my Cute Kids

Hi Everyone,
Well we finished, a couple weeks ago (with school i mean), and then it was off the the coast. Our organization had its annual conference, always a good time to reconnect with colleagues and friends, and also hang out on the beach a little and relax. So that's what we did. The conference was a week and then a holiday for a few days. We returned to cool cloudy Nairobi last Tuesday. Now its been time to catchup on things which got pushed aside during school and Jamie's sicknesses and stuff. But we are well, and happy. Jamie did very well on the coast with all that humid air, and even now is pretty well though she gets tired often up here at 6500ft. SHe is about 32 weeks now, so certainly on the homestretch. In fact she may be induced early because of her gestational diabetes (things to pray about). So we may be 5 at the end of next month, certainly around the time school starts for me.
We are house-sitting for one of my profs while he and his family are on furlough in the UK. Its nice, the house is large with a big yard, and a trampoline for the kids. One of the best things for Jamie and I is that it is actually quiet. School will start the 7th of Sept for me and the 15th of Aug for Junio. I hope everyone is well, and I am glad I have the chance to actually post a blog again to y'all. please email us or something soon. We will be sending a newsletter out pretty quick i think (its on Jamie's todo list). Enjoy the pictures of my cute kids.
Jer

Finishing Well

Jer ran in his first race.  It was a fundraiser for the Bibleless people of Kenya.  It was supposed to be a 10K but the route ended up being only an 8.7K disappointingly.  He ran with his friend David who had been training with him.  And their friend Esayas did the 4K walk. Mommy and Annabelle and Junio got up at 6AM to watch Daddy.  There were tears when Junio realized that Daddy didn’t win the race and get a trophy.  I tried to explain that he was competing against former gold medalists in the Olympics and that Daddy was very happy with finishing in 47 minutes but I don’t think he quite understood!

Jer is also busy finishing the race to complete this school term.  He is slowly working away at all the presentations and papers.  Almost there and then it will be break!  Ahhh!

Junio just finished a week of Vacation Bible School.  He has come home beating his chest like Tarzan and singing silly songs all week. But then, what else is new!  

Annabelle is finally back to normal after a whole month of one sickness after another.  She is happy and soooooo talkative!!  She went back to baby class two days this last week and always comes home with lots of stories about her friends.  She is now working on counting in Swahili, which has been fun!  

I am feeling better now after a couple of trying weeks with blood pressure problems.  It turns out that I have gestational diabetes and even though the two things aren’t supposed to be related, when I went on this special diabetes diet, I have had hardly any problems with my blood pressure and I feel so much better.  Praise Jesus!!  Another praise is that a German friend of ours happened to have an extra glucometer so I can test my blood sugar.  We were dreading having to buy one here because they are so expensive but he said that I can use his extra one until I have the baby and don’t have to worry about it anymore!! Yeah!  

Mid-Term

Jer and I are both mid-term right now, him in his 3rd term at school and me in my pregnancy!  

Jeremy is very busy with school and trying to press on with all his papers and books.

Annabelle got pink eye last week which would have been fine but we forgot to tell the doc that she was allergic penicillin and so her first eye drops made her look like she just lost a fist fight. She is fine now though with different medicine.

We are having a little girl!  Yeah.  Junio's response was "Dad... that means we have 3 girls to take care of now instead of just 2."  The responsibility of a 6 year old!! He has proved his responsibility well this weekend though when he got Annabelle up on Saturday and made her breakfast all by himself.  We were not only impressed, Jer was also actually able to sleep in on his day off.  Wow!!

And now for something different

Dear Friends, greetings from Nairobi. I am done with school (and on my last week of a two week break before they begin again), and Jamie's family has left but we had a great time. When they were here we did a one day safari in Nairobi national Park, we went to the coast and spent 4 days on the beach and snorkeled a bit and ate alot and did a number of other fun things ( I also took 3 exams and submitted a couple papers). In the mean time Jamie has been regaining her strength and starting to feel better little by little. Thanks for your prayers, we are so grateful that God is blessing her with strength and energy and not as sick of a stomach! Indeed, Jamie also told me this morning she felt the Baby kick last night for the first time.
This week is my week to catch-up on all the loose ends which I did not have time to do during the term, and try to rest a bit. Its funny I was worried a bit about driving my car to the coast and back so I prayed "dear Lord may we get safely to the coast and back, and then anything can happen to my car, just keep us safe." SO the car did great, and on Sunday ( we got back last week) on the way to church it overheated and burned out the valve seals and a head gasket. But I got in touch with a highly recommended mechanic from the church we attend here and he picked the car up Monday and dropped it off last night (Tues) at about 4pm, not only that but it was only about 200USD for the whole thing! Anyway, I think the whole situation is ironic because God answered my prayer to the letter. anyway...Thats a quick update enjoy the pics.

