Botswana Bulletin #61

Botswana Bulletin #61

"Winter Is Coming"

June 22, 2014

Prayer Requests

1)  Support - I have recently lost some of my monthly financial support due to life/financial situations.  I currently don’t have enough financial support to cover my costs for the duration of my time in Botswana (I was planning a trip home in March 2015).  My current shortfall is about $4000 ($500/month).  Please pray that the Lord would provide the funding needed so I can continue serving Him here in Botswana.

2)  Maun Trip - Praise the Lord that I was able to head up to Maun, Botswana and help move the Flying Mission office up there to a new facility without issue.

3)  Annual General Meeting - Flying Mission recently held it’s Annual General Meeting.  It was a long but peaceful meeting which was a big answer to prayer.  Continue to pray for unity within the mission.

4)  Open Baptist Church - Continue to pray for me as I serve on the worship team at Open Baptist Church most Sundays.  We are very short on team members so pray that we won’t all get burned out.

Introduction

Greetings all from a chilly Gaborone, Botswana!  Yes, winter has officially arrived in Gaborone.  During the rainy season the surroundings change quite dramatically.  The grass grows, flowers bloom, and the Khalahari desert seems to come alive.  The same thing happens during the winter but the change is different.  Warm hats (toques for my Canadian friends ) appear, winter jackets, gloves, and people exclaiming, “It’s freeezing!” even though the temperature is only +10C.  Currently it’s about +16C outside but inside my house it feels colder than that.  Living in a brick house causes the house to stay cooler longer.  Basically the house never really heats up.  All the more reason to head outside during the winter.  It seems like the opposite type of behavior you’d expect during winter but its actually more pleasant to spend a cooler winter day in the warmth of the sunshine.  Oh, and by midday its usually around room temperature (~+21C) so its definitely a comfortable time of year for myself.  Not to worry though.  By August the days will start getting longer and the long hot days of summer will be back.  Speaking of “back” it’s good to be back writing to you.  It seems like its been a while so let me get you all caught up on what has been happening here.

Support Issues

Normally I don’t like starting my letters talking about financial issues as it can put people off but its an issue that is currently at the forefront of my mind so I thought I’d share it first.  As I mentioned earlier in the prayer requests section of my letter I have recently lost some of my monthly financial support.  It is a significant enough amount of money that I will likely run out of funds by the end of December (I had planned to stay in Botswana until March 2015).  The current shortfall is $500/month which amounts to around $4000.  I am asking you to prayerfully consider whether the Lord is calling you to partner with me financially.  For the last 9 years the Lord has supplied all my financial needs through a fantastic group of supporters.  I’m trusting that He will be faithful yet again and confirm to me that this is where he wants me.  If you are interested in doing this please talk to the friendly people at SIM Canada (1-800-294-6918) who can step you through the different ways in which you can give or go online to their website at www.sim.ca.  I want to say a big thank you to all of you who continue to support me in prayer and financially.  I could not be here without you.  Thank you so much!

Maun Trip

During the first week of June I had a chance to go up to Maun, Botswana which is located in Northern Botswana right at the base of the Okavango Delta.  Flying Mission has an office there where we currently have 3 pilots doing alot of flying into the delta.  The flights are mainly tourist flights but they allow the mission to generate income to fund the rest of the missions activities.  I didn’t get the whole story but for one reason or another Flying Mission needed to vacate the current office they were in and find other accommodation.  Suitable accommodation was found only about a block away from where they were currently staying.  Since the office had a computer network to move including phone and internet lines the decision was to send me up to Maun to help with the setup.  The moving of the office itself was relatively straight forward but in order to move the internet and phone lines I knew I would have to deal with the Botswana Telecommunication Corporation (BTC).  This was a bad thing.  For my friends in Canada, you’ve probably had some issues when dealing with Telus or Rogers or whoever provides you with your phone and internet connections.  Take that experience and complicate it by a factor of 100.  This was now my reality.  The other reality is that phones and internet connections have now become crucial to running a safe and efficient operation.  Without them we are at a severe disadvantage, as would any office.  Keith Kowalski, a fellow Canadian and Base Supervisor in Maun, had already done some foot work with BTC so they knew we were moving but unfortunately he hadn’t had much success getting anyone to tell him when a BTC person would come and help us.  So in the words of the Apostle Paul “in great fear and trembling” I tried contacting BTC to see if I could organize a technician to help us move the lines. 

As expected I didn’t get much help and was getting directed from one person to another who were all giving me different stories.  The effort I was putting into making this a reality seemed futile.  So, when I wasn’t on the phone I was helping Keith move the furniture and we ended up setting up most of the office during the first day, minus phones and internet.  With one day down I only had one day left to see if we could get the lines moved before I would head back to Gaborone.  The situation looked grim.

The next day after more futile phone calls were made one of our local staff members, Linda, suggested I go to the local BTC office in Maun and see if I could get more accomplished in person.  Linda went along with me in case a more fluent Setswana voice was needed.  Well, I don’t know if it was my large stature, my loud voice, or Linda’s persuasive Setswana, but meeting the BTC staff in person seemed to work because the next thing I knew a technician was on-site to do the phone switch.  By lunch time that day our office was fully operational with a phone and an internet connection!  Praise the Lord!  This may seem like an over-exaggeration to be thanking the Lord for phones and internet but it is such a blessing to have and something that we need to do our work here.  Sometimes I find myself praying for immigration forms and for the power to come back on and it seems petty because I’m not praying for a lost soul.  However, Jesus said in Matthew 6 that “the Father knows what you need before you ask him.”  God knows that we needed these things and He helped us to obtain them so I give Him the glory. 

