Jars of Clay....

In August, I was contacted by Marcia, an extremely talented artist from Wetaskawin. She was asking permission to use my photo as the inspiration for a painting she wanted to do. I was honored (having seen some of Marcia's amazing work already at the Wetaskawin Full Gospel Fellowship before we left Canada), and of course gave her my permission! Here is Marcia, Myself, and the absolutly beautiful painting on the day of its "unveiling" at the church where it will hang. It brought tears to my eyes, knowing that that hand in that picture is one of our grannies, a woman who at a fairly advanced age decided to learn to read and write in the ladies literacy school, run by the mission. She moved from her home, community and friends to help us by being the "house mother" at the orphan home in Chitundo where the orphans in grade 6 & 7 stay during the school year. She makes these pots as a way to have a small income, and takes great pride in decorating each one with a design. They are sold for between 7 and 30 Meticais ( 20 -80 cents) each and involve several days of forming, drying, baking.. 

Rick preaching at Wetaskawin Full Gospel Fellowship this past Sunday.

I was especially moved when Marcia told me that she hoped this painting would remind me of our work in Africa.. and it does. We are helping to "form and mold" the leaders of the church, by teaching and encouraging, so that they are able to in turn to do the same with their churches. We also are reminded by the verse, that we have a great treasure, good news, to share, and thru God's Grace are able to use our earthly resources and talents to bring that news to the people of Mozambique- whether in words, or thru our actions every time we love an Orphan, widow, sick villager or struggling pastor with the Love of Jesus.

Our last week in Alberta was very busy (just like the first one!). We visited Keren's (remember Keren? she was the nurse from Alberta who spent Ten months with us on the farm) parents for an afternoon- which was a lot of fun as they have a whole "store" of toys hiding under their stairs!

We also visited Miss Suzanne (who let Tendai play with her stethescope) and Shannon and Jodi, and others from Three Hills Alberta. Was great to see some familiar faces from the Prairie Bible nursing teams!

The next day we travelled to Athabasca to see some friends we know from our Youth Pastoring days in Killarney Manitoba, was great to be able to fellowship and encourage some freinds. Rick and Bruce enjoyed some time hunting while Deidre and I took care of the munchkins, and visited at home. 

 (dont they look like they could be brothers???) (they arent)

We also spent an evening in Calgary with family there, and accompanied them to their churches annual Family Fest... Tendai went as a lion and was sooooo cute!

Finally.. after driving thru the night we arrived home Monday afternoon. Tendai got to try out her new borrowed toddler bed and much to our suprise went right to sleep in it.. no problems! Its no wonder she was exhausted.. we have been going going going for two weeks straight.. nice to have a week of just work and home and visiting folks close by!!! We are so thankful for this "retirement fund" house and also for fantastic weather! Praise the Lord we are all still reasonably healthy ( colds and runny noses but in the grand scheme of things thats nothing!), our vehicle is doing great and we have been booking into lots of churches. We are now booked up till end of the year, and most of January!

Thank you for all your prayers- your continued prayers for our travel safety, health, and finances are appreciated! God Bless, Rick, Heather & Tendai!

On the Road again!

not quite able to touch the spot where Wetaskawin is!

Hi all! As you can see from our lovely model we are currently in Alberta! We are pretty busy visiting with folks, speaking in churches, youth groups and meeting with mission committees but we are having a great time! We were so encouraged by the folks at Carrot Creek Christian Fellowship this past weekend, and we are glad to know that there are many there who pray for us faithfully.

Currently we are based in Wetaskawin, south of Edmonton, where the Full Gospel Fellowship has a "prophets chamber" apartment, set aside for visiting missionaries, pastors or those in need. This place has blessed us already and we truly do look forward to the next two weeks here.

Thank you for your continued prayers as we travel around Alberta, and then back to Manitoba in the first week of November. We also appreciate prayers for our health as we seem to have arrived just as cold and flu season is kicking off!

