The Shumaker Family's Blog

Yesterday Keith thought he had a cold as many colds are going around.  Tonight, his legs started aching and he suddenly had a very high fever, both very typical malaria symptoms.  He has started on a malaria treatment even though he has not been tested.  Malaria hits Keith rather quickly so we don’t have time to play around.  Please pray for him.  We have lost count of the number of times he’s had malaria, but we know it exceeds ten times in a four year period.  For some reason, his body is extremely succeptible, even though he takes a prophylaxis.  (preventative)  Every time he gets it, I think, he just can’t keep going on like this.  We praise God for the last few months of good health we’ve had up until this point.  We ask you to please help us pray that God will touch Keith’s body and restore his health and strength so that he can do the work God has called him to do here. 

Last night I was in a village called Babo. I went with another missionary, John Cooley. We worked with him some when we first came to Burkina Faso. The village is about 5 hours away in the northern part for the country. We had a great trip and saw a few people trust Christ.

What bothered me the most is that we passed many villages on the way that had no gospel witness. We passed by two big towns that as far as I know don’t have anyone or at least not many preaching the truth. Sometimes I think that we are advancing and then I realize that there is so much more to be done. Sometimes it is almost overwhelming but little by little, it is going to be done.  It must be done because these people are precious to the Lord Jesus Christ. We need more men who can preach the Word. We need more missionaries. Please pray for us.

I wanted to share with you a victory that we had yesterday. Emile, a 6 year law student in our church, has really been on fire lately. I asked him to do the devotional for our youth meeting, and he did a tremendous job. I have never worked with him on an outline or whatever, just told him to give a thought from the Word. He gave it in an outline form anyway.  I was very surprised and thrilled. His cousin, Norbert, has been coming to church with him the last few weeks. Emile kept telling him that he needed trust Christ and not religion, but he felt that he was okay. Sunday night I taught a lesson on, “What the Bible teaches about Mary.” He saw that he was placing his faith in man’s teaching rather than Jesus.

Monday morning, Norbert, wanted to talk with me. and we set up a meeting for that afternoon. When I sat down to talk with him, he told me that he was afraid he would have a hard time not sinning when he went back to University. I told him that would be correct if he didn’t have the Holy Spirit living inside of him. I told him that he needed trust Jesus, and he agreed. He bowed his head and prayed to receive Christ. We were thrilled. It is always great when one turns from darkness to receive the light.

Yesterday, after my wife had a Bible study with Pastor Zachary’s wife,  she told my wife about an older man came to church on Sunday afternoon after everyone else had gone home. He had a rod in his hand and was looking for his son. Since Mrs. Zachary had no idea if this man’s son was there or not and she did not want to get him in trouble, she said, “Pardon! Pardon! Your son was not here.” (The custom here is to beg forgiveness for children that have done wrong.  It went over real well with us the first time an older man tried to stop us from correcting one of our children.  Though we may not agree with this practice, it is their way of showing that they love our kids.)  Anyway, this man heard that his son was at church that morning and was coming to beat him.  When his father found him, I’m sure he got in major trouble for coming to hear the Word of God. This is the reality that we face with Islam.  In many cases, the parents wouldn’t mind their children coming to church, but they fear others. This is not the first time we have heard a story such as this, and it won’t be the last.

Mrs. Zachary said a woman carrying some type of cord in her hand also passed by the church looking for her child.  She wasn’t happy that her child came to hear about Jesus and was possibly planning to punish the child.  As I am writing this, I am reminded of two other women that walked in with their Muslim outfits after church was over. We were eating as a church. They came in, looked around, shook my hand, (we offered them food, but they refused) and left. I suppose that they were also looking to see if their kids came to church.

I have always said that the Muslim religion is a religion of force and fear. Many people are forced into it, and by fear, they are kept. I have seen this so much. On visitation last Saturday, a young man told me that he shared the Gospel with a blind, old Muslim man. The man said that the news was amazing and wonderful. Then when asked if he would accept Jesus in his heart, he said, “How can I do that? I can’t do that! I am a Muslim.” Many times I have witnessed to Muslims who agreed that I had the truth but said that they could not accept it.   How sad to see how Satan has control on these people. My heart is broken for them, and my prayer is that many will come to the truth. Will you pray for these precious souls?

God truly blessed today. First, we went to Tingandogo. This area has been tough, but we are beginning to have many faithful members here. We had two people raise their hands and after the service they trusted Jesus for their salvation.

