I wish I had witty subject lines....

Oh boy. It is so hard to believe how short our time here is: two weeks from today for the three of us and one week from Wednesday for Erin! These past few weeks have flown by as we are bringing some of our regular programs/clubs/bible studies to a close for the summer and trying to spend plenty of time with all of our friends here. Here's the quick rundown:

-While the girls are continuing the Tuesday after school art club with their faithful 5-6 girls for the next two weeks, John and I have had less faithful attendance from our 5-6 guys in the last few weeks, and so are going to spend the time with the two brothers that we have invested most in, Marty and Calvin

-Ballyloughan, as we have mentioned before, has started a Wednesday night outreach into the estates, and we are helping for the next two weeks with that, leading sports activities for kids

-We are continuing our Thursday door to door prayer ministry until we leave, as we are nearly finished with individually visiting ever home in the estates. While this sometimes proves routine, or without many people to pray and talk with, the past few weeks have been so encouraging! During the last two weeks, we met and talked and prayed with two grandmothers of one of the largest families in the area. When I say large, I mean they each told us that they have a range of 60-90 grandchildren and 20-30 great grandchildren. This family is a traveling family that is very very closely knit and is matriarchal by nature, and so it is a huge thing for us to not only meet these lovely ladies, but to receive such warmth and acceptance from them. We were also able to pray with them and will be giving them Bibles. This is also the same family that supplies about 50% of regular attenders for Kidzone at church at Hillside each week, so please keep this ministry and this family in particular in your prayers.

-Our Thursday night youth club is finished, which frees us up to hang out with everyone. Since the weather has been phenomenal for the past three weeks, and it is light until 10:30, there are many older kids out. John and I have been playing much more football on the courts recently, and it is prime time for strolling around and visiting. It is also clear that the summer is nearing, as the older ones around here start getting into their crazy mindsets again, complete with excessive drinking, late night parties, fighting, police riots, and the like which are already becoming regular.

-Fridays and Saturdays are pretty free for us to meet with any people we are close with, and to just hang around with the kids.

-Besides our weekly events, we are scheduled to have dinner with someone different nearly every single night until we leave, so this is great to get some final quality time in so many different friendships. We have already had tons of great times recently, including going to a huge motorbike race at the coast this weekend (similar to Nascar in popularity and style, but a roadrace), and a huge barbecue with friends yesterday after church. We are soo thankful for the hospitality and level of love that our friends here have shown us this year.

-Finally, this Friday evening, we are having a big goodbye barbecue for pretty much everyone we know here, including people from both churches and especially people from the estate. Some friends from church are helping us with the food and supplies, and we are beginning to tell everyone. Please pray for this time, as we expect and hope to see lots of people we know, get a chance to say a final goodbye, and still share our love of Christ through this final act of kindness.

Well, true to form for my updates, this has become longer than I intended, but hopefully you have found this encouraging and will be faithful in prayer for us through this last bit of our time here. We love you all!