Here are a few pictures from the last week, Blessings, Rick, Heather & Tendai Neufeld!

 Rick preaching at Carrot Creek Christian Fellowship

 Tendai hasnt quite gotten used to North American style worship services yet!

Just hanging out with two wonderful people, George and Carolyn Stone- we so appreciated their hospitality, generosity, and prayers! (and the homemade jam, pickles, moose meat stew and meatballs were pretty good too!!)

Yikes.. its been one VERY busy week!!

  

What a crazy week it has been! We flew out of Jo-burg last Wednesday night and havent stopped moving since! Tendai was a trooper and did great travelling! She had FIVE different flights in less than five days, but had no problems whatsoever with the UP and DOWN or the sitting for long periods- sure she got a bit antsy, but nothing a walk in the aisles or a fort built by daddy (see below) couldnt fix!

Once we arrived in New Brunswick we had some important visiting to do (including suprising both my parents  and my granmother) None of them had ANY idea we were coming so it was great to be ale to see the looks of absolute SHOCK on their faces when we arrived. And to make it even better it was my Grandmothers birthday! She said meeting her great grandaughter all the way from africa for the first time was the best birthday present she has ever gotten!

Tendai also enjoyed some spoiling by her grandma!

Rick was able to preach and share about our ministry at Hampton Baptist Church - where I myself attended as a toddler!  Watching the video on the big screen reminded me of how much I miss the orphan kids I work with ... it will be a long six-seven months until I see them again!  We are looking forward so much to sharing about the work we do with Orphans and Widows, the training seminars with Pastors and our heart to see the communities we are involved with grow and change in so many positive ways. If you see us out and about, dont be scared to ask about our work in Mozambique, it is our passion and we love to share about the many areas of community development and ministry we are involved in! It has been so exciting these past two years to see how we can really be agents for positive change if we let God work thru us and in us!

One last pic with Grammie and Grampie Clarke, before we head west to Manitoba!

Welcome to Manitoba! this is our Home Church's welcome sign.. dont we feel special!?

 Once we arrived in MB its been a whirlwind of errands (gotta renew the all important driving licenses), visits with friends and family, and moving into our "retirement fund"house. Thanks to some REALLY generous folks, who allowed us to purchase a newly built house at pretty much "cost", we have been able to build a house that will be rented out while we spend the forseeable future in Mozambique- then, way way down the road we will have a house we can live in once we retire and wont have to worry about a mortgage or rent! Its a huge blessing and one we NEVER expected to recieve.. but God is good that way- he throws little and big things our way just to remind us He cares!

Its nice to know our Canadian Retirement plans are looking up- although I sincerely hope not to making use of them for at least 20-some years! Back home in Mozambique our garage is nearing completion, and now we will need to start thinking about starting on our permanent house. Up until now we have been renting a short termer cottage... but the short term visitors are kinda needing it more and more, and we are definetly needing more space since we hope to expand our family even more when we return and we are desperatly needing office and storage space for the ministry!

Thanks for all the prayers for Tendai's visa, we do appreciate them so much! God worked everything out in the most amazing ways! Please continue to pray for us as we being travelling this coming week (we are coming out to Alberta, so if you would like to visit with us, let us know.. our sundays are booked but we have lots of time during the weeks to visit, or speak at youth groups, awana clubs, small groups, etc.) On this trip we will be in Alberta till October 31st. Please pray for  safety while traveling, that we will be able to share about our ministry and work effectively and clearly and that we will have a good time of renewal and fellowship with our supporting churches, friends and family.

God Bless, Rick, Heather & Tendai

Leaving... (this time on a jet plane!)

Praise the Lord! This monday we finally received Tendai's Visa for Canada- WOOOHOOO!!!!! Its been  long months of waiting, but we are FINALLY going to be going home! Booking on short notice means some interesting flight plans... but we will be leaving later this week, and arriving in Manitoba on Monday evening. Please pray for safe travels, especially since this will be Tendai's first time flying!

