The Shumaker Family's Blog

We have been blessed. We have had some churches and individuals give for the construction. We are trying to find quality granite and sand.  I will have the electrician come and do his work this week.  Then, hopefully next week we will be able to pour the rest of the upper floor.  We are still in need of about $1,500 for the cement.  Cement keeps climbing in price.  Since we stopped building in Feb. the price per bag of cement has went up by $2.40.  Since we need 200 bags the increase alone will cost $480.  The cement for the flooring will cost $3,100.  God has been so good to us.  I was looking at pictures of the land the other day from when we had nothing and just after we began to build.  God has really blessed us.  Thanks for all that have given and all that have prayed.

We are going to be starting our Bible College this fall. We are in the process of preparing books and materials. I really believe that our Bible College will allow us to train men. Trained men are the key to reaching this town, country and the world. I do not believe that a man must have a Bible diploma to preach the Word. He must have a call, but he must be equipped also. The Bible college will equip these young men to serve God.

Nothing in life is free. It will cost to train these young men. I have estimated that it will take $60 a month to house, feed and train each man for the ministry. We are expecting 6-8 young men to start this fall. We could have more, and I should know soon. To go to school and to find a part time job is about impossible here. I never want to give them a totally free education so we have decided that we can put the students on a work scholarship. I have always heard that something that doesn’t cost anything will not be appreciated.

They will work(labor) 4 days a week, 4 hours a day = 16 hours a week : 16 hours a week = 64 hours a month
They won’t get credit for work on Saturday. It is church ministry.

Cost for School Each month Study Materials Costs: 5000 CFA = $10; Food : 17,500 CFA = $35
Dormitory 7,500 CFA = $15
Total 30,000 CFA = $60

We are asking for sponsors for these young men and maybe young ladies. If you would like to sponsor a student each month, please let me know. This will be a great help to the ministry here and also a great investment in eternity.

We had a wonderful day today, except for the heat.  We had a class on how to evangelize this morning and then we went out to evagelize.  We had a youth meeting at the house tonight and we had a blast.  We played spoons.  It gets wild when we play, but they love it.  I will preach on the sin of Achan tomorrow.  Please pray for this message. It will be strong but necessary.

I was very saddened by something today.  One of our men, visited a women that had become very faithful but we haven’t seen her for three weeks now.  She recently got saved, never missed and had the prettiest smile since receiving Christ.  It turns out her husband told her that he didn’t want her to be a Christian.  He told her that she would have to choose the church or him.  If she chose the church, he was going to kick her out on the street.  They invited the man to church and told him to come and see.  Please pray for the situation.  To see the joy that was on her face a few weeks ago and to have this come up, breaks my heart.

I went to Bados village  on Wednesday.  We had a great trip.  I was wanting to talk to his family again about salvation.  I was able to witness to them back in December.  I wanted to follow up before now but Bado has been out of town working and I have been traveling, so we haven’t had the time.  We were received very well.  Their village, which has about 5000 people, has already given us a piece of land.  They were begging us to begin a work there soon.  I told them that we have a great desire too but we don’t currently have the man power.  My heart is always broken when there is a great need and desire but we can’t fulfill the need.  We need  more missionaires and need raise up more young men nationals.

We also visited a little town that is 7 kilometers from Koukouldi (Bados village).  The mayor of the town has heard what we have done for the children at Koukouldi (this is the village were my parents and others have helped kids with their school supplies).  He has offered to give us a piece of land.  God is opening up so many doors it is unreal.  We will try to meet with the mayor soon.  I will have to tell him that it might be 4-5 years before we can get there to start a work.  How sad that is!

“The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;  Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.”

There has been something on my heart for a long time, but my trip to Mali has confirmed a ministry that we need to start.  I have no idea how I will start this ministry or how we will run it but it is a major ministry, that can and will produce great fruit.  We would like to start a health clinic.  While in Mali, we found out that one of the churches had began to run health clinics in nearby villages.  Because of this they were able to start 5 churches (mostly in Muslim areas).  They have 11 other villages that are begging for churches but they lack pastors.

It would be great if we could have a doctor or a nurse that could be a missionary here.  If not we will try to get someone trained here, to do this ministry.  My plan is to create a health clinic, a building, in Ouagadougou.  Then once or twice a month we will take the workers from this clinic and go to villages for 2-3 days, treat the people physcially and also spiritually, by preaching the word.

In Ivory Coast a few years back, we had two days where we had held a health clinic.  This was in a Muslim village.  We treated over 500 people.  We had over 350 come to a night preaching service, with over 300 of them being Muslim.  This is a great way to open up hearts to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

We had friend day today at Water of Life Baptist Church.  This is the first time that we had friend day.  God really blessed and we had a bunch of first time visitors.  We had more than 20.  We had 83 adults present and 34 children.  The greatest thing about the day is that we had four professions of faith this morning and another one tonight. Praise the Lord!  That is why we are here.  We will have friend day next week at our other work at Tingandogo.   God is doing a great work.

This past week I went to visit the country of Mali.  We had a tremendous trip.  I with with a missionary from Ghana (Steve Volonte) and three African brothers.   It took about 12 hours to go from Ouagadougou(capital of Burkina) to Bamako(capital of Mali).  We were able to meet with a few Baptists while in the capital.  They are doing a great work and God is giving them great fruit. I was actually a little shocked  because I thought that there wasn’t much going on being that Mali is more thank 90% Muslim, with less than  1% being Christian.  My heart was deeply touched.  From time to time we try to visit other countries so that we can see what is happening and what needs to be done.

To many people get caught up in their town, in their country and forget about others next door and others in the world.  We get caught up in our own little world and forget about Gods world.  We are thrilled about what God is doing and what He is going to do.   There is so much to do.  Please pray that God would raise up some other workers.  We need them badly.

I want to start by thanking all of you for your prayers. The trip was long but well worth it. I had a meeting with some missionaries and pastors in Ghana. We had 4 African countries represented at the meeting (Ghana, Togo, Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso). We have formed a fellowship and we were meeting about our plans this year. This is the same group that had the pastors conference last year at our church.

Then I was off to Abidjan, Ivory Coast. I was a little apprehensive about traveling in the Ivory Coast due to the war there, mostly because my license plate is from Burkina Faso. Burkina and the Ivory Coast haven’t always been to friendly during this time. Surprisingly I was rarely stopped and never hassled in South(by the military).

The whole trip was over 2,000 Kilometers. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot but on African roads it can be. There was one stretch that was only 120 kilometers and it took over 4 hours because of the potholes or should I say craters.

I made it back home at 8:30 tonight.  We left at day break.  I wasn’t expecting to make it back tonight but we made good timing and we traveled a little after dark, which I usually don’t do(for safety reasons) but I wanted to see my family.  I had an amazing trip.  I will try to write a couple of updates tomorrow.  We went through rebel territory in the Ivory Coast today.  That was interesting.  No harm done except for the wallet.  Many checkpoints and they all want money.  It is good to be home.

I will be taking a trip to Ghana in a few days.  Then I will travel to the Ivory Coast.  I haven’t been back to the Ivory Coast since we left December 2004.  I am excited.  Please pray for God’s protection and blessing upon the trip.  Please pray for Rebecca and the kids also.  I don’t like to leave my family but sometimes it is necessary.  I will be gone for about a week and a half.