New Life

This past week, I headed down to Savannah to help the team from Arkansas wrap up their time there. The mood amongst them was somewhat subdued; I could tell that they were ready to get back to the friends and family they left behind in the US. However, I also sensed the sadness they had in leaving their new "famliy" behind. I was pleased to see the bonds and the relationships that had been formed between these five twenty-something Americans and a whole village of Africans, who ranged in age from just a few months to well into their sixties. What they lacked in language ability they made up for in a desire to communicate the love of Christ. Even after a month of eating village food and living in very close proximity to a lot of people, the spirit of this team had not been dimmed.

My other reason for going down to Savannah was to baptize some of the new belivers. A few days earlier the team reported to me that there was a desire amongst the new belivers to follow the Lord in baptism. So, I went down to the village with great expectancy. My plan was to baptize all of the new belivers in the village together. However, the Lord had other plans and my plans quickly did not come to fruition. I only had the opportunity to talk to three of the belivers about getting baptized the next morning, and one of them said he was not ready. So, the next morning, we got in my truck with two of the belivers to head out to the lake. As we were pulling out, one of the belivers that I had NOT talked to the night before asked where we were going. I told him what we were going to do, and he said "I want to be baptized as well." "Get in the truck" I said. We all headed to the lake, and right there, In a place were cows came to dirnk and people came to wash their clothes, we witnessed three new members of our "family" make a public profession of their new life in Christ.