Tim & Helen Smith arrived last Friday to join our missionary team in Congo. The Smiths spent 3 weeks in Equatorial Guinea during which they visited their friends and the churches they worked in over the past 10 years. They also sorted through their belongings and decided what to move to Congo, what to sell and what to give away. Friday they chartered the JAARS Cessna 206 and flew from Yaounde to Gemena with a few of their belongings. The rest of the stuff they are moving will come on a later flight.
The Smiths arrival completes the next step of re-establishing long-term missionary presence in Congo, something the CEUM has requested for years and the Covenant has desired to do. We arrived in early April and now our teammates are here to live next to us. Keith Gustafson serves as the Congo Country Coordinator based in the US and makes 4 month-long trips per year to Congo. He was in Congo in April when we arrived and now again in July when Smiths arrived.
Tim and Helen made these comments about returning to Congo.
Helen: “arriving in Congo today feels like I have come home. It feels comfortable to be back in Congo. The music, the singing, the greetings, the kind of reception were wonderfully welcoming. ”
Tim: “feeling the warmth of people’s love and their joy in seeing us is very encouraging. We had a neat feeling coming up to the reception prepared for our arrival. We could not have imagined that God would bring us back to Congo and yet here we are as we have sought to follow His leading. We look forward to what He has in store for us here in Congo.
I wonder how Ken Lundell would react to your situation. Years ago when he came out for fellowship he encouraged us to “be flexible”. This situaton that you are in now needs better words than that. You are constantly in my prayers. Just wish that it didn’t take so long for things to reach you and am praying about that, too. Have appreciated so much this update from you and Smith’s first word from there. Greet everyone.
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