Upon our arrival at Cissin, we realized we had problem. We arrived at 9:58 and service normally starts at 10:00. Sometimes we are late and sometimes we are on time because of the service at Tingandogo. The problem was a good problem. We realized that we might not have enough place in our small building to put all of adults. We already start with the kids outside because of a lack of space. We had a group of about 12 evangelize yesterday afternoon while some of the women prepared for today’s meal. Because of the evangelism and our first baptism we were packed. We had to literally pack the people in like sardines. I couldn’t move when I preached. We had well over 60 adults. (I didn’t get a good count.) We had over 70 kids. I know we had over 130 this morning. This church is only 7 months old and God has truly blessed. I had the great privilege of baptizing 20 people this morning. God has done a great work in this church. We had over 40 tonight and most of those were adults. I told them tonight that my goal was to one day have the same problem that we had this morning(lack of space) in our new building which should be able to seat over 300 adults.

This is a picture at the beginning of Church. We must have had about another 15 crammed in the building a little later and a few had to stay outside the door. Praise the Lord that the bottom floor should be done in about 1 month and half.

One of the privileges I have here in Burkina Faso is the chance to be involved in the children’s ministry. Many of the adults here do not have a desire to spend time teaching children. I like to remind the children that Jesus was not too busy for the little ones who came to him. I also tell them over and over again that He used young people in the Bible, and that He can use their lives too, if they will let him. It is my heart’s desire to see children accept the Lord and stay faithful to Him as they grow so that when they are older they will be free from scars of sin this world can leave on those who are not following the Lord.

Sometimes it is hard to know if we are really getting anywhere with the children, but the Lord blessed today at both the Tingandogo and Cissin children’s churches. Both groups of kids listened well, and the Lord helped me as I told the story of Zacchaeus. Right now we have to combine children of all ages so it’s really a challenge to keep everyone’s attention. I rely on the Lord’s help and sometimes feel like I do everything short of standing on my head to get their attention back on the lesson. Praise the Lord, with His help I was able to get through to one at the Cissin church, and hopefully more than just him understood the word of God.

After I explained that God wants us all to turn away from our sinful ways as Zacchaeus did, one teenage boy raised his hand and asked how we could be forgiven of our sins. I answered his question, and then Salif, another children’s worker, pulled him aside to talk to him individually. Moussa prayed and asked Jesus to forgive his sins and gave his life to the Lord. Please pray for him. He explained to Salif that his father is a devout Muslim who faithfully attends one of the larger mosques near our church. The father could possibly punish him if he found out he was coming to our church. Salif was able to tell him, “I’ve been in your shoes,” because he is a former Muslim. He encouraged him to continue to seek the Lord and to pray for his father. Please pray for Moussa and his family and for us to have the strength and wisdom to reach the children and teenagers of Burkina Faso. Satan wants their lives, but we know his goal is only “to steal, to kill, and to destroy.” May God allow us to lead them to the One who can give them abundant life!

This is a day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it. I always loved that song in English and I have fallen in love with it in French. Sometimes people ask me what I do all day. That is a hard question to answer sometimes because my day varies from day to day, but I thought that I would give you a detailed description of today.

6:30- My alarm went off, and I had a quick time of devotions. ( I know that it shouldn’t be so quick but I made a promise to Emile that I would be at the clinic by 7:30 or so.)

7:15 – Salif and I left the house.

7:45- We arrived at a health clinic to visit Emile’s friend that has been sick for over a week. (Please pray for him. He is a Muslim and we are praying that God will open his heart). We talked with him and gave a love gift(money) from the church(really my pocket, but I like to say it is from the church).

8:30- We went to visit the little boy that I wrote about earlier(5 year old with a hernia). He had a successful surgery and we wanted to say hello. He was happy and his mother very grateful that we helped her son. While on my way I got a beep on my cell phone. “A Beep” is when somebody calls me and hangs up so I can use my dime to call them back. How thoughtful, huh? It is Pastor Zacharie that works with us. The masons need cement. Kind of hard to get it on the other side of town. My thought(Why didn’t they tell me this last night?) We are building out baptismal pool for our 1st Baptism at Cissin. We should have about 20 to baptize on Sunday.

9:30- Another call from pastor Zacharie. We are on our way home. They need some plumbing equipment for the Baptismal pool.

9:45- Go to that land to give the pluming supplies and the iron workers tell me that they need more cement but not just any cement, cement from Togo(it is supposed to be better but who knows). Again I think, “Why didn’t they tell me this last night?” Togo cement can be harder to find sometimes.

10:00- I arrive at home. I told my wife I would be home at 10:00 so she can take the car to go grocery shopping, but the problem is I still haven’t finished my visits. This is par for the course. She told me that she never expects me home when I say, something always comes up. I get Emile setup for work, as he is translating things from English in French for me.

10:30- We arrive at a widow’s house who has been very faithful to our church for 2 and half years. She wanted me to pray for her. She is having a hard time because her work isn’t going well. She cooks food and sells it, but she is struggling. She owes a shop owner $10 for rice but doesn’t have the money to pay it back. We pray for her and I help her with $14. She has never asked before and is very appreciative. Her friend wants prayer too. The friend tells me that she has bad spirits that bother her and she wants me to get rid of them. Interesting, huh? I tell her that I can pray for her, but it won’t really do any good until she knows Jesus. After 20 min of explaining she trusts Christ. Praise the Lord.

