if anyone lacks wisdom, let him ask...

In her last post (December in Madagascar), April wrote about Lantu and her family. As you can imagine, we were both very excited that Lantu and her oldest son had prayed to receive Christ. Furthermore, just last Thursday we had our first opportunity to study the Bible with Lantu and her second son Yasina (13 years). For the most part, this type of thing is still very difficult since we know so little of the language, but our night guard, Kris (also a pastor), speaks English well, so he serves as our translator when we exhaust our kindergarten-level knowledge of Malagasy. We had a wonderful night talking with Lantu and her son as we shared our testimonies, listened to hers, and then read some scriptures together in Malagasy. As we concluded this first meeting, April and I were encouraged and Lantu was excited as we made plans to meet on a weekly basis.

This week has brought with it some unexpected changes to our plans, though. As April mentioned, Lantu's husband, Henusi, has been staying three hours away in Tana looking for work. (Quick side note as a point of clarity: when we mention a place being three hours away in Madagascar, that is roughly the equivalent of 6-8 hours away in America; such is life on the Red Island) Surprisingly, at least to April and me anyway, he and Lantu had not talked for a relatively long period of time, but he returned to Antsirabe early this week. We thought this was a little odd seeing as it was unannounced; at the same time we were glad Lantu was reunited with her husband and the children had their father back.

Then the strangest thing of all happened: we returned home yesterday afternoon from a day of walking through rice fields and climbing big rocks to find that Lantu and her family--all except the 13-year-old boy Yasina--had left Antsirabe and were on their way to Tana. We noticed that they weren't around yesterday afternoon, which wasn't difficult because the twin boys (Mikael and Erik; around 3 years) are never shy about letting us know that they know when we're home. We just assumed the entire family was gone until Yasina popped his head above the outer wall outside their home this morning as we were leaving. He and April talked for a couple of minutes, long enough for him to communicate that everyone else was gone and that he had no electricity or running water in their house until December 31.

I'm sharing this because we need your prayers for this situation. Obviously, we are saddened at the departure of Lantu and her family (Antsa, the nine-year-old girl, is Emma's best Malagasy friend). We didn't get to say goodbye to them, and we only hope that they return sometime soon. Also, we are confused about the fact that they left a 13-year-old boy here to fend for himself. This certainly isn't an American cultural trait, but we also don't want those things that we consider cultural norms to interfere too much with our life here (or anyone else's for that matter); at this point we just don't understand why they would do that. Moreover, we were in agreement with Lantu that we would meet every week to study the Bible in order to help her grow in her walk with the Lord, and it goes without saying that those plans are presently on hold.

How you can pray specifically:

--That we would have the wisdom we need to handle this in a way that honors God and is beneficial to their family.

--That Lantu would continue to grow in her relationship with God even though we can't meet regularly for discipleship.

--(Somewhat selfishly), that they would return to Antsirabe so we could continue our relationship with them.

--That God would save Henusi, Lantu's husband. To be completely honest while using American terms, all we know of him is that he's a shady character.

Thank you all for your prayers as we seek to follow God in these distant lands so that people from all tribes and tongues might join with us in worship of the only One who is worthy.

--Adam