A quick Hi

A quick Update:
Hi friends, here is another quick update.
We'll as most of you can figure out by now, we are still in Kenya,

which means the country did not degenerate into civil war, for

which we are grateful. As things have calmed done here politically,

our academic lives have also returned to normal. I have finished my

classes, but now i have to finish projects and take exams. Jamie's

family flew in for a couple weeks on friday, which we are very

excited about. Jamie has been sick as you know, but she started to

get a bit better last week before her family came, but then got a

nasty bug from somewhere, and now is on antibiotics and sick, if

its not one thing its another...but God is taking care of us one

day at a time. Thanks everyone for watching, sorry the post has

taken so long. we'll be in touch soon.

Jer

Typos

In the last post of pictures I had intended to write. 'smiley girl' not simply girl. and its supposed to say anna and friends. thats what you get from a near exhausted father doing work in the library till it closes, and getting up with the kids early in the morning. Please pray for us and my term papers. THanks.

Mr T and others

Hi friends, here is the long awaited pictures of Mr. T and others.
-Mr. T 1
-Mr. T2
-Poor sick Mommy
-simply girl
- anna a friends. notice the difference in skin tone, hair color, and facial structure. An indian, an Ethiopian, and our little squeaky (or talky now!) see ya.

A quick Update

Hi friends, here is a quick update.
We had mid-term break this past weekend (which is really only a Friday and Monday off), so a long weekend, but its been good to have a bit of break. It appears as though things in Kenya, are actually getting better. The violence is subsiding, and the negotiators have reportedly begun to workout something that will work as a settlement for the political situation. Thanks for praying, keep praying though, because, well, I for one will believe it only when we see it. Its been a tense couple of months. Interestingly, the violence of the last two months has really had little to do with politics. The political disagreement only gave an excuse for tribal tensions to flare. But anyway... so we had a good mid term break, which for me was spent trying to get started on term papers and things. I have had some success and also some rest, which is great.
Jamie is sick. Not as a bad as last time,but none the less. So really the only thing she does is rest. Right now this is best. Her rest is somewhat imposed, by me, to try to ensure we don't repeat what happened last time. She has only thrown-up a handful of times. So please keep praying for her. And pray for me as i try to fill in some of the gaps, for a while. Gladwell has been great and is learning to cook lots of cool stuff.
The kids are doing well. Junio is enjoying his school. His school is situated on this side of town and in a safe and secure "out of the way" location so he has had no trouble going to school these past weeks. They had crazy hair last friday, for which, we cut Junio's hair to look like Mr. T. I'll post a picture as soon as I can. But he now likes to come up to me and tell me, "I pity the fool..." Annabelle is generally happy, and doing well. She has had a bit of an adjustment with not being the center of Mommy attention. This, of course, is inevitable and it will continue this way. But she enjoys going to the store with Daddy and taking walks with Gladwell and our good friend "aunt" Julie. She has gotten a number of bug bits recently, but they are not bad and are under control (in fact, this time she seems to be reacting to them much better than usual). Praise God for this.
Well, i guess thats about it. Thanks for praying, thanks for watching.

Jer

Lots of News

Lots of News:
Hi everyone...greeting from Kenya. We are well, thanks for your prayers. As most of you know the violence in Kenya continues, but we remain safe and secure. Classes have started, and seem to be going well. For the moment we are finding things a bit easier than last term, but it is still early. Its also a bit more technical linguistically....which is fun.
In other exciting news, we have decided to put Junio is a different school. There is an American School very close to here, which also gives us a discount as its a missionary school and was started by our organization. We really think this is going to work out great. Junio was having some issues with understanding different words because of the Kenyan accent. As a result his reading in the long term, was going to be hindered so we decided, we needed to do something now to ensure he doesn't have to catchup later. And so far, he loves it. He has one of the best teachers there and is really enjoying things. They have a fantastic library, and he still has a multinational class with classmates from around the world.
Also in other wonderful news! We found out last week that Jamie is pregnant again!! WE are very excited, but also a bit apprehensive, because as some of you know Jamie was very sick for 7/9 months last time and had to be hospitalized during that time. SHe started to get sick about 5.5 weeks along last time. Now she is 6 weeks along, and so far so good, only slight nausea which has been remedied by a quick snack. Please pray for her, that it is not like it was last time. Everyone keeps telling us you just can't compare pregnancys, they are different each time, I do hope they are right, but we'll see. As I said so far so good. If we are right the next "Langlette", as one of our friends called it, will be here just in time for the next academic year in September.
So thats the skinny. thanks for watching.
Jeremy

Pictures:
Annabelle feeding her new baby doll
Junio and his friend Johnny on a bouncy castle before school started
my new haircut courteousy of Jamie.
Jamie hard at work with Morphosyntax
a fun pic of the kids

