Archive for March, 2009
Saturday, March 7th, 2009
"Crazy" Woman Brings Wheelchairs to Cameroon
Here is a story whose winding thread leads to our ministry with Monique Bessomo in Yaounde, Cameroon.
A few years ago an elderly woman settled with her possessions under a tree beside a main road in Yaounde that Julie Anderson often traveled. Julie asked about her. People called her “the crazy woman”–why else would someone be so dirty, live under a tree, and talk to herself?
However, when Julie began to talk to the woman herself, she learned that she was not crazy. She was Marie Therese and she was a homeless widow and destitute because she had been turned out by her children.
Julie searched for a home for Marie Therese. A friend told her about another widow who might have a room, and she did. Marie Therese had a home again and no longer looked or sounded crazy.
The woman who took in Marie Therese is the mother of Monique Bessomo. During visits to Marie Therese, Julie became familiar with Monique and her work among people with disabilities.
Knowing my involvement with Joni and Friends, Julie wrote me to ask if there was any way JAF could help Monique.
That led to the work of the 2007 Harvest Project team in Yaounde, and to our return now in a few days.
I wonder if Marie Therese grasps that God used her to bring wheelchairs and walkers and the gospel to dozens of people?
(Photo, l. to r. — Monique Bessomo, Noel Piper, Julie Anderson, Marie Therese)
Thursday, March 5th, 2009
Pray for Monique
Monique Bessomo is the founder and head of the ministry we will work with in Yaounde, Cameroon. I’ll tell her story soon in another post.
But now, today please pray. Julie Anderson writes from Yaounde:
Monique’s husband [Maurice] is very sick – in a small hospital in a small town about 1/2 hour drive away. . . . I don’t know the details. She came back to her center today thinking to meet with Silas and me, but found her new nurse (hadn’t even yet started work) also very sick with convulsions. So Monique turned right around and went back to the hospital with her. [About that time] the hospital contacted her that she needed to come back anyway because her husband wasn’t doing well.
Silas plans to go again tomorrow morning, if she’s available. (There’s no phone connection in the area where the hospital is, so he’ll just wait till he hears from her.)
Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009
Team Cameroon: Silas Nfor
I can hardly imagine how we Americans on the Harvest Project team last time would have been floundering around Cameroon if it hadn’t been for Silas.
What a blessing it will be to work again this time with a Godly man whose heart reaches out toward people with great needs, especially their need for Jesus.
Silas and Mary’s home in Yaounde is the headquarters and hub of their ministry–Victory Vision–which grows out of skills and gifts God has given them.
Over the years Silas has been and is a cook, caterer, baker, shopkeeper, and Mary has had a tailoring business. He is the kind of person who eagerly picks up new skills and uses them to support his family and for the sake of the wider Kingdom of God.
At any given time, a few young men from dire situations–orphans, for example–live in the Nfor’s compound as apprentices to Silas. Before morning light, they fill the quarter with the warm fragrance of baking bread. Later they deliver the loaves to shops around the city. At other times, they assist Silas in event catering. All the while, Silas and Mary’s goal is to help people find the gospel practical in their daily lives.
Silas and Mary labor long hours just to barely support their family. Life is hard, but still they reach out to others with the gospel and practical help.
We praise God for Silas’s ministry of being with the Harvest Project team and the ministry of Mary and their children in sending him with us.
left: Silas’s earthen bakery oven / right: stacks of loaf pans
Monday, March 2nd, 2009
It’s Julie’s Birthday!
Happy Birthday, Julie!
Over here in the U.S., all your team mates will be asleep, Lord willing, when you wake up there in Cameroon. I hope you get online first thing in the day to know ALL day on March 3 that we pray it’s a great day for you.
Love from your big sister,
Noel
Monday, March 2nd, 2009
How to Pray for Joni Eareckson Tada
(This is the first time I’m posting twice in one day, so don’t miss the previous post about Julie Anderson.)
Joni Eareckson Tada is the founder and hub of Joni and Friends. JAF ministers to and with people with disabilities around the world. Many people in many nations, including me, look up to Joni as a hero of the faith. She has been quadriplegic since a diving accident when she was 17 years old and lives and proclaims the sovereignty of God in all things.
Justin Taylor, a friend of ours, writes today at his blog: “Friends who have seen Joni recently have said that she has been really struggling lately with her health and that she is in need of much prayer. . . . I asked her how readers of this blog could pray for her.”
Let this be a reminder to us to pray for Joni, and to let her requests help shape our prayers for others we love who are suffering.
(Pictured with Joni is Judy Butler, her long time associate, whom she mentions in her prayer request list.)
Monday, March 2nd, 2009
Team Cameroon: Julie Anderson
(A reminder with many thanks: If you were thinking of making a donation on behalf of a Harvest Project team member, this would be a good time.)
In the interest of full disclosure: Julie Anderson is my sister. But I’m not slanted in my opinions of her as a Harvest Project team mate. Any of the others on the 2007 team would say a similar thing.
Julie is a fantastic team mother.
She has lived in Cameroon most of the years since 1984. She and her husband Steve are members of Wycliffe Bible Translators. Their son, Luke, grew up in Africa and is now a student at Bethel University in St. Paul.
Over the years, Julie has had many different kinds of responsibilities and opportunities as a Christian woman and as a member of the mission community. Her gifts of hospitality and help and mercy have shone.
In 2007, the rest of the team was the benefactor of those gifts and of her familiarity with Cameroon. Julie arranged our accommodations, including last minute scrambling when the guesthouse in another city where we were booked suddenly wasn’t available. With less than 1 day’s notice, Julie found a place for 16-18 people.
Along with other Cameroonian team members, she got us where we needed to be, found materials we needed, and fed us. Julie herself spent plenty of time at the market finding our meal fixings, even taking into account our personal preferences as much as possible.
This time, she’s adding the role of mentor as she helps others learn the ropes.
I am so glad God gave me Julie as a sister and that she is part of our team.