Annual General Meeting

Last weekend Flying Mission held its Annual General Meeting (AGM).  I’ve attended the last two AGMs and both were fraught with disunity and arguing.  I had been praying that this year it would be different.  To everyone’s delight, I believe it was.  The meeting could have definitely been shorter, but by the end of the meeting I think we all were able to breath a sigh of relief that no fireworks went off.  In fact, I was encouraged by the departmental reports which are usually my favorite part of the meeting.  It’s great to review the year and see all the things the Lord has done through us as a mission.  I’m excited to see where Flying Mission will be by next years AGM.

Open Baptist Church Worship Team

Please continue to be in prayer for the local church I am a part of, Open Baptist Church (OBC).  As I’ve mentioned before the church has gone through some tough times which resulted in the senior pastor resigning.  This caused a ripple effect in the church and caused a number of church members to leave as well.  This crippled the worship team and as a result the team is down in numbers.  To bolster the team I was invited to depart the sister church (OBC G-West) and attend OBC Bluetree (the mother church) and play the drums for the worship team there.  I have really enjoyed being a part of the worship team but it is very tiring.  I play almost every Sunday and which means a 2 hour Thursday night practice and getting to the church at 6:45am to prepare and partake in the two morning services.  Its alot of work and some of the worship team members who have been doing this for a long time are starting to feel the burn.  Please pray that as the church heals, more volunteers would become available to help with the leading of the worship.  Pray that the people involved in the worship team would not go into “cruise control” but that the Sunday services would be a blessing to them and uplift their spirits as they sing praises to God.  May the church be edified by the efforts we put into leading them in worship.

Flying Mission E-memos

Flying Mission has put out two “e-memos” since I last communicated with you.  If you haven’t already received them and would like to check out more of whats happening at Flying Mission feel free to scroll down to the last two posts.

The Lighter Side

I know I’ve mentioned this before but I really love living in Botswana.  There are things that bother me from time to time (I’m sure that happens anywhere) but for the most part I love it.  One of the things I love most is how much the Batswana love to laugh.  I think it’s one of the main levels at which I connect with people here.  They love to laugh, and so do I.  To some people the things I see that make me laugh maybe wouldn’t make sense to them as its something they see everyday.  However, I’d like to take a moment to share with you some of the things I’ve observed over the last 2 months that made me laugh.

I was driving down the road one day when the license plate on the truck in front of me caught my eye.  All license plates in Botswana start with the letter B.  There are variations to what comes next, but most license plates then have a pattern of 3 numbers followed by 3 letters.  The license plate on the truck in front of me had fallen off so the guy decided to “fix it”.  He decided to make his own license plate number using some cardboard and a felt marker.  Unfortunately, as he wrote out his license plate number it became obvious that he was going to run out of room.  So instead of starting over, he simply crushed the last 3 letters together at the end of the license, basically making it unreadable.  He then placed it at the back of his truck with a tie strap.  Fixed!

For some of you reading this letter finding chickens walking around in front of your house when you got home may sound weird.  Not for me!  Actually, its not uncommon for people here (even living in a residential area of the city) to have chickens in their yards or even “around” their yards.  My neighbor across the street has recently gotten some chickens including this massive hen.  The hen looked so much like the hen on the front of boxes of Corn Flakes cereal that I named the hen “Corn Flakes”.  Now every morning and evening when I’m coming and going from my house I get to greet Corn Flakes.  At least she’s a neighbor that I know won’t rob me!

Here in Botswana one of the most favorite places for people to shop is at what is called “Chinese Shops”.  The reason for its popularity is one of the reasons I don’t frequent them very often.  Often the products sold in these stores are very cheap.  He problem is, it’s usually for a reason, most often poor quality.  Anyway, alot of people enjoy buying clothing from these stores.  Once again something I don’t often do.  Not because the clothing is necessarily poorly made, but simply because I am too big to fit into most of the clothing they sell.  Also, it can be very embarrassing wearing these shirts because the English written on the shirts is often lost in translation.  Recently, I saw my friend with a shirt on that had something written on it but I couldn’t quite making it out.  Approaching her I asked her what was on her shirt and she said she couldn’t really tell me.  I wasn’t sure what she meant so she pulled at the bottom of her shirt to show me.  To this day I still don’t know what it means.  The shirt simply read, “JUST IT FORGIVEN ISN’T?”  I guess we’ll never know the answer to the question.

Conclusion

I think that is the bulk of the news for now.  Thank you for taking the time to read my letter.  I’ve been humbled over the years at the kind words I’ve received from people who read my letters.  I’m glad you enjoy them.  I’ve changed them a bit over the years and that’s mostly due to the advice I’ve been given by people as to how to make them better.  If you have any advice I’d love to hear it, or if you just want to say, “Great job” I wouldn’t mind hearing that as well.  Thanks again to all of you for your continued prayers and financial support.  God bless!

Graham Crawford <><

              

Online donations can be made at:  www.sim.ca

(My missionary number is 24460)

For more info on Flying Mission visit:  www.flyingmission.org

The opinions expressed in this letter are my own opinions.  They are not necessarily the opinions or views of my employers, SIM or Flying Mission.