We are buying that for Doris.  Then there is a sewing machine with lots of notions and material.  We are buying that for Eugene's wife.  She has been teaching widows how to sew in village areas for some time.  She has one old sewing machine but could use at last one more.  The team brought sewing scissors out to her from America.  They have been greatly used by the Lord.  In fact some ladies have come to know the Lord as a result of those scissors.  We use everything, absolutely everything, for His honor and glory.

We are off and running.  Started with breakfast for one this morning.  Moving right along to dinner for four this evening.  Then we jump up to 10 for breakfast in the morning.  Seven o'clock.  We will top out at 14 by Sunday.  And then we are cooking in earnest.  It's a good group.  We see some of these guys twice a year.  They are all serious Christians.  They come from Germany, America, Chad, Central African Republic, and Cameroon.  They keep us busy, busy, busy.  But we enjoy serving them.

And we continue to pray for Dorothy that she will get a job real soon.  We have hired her for this month.  But if nothing works out after this, she will go back to Bamenda and not have any work there either.  God is still in control so we lean on Him.

Today was a cooking day.  Homemade chicken noodle soup.  Spaghetti sauce.  Lasagna.  Enough chicken pot pie for fifteen.  Chocolate cake.  And re-fried beans.

Tonight their director arrives from Germany.  Six months ago he came but his luggage did not.  Not until the very end of their conference.  It was terrible.  He ended up buying new cloths to get by.

Tomorrow the rest of the people arrive and then the work starts in earnest.  Three meals a day.  Morning coffee break.  Afternoon coffee break.  Dishes, dishes, dishes.  We swept and mopped the floors today.  We're all set.

She came bursting into Shiloh, rushed up to each one, threw her arms around our knees, and hugged us for all she was worth.  Then she announced that they were on vacation.  "Vacation is when you don't come to work.  We're still on vacation.  We're going back home and not coming back to work."  Wow!  What an education she gave us.

Doris told us that each day she is asking about Shiloh.  I mean, vacation's fun.  You get to sleep in and do other things.  But Shiloh is considerably funner!  And Shiloh has Papa Jim.  So she hugged us some more, gave me a bunch of butterfly kisses, told me she loved me, and skipped off upstairs with Papa Jim to have some alone time.  Several hours later when it was time to go home she was so dejected I thought she was going to cry.  Forget vacation.  Let's go back to work!

Do you ever think about what you would do if you somehow got a million dollars?  Not winning the lottery.  That wouldn't do.  Somebody decided to just give you a cool million.  What's the first thing you would do?  I have a sister who would probably go on another cruise to somewhere or another.  Buy a fancy house?  Or a luxury car? 

So here's what I would do.  I would make a list of all the Cameroonians (the godly ones) whom I could help with a million dollars.  Then I would start down the list and help them one by one.  Buy cars for various ones who could really use them in their respective ministries. Build houses for certain God fearing pastors.  And other godly ones.  Help widows set up businesses.  Maybe pay school fees for a few orphans.  I can think of at least two churches that need buildings.  And there are certain Cameroonian missionaries whose ministries are struggling.  I could certainly help them.  The list is long.  I wouldn't run out of ideas before running out of that million dollars.  

But it's not likely to happen.  Now in our lifetime.  So what are we going to do with the little  we have?  Go on a smaller trip?  Buy a more modest home.  A VW bug?  Or invest it in the Kingdom at our level, where we live. Something to think about.

Today was our monthly shopping day.  Francis and Dorothy did the market shopping part of the work.  They went into town with Donald, the younger brother of Francis.  My friend Bear wanted to go shopping with me so we went into town with Eric.  We went to a number of stores I hadn't been inside of for some years.  Mid day we stopped and bought hamburgers, fries, and milk shakes.  Not quite like MacDonald's, but close.  She had never been to the hamburger restaurant, so she learned something new.  The fun part is always processing things when we get back home.  Our pantry is stuffed to the max.  So is the fridge and our big upright freezer.  This will hold us for the month.  We're feeding a big group three meals a day and two coffee breaks for a week starting the end of this week.  They will put a dent in our groceries!

