Price Family Update--Cars, Kids, and Croissance

Things are wet in Cotonou.

Great Lakes Avenue turned into one big lake this past weekend. The water slowly drains into the soft sand, but until then, it’s about 18 inches of water covering mud et al. What makes it even more pleasant is the open sewers mix together with the puddles of rainwater. Nothing like the smell of raw sewage in the morning!

Fortunately, the road crews leveled off the other main dirt road, so we can easily pass through there for the first time in 18 months. If we had a car. Last Tuesday was the last time we will ever drive our four-door Corolla. We bounced our way down mini-dunes on Great Lakes Avenue and heard very bad, but brand-new, sounds emanating from under the hood. I was at a loss—we went straight to the mechanic instead of running our errands. The verdict—broken engine supports—you now, the parts that hold the engine in place, two of the three were broken! Broken! Well, the cost to repair even going the cheap route will be more than we want to spend. So, now, we’re still looking for a car, but we have no car while we are looking. On the bright side, it hasn’t rained during our trips to and from school or appointments. We’re on moto-taxis, so rain would just not be a good thing. On the brighter side, y’all must have been praying that we’d find something, because in the last twenty-four hours we have developed three strong leads on a new car.

Oh, I take that back about not raining while on moto-taxis. Sonya just walked into the Internet café dripping wet. She reports: “At least I’m dry from the waist up.” (Note: I just re-connected to the Internet, we had to disconnect when the power went out during the T-storms that just passed through.)

Cars
This morning I was waiting to meet the owner of one of those possible new cars. I was sitting at our latest favorite restaurant La Terenga, a Lebanese place. The owner saw me sitting there on the verenda reading, and offered me a free espresso. We know her and her husband well. Their son and Payton are in the same class at the French school. That just about made my day, especially when the owner of the car didn’t show up. But, while I was sitting there, another car for sale passed by--a better possibility than the one I was waiting to look at. I called the car owner I was waiting on. His kid had a school assembly that he’d forgotten about. How can I complain about that? So, tomorrow morning we look at all three new car possibilities—one owned by an American, another by a Lebanese, and another by a Korean. Hopefully, it will not be raining.

If you were wondering what I was reading when I got the free coffee—Organic Church by Neil Cole. What a great book, but don’t read it if you don’t want the rug pulled out from under your feet. Anything you might hold dear regarding how the Christian life is to be lived out might not last past the first two chapters. What do I mean? Well, what if your church’s vision statement was “Every Christian is a church planter, every home is a church, and every church building is a training center”? Or, what about this: “Lower the bar of how church is done and raise the bar of what it means to be a disciple.” I really like this idea. I shudder to think what might be in store if the global Church took these words seriously. That means I like the direction this guy is going, but I’m not sure everyone will be happy with that direction.

Beninois Churches (La Croissance Continue)
The growth continues. Croissance means growth in French, and it’s pronounced like the world-famous pastry. Another six churches were planted in Cotonou last month, according to the D.S. Moise Toumoudagou. (too-moo-da-goo). Instead of giving the news myself, I’ll let Moise speak on his own behalf and for the tremendous work of God taking place on this district and in this country.

“Once again, I give all the thanks to God for he does not stop effectively using those who put their confidence in Him. My colleagues—pastors and zone coordinators—are still instruments that the Holy Spirit has used in the past few weeks. This time, there has been something happening all over the district of Benin.

“Six new churches have been planted in the last month.

1) Boukoumbe: a medium-sized village in northwest Benin.
2) Cobly: a small town near Tanguieta also in the northwest
3) Guema: a neighborhood of Parakou in the northeast.
4) Towe: a village near Bohicon in the center of Benin.
5) So-Tchanwe: a lake village in southern Benin near Ganvie.
6) Fidjrosse: a neighborhood of Cotonou.

“Pray therefore with us that the Lord could affirm these churches that will be joining the sixteen already planted during the past six months.”

That’s an average of one church planted every week since the beginning of the year.

Man. It’s hard to keep up, but that’s what we’ll do tomorrow, as we meet to figure out how to bring the new pastors up to speed.

The Kids
They both passed to the next grade. With Parker it was not certain. He took a week of exams (yes, he’s in the second grade) to determine if he could go on. He was strong in every subject but French. He worked with a tutor, a Muslim colleague of Sonya’s when she was at the British school. She helped bring up his French enough to pass the exams. His teacher at the French school told us that he did better than some of his classmates on parts of the tests, even though he missed five of ten months of school this year. She said he would have been right at the top if he hadn’t have missed any school. Payton passed easily from kindergarten to first grade. But, next year will be a shock for him. Of course, everyone thinks Parker and Payton are French until they meet Sonya and I.

Last weekend, Payton asked me, “Do you like clean or dirty?” I asked him where in the world he came up with that question. He said I should say dirty, since girls like clean and boys like dirty. Something he heard on Disney Kids back in the States. Just too funny.

Travel
At the end of the month, Sonya, the boys, and I head for Accra. They will stay there for ten days while I go to South Africa for educational meetings. Poor me. It will be my second winter this year, however. Sonya and the boys will get to visit with some good friends, the Wattons. Then, at the end of July I go to Cape Verde Islands for two weeks, again for educational meetings, youth seminars, most of the district assembly, and a chance to speak at the graduation ceremony at the modest Bible school there.

Prayer Points
--We’re gearing up for some major decisions regarding volunteer ministries and the teaching center for this area. We’ll be able to announce something in a couple of weeks.
--We’re just trying not to get too sick. Two of us have been rumbling in the stomach area during the past week.
--Moise has been very sick with the flu during the past week, and his wife is seven months pregnant, so let me just say, she isn’t feeling too good, either.
--Some missionaries we know are dealing with a bunch of stuff. We’ve had to say goodbye to quite a few in the last few weeks. Not fun.
--All the stuff we need to catch up on. There’s lots.