Adam and Abigail's Adventures

To all my few but faithful readers, I hope you all have had a fine Sunday! It has been a good one here at Coventry Hills. Around the time we were finishing up gathering Isaya Bwile's needed school funds, Richard Olwenyi (a old school classmate of mine from the Andrew Connally School of Preaching) asked if we might help him out in procuring funds for bibles for the new converts in his area. He preaches for a small but growing congregation.  You know me, I'm all about books and education, so I said we'd see what we could do. The Lord blessed our efforts! Enough money was raised to buy 105 bibles! I thought that number would be 107, but Richard had to use a little bit of the money in order to travel some 4 hours there and back to buy them. You know how you stress out about doing something you've never done before and you realize, "Boy, that was easy. Why in the world did I spend so much time worrying." That's what I did when it came to sending the mon...

                                                             Spring is here! And it is time to give you an update on Isaya, the young Kenyan, who through the help of  many wonderful Christian brethren has been able to attend medical school. He starts the second semester of his first year today. (For more info, read this  post .)      To start, a letter from Isaya: " Dear brothers and sisters in our Lord Jesus Christ, I take this precious time to write this page to inform you on how I'm doing in medical school.      First I thank God for his continuing mercies and blessings in our Christian life. I have learned to appreciate His divine design for the universe and the human body.       For the time I've been in school, understanding the working system of the body,...

This is Isaya (in America we would say Isaiah). He is 20 years old,  the son of Fred Bwile, a graduate of the Andrew Connally School of Preaching and he wants to become a doctor. He is an active member of the congregation that his father preaches for, often times teaching bible study. His family lives in Kenya where there are only 0.2 physicians per 1,000 people (2011-2015) compared to the 2.5 in America (2011). Teaching bible study. Mr. Fred contacted me a few days ago, saying that Isaya had completed his secondary education (high school) but that they didn't have the funds to send him to college. He said it would cost $240 per year. Correction: I was informed today that that number is not correct. It will actually cost $2,400 per year. I told him I would try and raise what I could. but that that was a lot more money than we both had originally thought. I know the Lord will provide if it is His will.  That's almost 4x less than what it costs to...

   "Go, stand in the temple courts," he said "and tell the people about this new life." (Acts 5:20) Peter and several of the other apostles were put in prison for speaking about the gospel and as an angel let them free in the night, he told them to go to the temple courts. Where was the best place to reach those of the Jewish faith? The temple of course. And Peter had been entrusted to take the gospel to the Jews (Gal. 2:7). What does that mean to us today? We need to position ourselves in locations where we can be the most effective. Or maybe we need to create such places.  You know, I've had people say " a library?" like "That's cool and all, but we want to support a work that will convert souls, not keep kids in school." And I can understand why they might think that, after all libraries are not viewed as places that can aid in the spread of the gospel. Tanzanians view education as one of the only ways they can better themselves...

   What a wonderful season Christmas is. Pretty lights, the scent of pine trees, delicious goodies and time with family! You want to hear a funny story? Adam has needed a new office chair for quite some time. Recently, I sat down on it with him and crack! I broke it. The poor thing would lean to one side when you sat on it.  So, I bought him the exact same one, brand new, for Christmas. It arrived today and I secretly began trying to put it together in the laundry room. After about two hours, I gave up. I decided to let him have it early so he could help me finish putting the pieces together (smart, huh). Well, he gets to looking at it and discovers I've placed the armrests on the wrong sides. Fix that, everything else goes in place. Ta-da! All finished. Get it into the office and it won't tilt back. Adam fiddles with the chair, sits back down, and almost falls face forward because it's leaning the wrong way! We had a good laugh over it. But I've learned m...

Hello from Pa! We had another great clothing giveaway on November 7th. The congregation really stepped up and we had even more clothes to give out to the community this time. It was a good thing too, because a friend of a family who lost their home to a fire stopped by and gathered up 12-15 bags of clothes and food. That brought our total to 75 bags of clothing and food given out and 18 families aided. We also had a member bring a bunch of books she no longer needed. When I saw this table, all I could think was "I need these!" Even though they were mostly children's books, there was this desire to take them all home with me. I obviously have a problem, hehe. The helpers enjoyed a meal of sloppy joes and baked beans. We would have had a bigger turn out but one of the members needed help moving so 5 or 6 men spent all morning and some of the afternoon assisting them. All in all, it was a great day. Picture on Right: Emily...

