Heading for BC and Botswana

After our last blog post we spent a lot of time discerning what God's plan is for our future. Although it was clear that our work with EOH was done, we are still waiting for the "bigger picture" but for now we feel that God is calling us for the short-term in different directions.


Machteld is in White Rock, BC to spend time with our good friends John and Rita. She will spend there about a month and will come back to Acton after that. Gert spent a week in White Rock as well and is now back in Acton to prepare for his departure for Botswana next week. He will be working with Flying Mission in Gaborone, the capital of Botswana, for about two months helping them to improve their financial accounting and reporting. On his way to Botswana he will stop in the Netherlands and visit family for a few days and after that fly on to Lusaka and the next day to Gaborone.


While in Lusaka he will meet with the staff of EOH in the office and maybe even meet up with Lucinda who has been in Zambia for almost a month now. She has had some difficult times with the huge storm that ripped the roof partially off the preschool building and some flooding. EOH lost the roof of homes 3 and 4 and the chicken run collapsed as a result of the damaging winds. It is heartbreaking to see the damage to the buildings but we are thankful that nobody from the Esther School or EOH was injured like some others in the village.


Gert will have to transition from nice and sunny weather in BC (8C) to cold and snowy in Acton (-5C) to a cool Apeldoorn (8C) and then a warm Lusaka and Gaborone (30C). It seems that the rainy season finally started in Gaborone with now almost daily thunderstorms. They really needed the rain badly since the water supply to the city was almost completely out. The whole city of about half a million people depends on rains for the water supply that is captured in a lake. By the end of November the lake was done to about 10% of its capacity and left water for about 2 months remaining. Hopefully there will be enough water when Gert arrives.


Please keep us in your prayers as we travel and are separated for a few months. Thank you for all your support and we hope to post another blog soon.


Machteld and Gert