We will update once we are safely home in Canada, but wanted to let you know that all those prayers lifted up on our behalf were heard and answered in a wonderful way! God is Good!

God Bless, Rick, Heather & Tendai

How my "manliness" almost killed me (a post by Rick)

Ok, I guess I could substitute stupidity for "manliness" but I think we could probably use these terms interchangalby.  Heres the story. First of course, I should preface this story by saying, I am a bit of a hypocrite.  For the last two years we have seen many visitors come to the farm and each visitor recieves the same instructions.   If you are achy, feverish, and have a head-ache you need to take your malaria medicine.  We tell this to every visitor although there are some who do not like to take that advice.  Those are the ones who tend to get real sick real quick.

Anyways, back to my story.  A couple days ago, I began to have lots of joint pain but just thought it was because I am getting older and am a bit of a wimp.  That and I tried to do push ups the day before.  I also figured that might be why I had such an intense headache since I get those due to an old neck injury.   My wife on the other hand highly recommended that I start on my malaria meds (shes a smart woman!).  She told me I was getting the symptoms and that I should practice what I preach and take the malaria meds.  But I insisted I am manly, and I DO NOT HAVE malaria (still not sure how getting a sickness is unmanly). 

Anyways, the next day some friends offered to watch tendai for us so we could go on a date.  Our first "date" in over 2 years, so I of course jumped at the opportunity despite being achey, slightly feverish, with a headache.  And what a wonderful date it was.  Since we are stuck in South Africa waiting for a visa for tendai, we were actually able to go to dinner and a movie, which was awesome.  (Especially since I was getting sick and it did not involve a lot of activity.)  After supper, we went to pick up the baby from our friends which turned into a really good visit.  However by this time I was like a kid with really bad diahrea holding back with all I had.  Not diahrea of course, but the effects of malaria.  I was fighting the chills, aches, and headache, but did not want to be a whiner and complain to my wife. I am manly (right, like a man can actually defeat a sickness raging through his body.... It's not a dragon!)  and I am not sick and will not complain.  Finally however, it was time to go, and I no longer had to pretend I was ok.  Of course by now the chills are so bad that I am shaking like a leaf in a tornado.   I think I pulled a muscle in my neck, and my lower back, just from the chills.  That and my jaw is strained from all the chattering and I don't want to talk (but I think that one Heather might say was an answer to prayer and not the malaria).   

At this point I succumbed to pressure and took the medicine, after a long long night of shaking, and suffering, I finally am getting better.  I am not sure if this makes me any less manly for taking my meds, but I know I will live another day.  Funny thing is, this is not the first time.  Last time this happened, I was brought to the hospital when my kidneys wanted to shut down.  Hmmm.  They say insanity is repeating the same thing over and over expecting a different result.   I disagreee.  On this premise, all manly men, would be insane!  Just doesn't seem right.  Anyways, moral of the story.   Don't work out the day before getting malaria.. cus it just makes it hurt more.

(Heather's note... despite what the title of the post says, Rick was not near death... he did have malaria, and it did hit him hard, but he wasnt near death. I would never let him get that sick, just to avoid looking like a sissy (which he doesnt... its just medicine for crying out loud!!)

Well for all those wondering what is going on now in our lives the basic answer is waiting, studying and preparing.  We are waiting for Tendai's visa. I think we have to have an answer by the 30th, but are hoping to recieve one much sooner.   The current process goes like this.  We have been told we need a TB test.  We do the TB test.  We recieve the answer which says Tendai does not have TB.  That response gets sent to Kenya where another doctor stamps the results.  The results then get returned to Immigration in South Africa, and our application is approved.  Lots of waiting.

 So now we are working on office work that needs to be done for the mission while we wait here. I am working on making church video's, reworking a youth book for the local pastors, and catching up on other mission related office work.  Other then that, we are just praying that God will continue to open the doors for us to be able to come home and we hope that you as well will pray with us for this.   God bless. Rick, Heather & Tendai