11:00- I have to talk to our church guard. After almost every church service at Tingandogo, somebody asks me for something. After months and months of this I find out that our church guard has been telling everybody in the neighborhood, if you have a problem just come and see the missionary, he can regulate it. Interesting, huh?

11:55 Only 1 hour and 55 min late I arrive home so my wife can go shopping. I decide that I will go with her so it will be quicker, and I will take her out to eat. While having an enjoyable meal together I get another beep, but this is from my day guard. Yes we do have a day and night guard at the house. Somebody asked me why one time. If you want to be robbed and lose everything don’t have a guard. Simple, right? I had in my mind that I wouldn’t answer my phone because I wanted to spend time with my wife, but this is my guard at the house, and my kids are there with the baby sitter so I think, maybe there is a problem. Oh, its Pastor Zachary again. He called on Simon’s phone because he was at my house looking for me. They can’t put the steps in the baptismal pool the way I asked because they put the pipe in the wrong place. Oh well, I will go find a solution in an hour.

2:30 – I get home and unload the car. I get ready to go and play tennis. I know that is carnal but I need the exercise. Before playing at 4:00 I need to go by the church and handle the stair problem. I find a solution and play tennis.

7:00- I get home, eat, play with the kids and check e-mails.

10:15- I start writing this blog.

11:00- Heat some water for Salif, my night guard, he loves coffee to stay awake. I tell him that I am proud of him. He did great with our visits this morning. He did a lot of the talking. If you would have known Salif 3 years before, you would have never thought he would be this bold and out going for Jesus. It is amazing what God can do.

That is a day. I can’t say it’s typical because tomorrow will be nothing like today. That is the great life of a missionary. I couldn’t imagine myself having to do the same job each day. That might not be bad for others, but I would struggle. I could have added more but I didn’t want to write too much as I am sure I already have. God has been good to me today as He is everyday. This is a day that the Lord has made and I will certainly rejoice because I know Him!

I normally would have had some type of Bible Study with at least one person but today it didn’t work out.

All over Ouagadougou, there are young men that stand beside the road holding a stick in their hand, with several cards attached. They go from car to car hoping to sell cell phone cards. Most cell phones are prepaid. You buy the card and charge the phone before using it. You can also buy the cards in the stores, but I like to help the young guy trying to make a little bit by working instead of begging. At a corner near our house, I am always hounded by about four or five of them trying to be the first to my window.

Last Saturday, I was coming back from evangelization at one of our works, and the rain started a little. When I turned the corner off the main road I saw one of the young men sitting under a grass hanger. I was with my son, Isaac. So Isaac and I went and sat under the hanger and bought two cokes. I split the drinks between Isaac, the card guy(Jean), an older man and me. I witnessed to them and to many others that came in from the rain. I then invited Jean to come to church with me and told him to invite the others to come. I was excited when three of them showed up on Sunday morning. The didn’t make any professions but we are praying that God will do something great in their lives.

I just wanted to show you how we have been delivering the iron to the church for our construction. This is a good picture of the life in Burkina Faso. Where there is a will, there is a way.

We had a great day on Sunday. We had about 80 at Tingandogo and 65 at Cissin. During my message two young men walked in. Africans are a little strange when they come into church late. Actually it used to make me mad(I know a preacher shouldn’t get that way). I guess you have to come to the place you are willing to live with it because you won’t change it. The regulars understand but visitors never do. They walk in, in the middle of preaching and have to shake hands and say good morning to everyone (out loud). Can’t they understand that I am trying to preach? To them, it would be more disrespectful not to say good morning and shake a few hands than to be quiet. I have had them walk up to the pulpit and shake my hand as I am preaching away. This story made me think of last week. A lady decided, for some reason I will never figure out, to undress her 2 year old boy. He then proceeded to walk half way down the aisle. So now, I have a naked boy staring at me while I am trying to preach. I have become a little used to these kind of things. So I just preached on. I looked down at him and noticed that he thought our floor was a little dry and decided to wet it. Yes, he peed on the floor. You ask, “What did you do?” Nothing, just kept preaching.

Sorry, back to the two young men. They came in during the message and said good morning really loud. With my attention deficit disorder I got a little sidetracked but figured I could get back on track. What happened next really messed me up. One of them stopped at the door bowed his head and prayed. Then he took two steps and did the same thing. I am trying to preach but thinking, what in the world is he trying to prove? He did this two more times as he advanced to his seat, and then finally, he sat down. I suppose that I should have had a good attitude about their prayers, but it was all for show. They listened well and as I gave the invitation to accept Jesus they both raised their hand. They prayed to accept Jesus and so did an older woman. God is so good.