August 26th, 2007: Liberia & Sierra Leone Assessment Trip Week-1

It is Sunday night, the 26th of August, and I have been in country 9 days now. I arrived last Friday to find that my luggage is on some around the world tour and I may never see it again. I have been living off of 1 pair of pants, 1 pair of underwear, 1 pair of socks 1 casual shirt. Since the average African waist is around a 28 inch, my chance to find some alternate clothing has been hopeless. The Gallingers, our missionary friends here, are in mourning because I had 53 movies they had just bought and sent to us for delivery in my bag. I had another family’s new shoes for all their children in my bag as well so this lost baggage is hurting more than just me.

The day I arrived, our good friends the Osborne’s picked me up at the airport. It was weird to travel for over 90 minutes and see that little has changed over the last 14 months. No water or power for a majority of the city only the small area around the capital building has power. The roads are horrible with large stretches of road that even our Land Rovers had trouble negotiating. The only thing that appeared improved was the National Stadium which had been repainted by the Chinese government. When I arrived on the dock a large contingent of port police ran towards me, I was a little nervous; these guys would normally barely move and if so it was like they were in slow motion. The running joke last year was that I could out run all of them. As they rushed me I began to wonder what I had just done, when all of a sudden they started chanting, "Big Belly, Big Belly Mark, Mark, Mark!" They all began hugging me and fighting to shake my hand and give me the traditional finger snap. They claimed to have missed me. They said I was very tough on them but I had trained them to do a better job and when it was hot or when they had no food I was the only one who would bring them food and drink. The Captain was on the dock and he looked and me and smiled, it was good to know that even though I was tough on these guys they had also seen the love of the Lord in me as well and they knew that I took care of them while we served together.

Within 10 minutes of my arriving on the dock, a body of a local man floated along side the ship. Captain Djurian looked at me, smiled and said, "I can’t help but think you have something to do with this, you been here 10 minutes and we already have a security issue. It seems he believes that excitement and adventure follows me where ever I go. Maybe he’s right. God has definitely blessed me with great adventures since my family gave up everything and chose to serve him in the mission field. As I boarded one of my former Ghurka guards, Lum, who is back as the lead Ghurka had his men stand to attention and salute me. He told them I was the finest man he ever served under and that I should be shown the respect of a senior officer. I was so humbled by this gesture I started to get teary eyed, I saluted and then shook each of their hands and thanked them for keeping the crew safe. They all seemed to appreciate that someone was recognizing their efforts; the crew should do it more often, we lost a Ghurka to malaria last year. Their sacrifice to serve with us, instead of serving on a nice cruise ship is just as noble of a gesture and it gives us a chance to share the Gospel with words and actions to show them who Jesus is. I have been buried in a whirlwind of meetings as I try to collect information from other world class NGO’s on how they measure their program’s successes and failures here in country that is really a 4th world nation striving to be a 3rd world nation.

I will be meeting with the Minister of Finance and Health this Thursday in their offices. In our first meeting they got the impression that I am some SUPER-GEEK who can solve their IT and healthcare training problems. Mind you they have no reliable or clean power for the computers and satellites. The newest computers they have are Pentium II’s that we gave them off our old ship. They want me to help spear head a Telemedicine initiative to use satellite communication to allow U.S. doctors to help train their new healthcare workers, they have few medical teachers here and most have not had any refresher training in the last 15 years. Dr Glenn Strauss, the V.P. of programs and I have had many meetings with managers and staff concerning this new shift to bring more accountability and professionalism to our programs and how we select and evaluate them. I have managed to visit several villages out in the bush that we have done projects for in the past to evaluate them and see if they are still using what we gave them. On Tuesday I will be traveling to the southern part of the country to evaluate some work we have done in Buchanan area. PLEASE PRAY for me and my team as this is the rainy season and the roads have been terrible. We have had 2 crew members hurt when their vehicles have rolled down some muddy embankments here in the Monrovia area. The roads to Buchanan are much worse, we are projecting the normally 2 hour trip will take 4-5 hours.

I have managed to visit our orphanage 3 times this last week. It has been awesome to see what the boys have built since I’ve been away and all the kids look healthy and well clothed. Each time I have brought dozens of loaves of bread with me to give the kids some carbohydrates. The rainy season has been long and hard and the orphanage has had trouble with their rice getting moldy and ruined. I want to thank all of you who have helped fund us and this orphanage over the last 3 years. The change in these children’s lives is immeasurable. They go to sleep each night in a dry bed, not a muddy floor. They have roofs over their heads during the rainy season that don’t leak. Their quarters have mosquito netting to help reduce the risk of malaria. They have water that won’t kill them and they are going to school and learning so that they might have a future other than street orphan, prostitute or criminal rogue. In this first week I have managed to get the 5 boys who we sent to masonry training and are now too old to live at the orphanage a place to live and a paying job with a ministry who is building 200 homes for war widows near the airport. So they can still come visit their brothers and sisters at the orphanage. A job is a HUGE thing here and the fact that God has granted this boon to these boys is simply a miracle! I’m just glad I had a small part to play in it because it really brings to fruition what Zana and I feel is our calling here; to not only to provide safe orphanages but to provide a future for those children that turn 18 and must leave the safety we have created for them and enter the often cruel, uncaring and dangerous world that is Liberia.

On Friday we lost a VVF patient to a blood infection that she had when she came on board. Unfortunately we didn’t know she had it and after the surgery she went into septic shock. Please pray for her family and our crew. Everyone is taking this news to heart, it is always difficult to loose someone when we have all come here to help. On Sunday I got to preach at the orphanage and to be honest it was one of the weirdest preaching I have ever done. As I began my sermon the skies opened up with a torrential rain that lasted till long past church was done. The beating of that rain on the tin roof was so loud that I was screaming at the kids so they could hear me. I recorded the audio of it hoping to capture some of the praise songs the orphans were singing to put on the website. Hopefully I will get to put a small bit of audio so you can hear me trying and failing to out shout the rain. Our friends the Osborne’s and Cook’s came to hear me preach as well as Lloyd Lambert, the man who will hire those 5 boys to do masonry work. Tomorrow I head to the airport to see if my luggage might be there and also meet with the US Embassy’s security detail to get their view on the rampant armed crime that has started to explode here. Just last Wednesday our good friends at Monrovian Christian Fellowship were broken into and had their staff roughed up by 4-5 armed intruders. One of these criminals was so strong he reached up to the top of the locked Nissan pathfinder’s door and bent the top of the door enough that he could reach his hand in and unlock the door. The criminal have finally figured out that it is only the missionaries and expats here who have anything worth stealing. Please pray for all the missionaries here that are in danger each night of being a victim to this crime wave. Well I got to go get some sleep tomorrow starts another busy week. Thank you for being a part of this we couldn’t do it without you. There are sometimes in your life where words are not enough. The words are poor shadows of the feelings you need to express, this is one of those times. Thank you for believing in what we as a family are trying to do, we could not do this with out your prayers and support. We will always be in your debt for allowing us to make a difference here in West Africa. May God bless you and honor all of that you place on His alter.