A Reflection from Jamie

15.01.08
So, many people have asked us how we are doing here with all the political upheaval. It is hard to describe how much we feel like newbies at all this missionary stuff. We have colleagues in war torn countries all over the world who deal with the kind of thing that we have dealt with here on a daily basis. So, I suppose, after awhile you just get used to it.
Today there is supposed to be some crazy parliamentary stuff so we are not allowed to go near the city. This last week was pretty calm with the only riot being when we finally decided to venture out and go to a restaurant, a riot broke out about ten blocks down and we got a text about it and left. Thankfully we had finished our food! But that is basically the situation. There is just this constant tension, should we go out. No, not today. Is it ever going to feel safe again? We are not the only ones to feel it. The Kenyans here have never feared for their lives before like they have in the last month. There are many people who are bitter and angry and feel extremely disappointed and scared all at the same time. All we can do is constantly lift our worry, anger and bitterness to the Lord or we would all go crazy.

Our Dear Friend Victor

Hi everyone, Thanks soo much for your comments and posts on our blog, its really great to see who is "watching". If you haven't posted a comment please do. As the violence and political upheaval in Kenya slows down and, we hope and pray fades away, our attention turns again to preparing for school. Term was delayed by our administration a week, so that people might have a chance to travel safely and perhaps recollect their lives a bit before we are hit with work.
Below is a letter from a very dear friend of ours, he is a pastor from Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (another country that has been torn apart in the past by war and political violence). He is a student here with us at NEGST. We got to know him while doing a project with him last term (which we got an A on by the way). He is trying to find avenues of sponsorship for his studies at NEGST. We asked him to write a short testimony, and we told him we'd give him a bit of "publicity" on our blog. If this is a direction the LORD might move you, please contact us, We have more financial specifics. If you don't know our email adress give us yours via a comment to this post, and we'll contact you. Think of it this way, in supporting people like Victor and others, you are building and strengthening the church in Africa. One of the worst problems the church faces in Africa, is not necessarily hunger and lack of provision (though this is a deadly African reality), but lack of a substantial Biblical and Orthodox theology (perhaps a even more "deadly" reality). There is a severe famine in sound Biblical teaching on this continent, and NEGST is one of only a handful of institutions the LORD has blessed Africa with that seek to remedy this need.

I am Victor Lonu Budha, from the North-East of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). I am married to Carine Dheve Lonu and God had blessed us with six children: 4 daughters and 2 boys. They are between 12 years and 9 months. With them, I have one orphan, a boy who is 13 old, in my charge. My home church is Communauté Evangélique au Centre de l’Afrique (CECA-20) and especially Eglise Locale CECA-20 Sukisa/Bunia.

I accepted Jesus as my Saviour and Lord when I was very young, during an evangelization campaign. But it was in 1988 that I committed to serve God. I began as singer in a choir and a Sunday school teacher. After my secondary school, I taught in a primary school for 3 years. Then I worked as secretary in my church denomination for 5 years and I went to theological studies for 3 years. After this period I served as headmaster in a bible school from 1996 to 1998 and I went again back for 2 other years for theological studies. When I finished in 2000, I went, as a teacher, in another bible school from 2001 to February 2005. From April 2005 to August 2007 I was pastoring in a local church.

My journey to attend NEGST began in 2001 but I only got my admission in June, last year , 2006. But I could not come to begin the academic year 2006-2007 in September, because I did not have money to pay school fees and my church was unable and still the same to help me in this matter. As the admission was valid only for 2 years, I finally decided, even without sponsorship or any promise, but by faith, to come at NEGST, because I was convinced that God’s time has come for me to be at NEGST and I did not want to lose my admission that I got after many years.

According to the financial difficulty, which has not changed even now, my wife and children remain in my country and I have come alone. I had just enough money for my travel from Bunia (which is my home town) to Nairobi. My wife is dealing with many issues to help the children (school fees, daily life) while she is jobless. To be without scholarship, separated with my family and the fact that my country has not a stable peace, especially my area (Ituri District), gives me great sadness much of the time and sometimes I am unable to concentrate for my academic tasks.

According to the deterioration of the country with the effects of wars, the church there has became very weak. It is true that the church is economically poor, but also it needs help in teaching of biblical principles and appropriate strategies for its growing. That is the main aim for why I am at NEGST and I will go back, when I finish, to my country to serve God in the church of Jesus Christ.

Therefore, considering all these facts, I am looking for the financial support. Any assistance of this kind will be your great contribution for the establishment of the Kingdom of God in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

May God bless you.

Victor Lonu Budha.

one more Picture

One more picture of Junio and Micaiah with their new bikes.

Christmas in Kenya...more pics

Pictures are:
-Us on Christmas
-Tim and Jeana
- Don
-The girls
- Annabelle wanted to go out... (don't worry we let her and it is completely safe)