                                                                                                   Deuteronomy 15:11- For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you "You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land" The night before the giveaway, several members helped us get everything in order. The foyer furniture was moved to make room for the racks of clothing. Tables were set up for odds and ends like belts and gloves and for the peanut butter and jelly. We had about 20 members sign up to be there the day of the giveaway; We arrived at the church building 30 minutes before starting time, cause you know, there's always last minute things that need taken care of. Tw...

                                                               Hello from the small town of Pottstown, Pa!      It's so good to be back! What with the birth of our little girl and daily life, posting had been put on a back burner. Back in December of 2014, Adam spoke to the elders here at Coventry Hills and asked if we could stay for a few years. I prayed, asking God to show us (through the elder's answer) what we should do pertaining to Tanzania and how we should go about getting back. They asked us to stay. We have not set a date for when we wish to be back in Tanzania. The reason for that is because living for the future takes the joy out of living for the present. Always thinking " I can't do that because of Africa" made putting pictures on the wall or hanging curtains seem like a waste of time and mon...

                         As we were preparing for PTP, we had hoped to have a small booklet of a combination of Paul's writings printed and bound to present to people that were interested in the work as a means of convincing them that we were capable of doing so. We contacted Logan Martin to extract some funds from the bank account to purchase a paper cutter. Low and behold, a gentleman at the congregation here knew of a paper cutter that we might have for free. It took him a little time to check into it, which resulted in our inability to produce the booklet, but the paper cutter is FAR better then anything we could have afforded and was FREE! We'll be able to use it here while we are in America and then be taking it to Africa when we return. It sure does look like a weird contraption! It weighs a few hundred pounds and is sitting on our dining room floor for now.      We also were given a foil stamper ...

                                                    We had a great time at Polishing the Pulpit this year in Sevierville, TN.  A big thanks is extended towards the Bradd family for allowing us to stay in their lovely rented cabin. Their five boys all have names beginning with the letter "A" so we fit in real well. Ha/ha.            We set up a table, and a donation box like last year saying " What's a dollar? Help send books to Africa." Adam and I talked with several individuals who advised us concerning purchasing items for the library in order to make the best use of the money. Over the next week or so, Adam will be writing a few posts to inform you about these ideas! Also about 10 men said they would spread the news about the library in order to help us raise the needed funds.           ...

                                            Hehe...shortly after I wrote the last entry, Adam and I found out that I am expecting. A little Rymon will be joining us in early February. It has changed our plans for certain, but we both are excited! A wonderful gift from God. I was told by a lady here at church that it's a boy...I guess we'll see in about 6 weeks!!    Many people wondered if we would have the baby here in America. Yes. Our plan is to remain in Pennsylvania till after the birth, and then begin traveling for support. I have to admit, when I first found out, I didn't like that it pushed getting back to Africa further down the road. But after more thought, this actually seems like one of the best things that could have happened. $30,000 isn't easy to raise. With God and this extra time, I know it can be done! Polishing the Pulpit is just aro...

My wonderful man and I  Greetings!             With our wedding, honeymoon, and our traveling ( plus jetlag) are over, it's time to get back to writing and keeping my wonderful supporters and those interested updated. As you have probably noticed, the name of the blog has changed. From time to time, Adam may also write and let you see things from his perspective.             While I had reservations at first about doing our wedding in Africa, I couldn't be happier with the way things turned out. It was the perfect day. Here are some of my favorite pictures that our AMAZING photographer, Tiffany Gaines, took: Adam's first look The ceremony My family ( minus my oldest brother and sister-in-law)  Lindsey and I   All my sisters           We took a very quick honeymoon over the weekend and began evangelizing on Monday.We did 24 ...

Beautiful Mount Meru                                                                         Greetings!            This post is ridiculously overdue and I ask for your forgiveness. I have been preoccupied, as you will see. While I have not been as focused on the library itself as much, what I am about to tell you is going to effect the library tremendously ! I will not go into all the details, as that would make for a very long story. I will try and just give the information that is necessary, while still making it interesting.      Back in August of last year, I met Adam Rymon at Polishing the Pulpit (a week long lectureship held in Pigeon Forge, TN). We talked for about ten minutes, basically...

                                                                                                                 Happy New Year! ( a little late, but maybe it still counts)                                                                 Can it really be 2014?                   ...

                                                                                                                                                  One of the Best Weeks in the Year Mr Thompson holding Matthew at church He was the coordinator for camp!       Abby Gaines, John Tyler Rice, Candace, Heather and Me Love you guys! I told him that this was going on the internet but he said he didn't care LOL   Stuart leading a song. So proud of the young man he is becoming! You remember Lazaro? This is him holding a bible study with a young lady.   Anita Hochdorf was our g...