Four Day and Counting!

It is Monday night and I have just had dinner with a prayer warrior friend of mine making sure she left here armed with prayer requests. Am I anxious? No but I do feel the urging to gird our team with prayer support as we ready our selves for this trip. For almost a year now the Lord has prepared me for my journey to visit His children in another part of the world and it is almost here. Yes! I am excited and ready to meet the ladies of Amani. I want to serve them by just being with them, loving them and encourageing them in their journey with the Lord. I am also excited to share with them my love of quilting. Two of my quilting budies and I have made 14 quilted runners to take to the ladies as gifts. It will be fun to share with them what American quilt fabrics look like. You see these runners have fabric in them from eleven different quilter's staches!

I look forward to spending lots of time with the ladies watching them create the these beautiful pieces of art and just maybe I will be able to help. And as we stitch I look forward to all we will learn about each other.

In June we saw one child off to Africa as Brittany preceded all of us to Rwanda to visit her sister church. Last Friday, Brittany was at the airport in Kigali, Rwanda to meet our son, Jared, as he arrived with the IBC Team Rwanda. So on Friday Jon will see me off to Kenya. This is definitly the summer that the Lord has deamed the Noetzels are to travel to Africa. Not sure what that means but we all go with open hearts and hands to serve and glorify Him!

Bwana asifiwe! (Praise the Lord!)
Debbie

Preparation Stage...almost done...Blasting off tomorrow!

Wow. The flurry of activity to leave home for 5 weeks is incredible! Last minute running around for needed items for us and the missionaries we are visiting has kept me hopping! I know the trip ahead will be full of challenges and lessons, and I can't wait.

Our DC Amani Safari team will be gathering in Nairobi in mid-July. Before I join them, I will be visiting 4 countries in the next 3 weeks: Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, and Malawi.

In Rwanda and Burundi, I will have the treat of visiting the "sister centers" of Amani in each of the capital cities, Kigali and Bujumbura. I am really looking forward to meeting and enjoying the women there, hearing their stories, and learning about their centers where "peace is sown."

As an old African proverb says, "If you are rich and not generous, it is as if you had nothing."

Truly, it is better to give than to receive...and a lot more fun!

Well, off to finish the last minute packing!

Betty

"For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea."
Habakkuk 2:14