They stayed at Shiloh on two separate occasions back when they were just here for short term mission work.  We hit it off right from the start.  While they are ten years younger than us, we are nevertheless lumped together as older ones.  Great people.  Lots of fun.  They have been everywhere.  Done everything.  Been missionaries for years and years.  Leaders for lots of teams of young people on short term trips in countries all over the world.  And then they came out here for good.  Settled in not far from us.  We do all sorts of things together.  They are the ones who drag us out of the house to all the events at RFIS, the mission high school.  We went to a Valentines dinner together.  Several plays out at the school.  She's the one who dragged me into the Cooking Club.  But now they are leaving Cameroon for good.  She has health issues.  He has an elderly mother.  We don't know what we are going to do.  Nobody can fill the hole they are leaving behind.  They are irreplaceable.  In their mission.  And in our lives.  Who will drag us off to things now?  We'll just be stuck at home, bricked in to our room.  No social life.  It will be terrible.  The life of a missionary is a life of "good byes".  But this is a tough one.  We feel it deeply and they haven't even left yet. 

Born and raised in Daoula, he spent the first seventeen years of his life there.  Daoula.  Hot, humid, wet, muggy, mosquito infested Daoula.  And never once in those seventeen years did he have an encounter with malaria.  Until now.  After living in Yaounde nearly a year.  Started with a headache three days ago.  By this morning he was sick.  Real sick.  We sent Guy with him to a local clinic.  The doctor took his temperature and would not let him come back home.  It was too dangerous.  He could easily go into cerebral malaria which is deadly.  Or have a seizure.  Our loose consciousness.  He put him on an IV drip.  Theirry is back at Shiloh now, better but very sick.  And he has to continue the treatment.  But he's leaving tonight for Daoula and his summer vacation.  Fortunately Pastor Israel, his pastor, is coming to Shiloh for an overnight.  He will take Theirry back in his car early tomorrow morning. 

She's filling in for Doris who is on vacation this month.  I gave her a mountain of ironing to do today.  She just as well get started.  It's going to take her all day today, all day tomorrow, and it may spill into a third day as well.  Four hours later Dorothy was all finished!  When I exclaimed over her speed, she reminded me that this is what she does.  She's a tailor and as such does a lot of ironing of the things she sews.  It's more than that.  She's fast.  And Doris is slow.  Maybe she can light a fire under Doris??  It's just a thought.

Her landlady informed her about three months ago that she would have to move out of the little boutique she was renting for her business.  And thus began the search.  Eventually she found some land for rent in a good location.  There just wasn't any other option.  So now she was searching for a container for sale.  Just before joining us in Eyene for the Bible Conference she found one.  It was a small one.  Just the right size.  It had an extra roof overhead plus electricity.   She told the lady she would buy it when she came back from the village.  Meanwhile another lady came along with a promise to buy on a certain date.  However the date passed and she did not return.  On Monday when we got back our friend went to pay for the container.  While she was there a man in a swanky car drove up.  He told the lady he would buy it and began pulling his money out of his pocket.   She removed her for sale sign and told him it was not for sale.  He became very angry and wanted to know what kind of game this was.  She let him know that our friend had just paid for the container.  He left in a huff and it was clear to all that God had saved the container for our friend.  What an amazing God we serve!

We came back in from the village on Monday afternoon. Tuesday morning I found myself in the dentist chair.  It was a two and a half hour ordeal that left me exhausted!  By the time I got back to Shiloh I could barely climb the stairs to our bed.  And I've stayed there ever since.  That first afternoon and night was pretty rough.  But a search on line did not reveal any medication that I could take other than pain meds.  Today I have been weak and have slept a lot, but am ending the day on a better note.  I hope to be back in the saddle tomorrow.  There is plenty to do after being gone from Shiloh for nine days.  Our suitcase has not even been unpacked yet.  Little by little, we will get back to normal though.