The Long Journey to Tete...

Well I guess it's time for an update... We FINALLY made it to our new home Tete! After two solid weeks traveling we're so glad to be home. There are so many amazing stories to tell of Papa's amazing provision and miracles but I don't have time to tell them all.  First off we are so grateful for our wonderful 4X4 vehicle! While we were in the states Papa told us to book our flights to Maputo (the capital city of Mozambique) by faith and trust Him to provide us a vehicle. When we booked our flights we were more than excited to book them by faith! Once the time came to actually fly to Africa we pretty much freaked! Ha! We began trying to change our flights via different routes and checking prices and we couldn't find anything that we could afford! The prices were outrageous for us to change our flighton such short notice.  We realized that Papa God was showing us that we WERE NOT supposed to change them. He told us to book them by faith and TRUST Him. He really stretched our faith on this one! He gave us so much peace and we kept our flights the same. Once we got to Johannesburg, South Africa we had NO MONEY to go towards buying a truck! By the time we flew to Maputo which was 2 days later somehow we had several thousand dollars! After a few days in Maputo we had $11,500 to purchase our vehicle! Papa God is GOOD. He's always faithful. Thru this process of buying a vehicle in a 3rd world country (which isn't all that easy) Papa showed us that our Faith can only be in Him. We can't put our faith in people or material things, we truly are on a journey of trusting in Him alone to be our provider.  Once we purchased our vehicle we began the LONG HARD 15hr drive to Dondo, Mozambique. Driving 15hrs in the states is NOTHING compared to 15hrs here in Mozy! Most of the roads are in really bad shape...there are tons of potholes and the sides of the road are so corroded that it's hard to tell the road from the dirt. The potholes make driving at night really FUN...NOT. The next day we drove another 8 or 9 hours to meet the Iris Relief team and the majority of that drive was thru the bush bush on a rough muddy dirt road (which I really enjoyed..maybe there is a little country in me! ha).  We did get to see about 100 Baboons, a huge iguana and a huge snake! That made the adventure even more fun! As we drove thru little bush villages it made me so happy to see the dirt roads lined with cute little babies and kids as well as the village people waving a jumping up and down with HUGE smiles, excited to see some crazy white people! Along this part of the trip I realized Papa really has called us to live a life as PIONEERS. The joy on a child's face when you stop and give them a stick of Wrigley's gum or an empty water bottle makes it worth it all! My eyes were really opened to how spoiled I've lived the majority of my life when I handed some kids a stick of Wrigley's gum and they ran to there mud hut to show some older youth, which came back to me to ask me what the stick of gum was. I actually had to take a piece and start chewing it to show them what to do with the gum! Ha... It's hard to believe that Wrigley's gum is over 100 years old and there's still people in the world that have never seen nor heard of it! Most of these people in the deep bush villages are born and raised there and never go anywhere else. They work really really hard growing their own food and farming to live. It amazes me how simple life can actually be. We really don't need the mojority of the things we have. God is showing me how life must have been for my grandfathers  fathers...generations of hard working men who carried their water from a well or water source like a river and used a bamboo outhouse to use the restroom in.  I love that Papa has called us to live much more simply. We literally get to carry our water from the well by bucket! We have a trash can buy our floor drain in the bathroom where we store about 25 gallons of water and we have a plastic cup nearby to pour the water over our heads to get wet. I love the simplicity of our life here! It makes us respect the luxuries that Papa God has so richly blessed us with while we are in the states or traveling elsewhere! We don't have anything to complain about. The rough roads, carrying water, sketchy electricity, sketchy internet, bucket showers...it's such a blessing to have these amazing things. My heart is burdened for so so many people in our world that don't even have the necessaties like water. I thank Papa for giving us MORE THAN ENOUGH. He always does!  While with the Iris Relief Team we got to bless so many people. We got to take Jesus & food (rice & beans mostly) to two villages that were very poverty stricken. The second village we went to was about a 5hr drive out some of the roughest dirt/mud roads i've ever been on! It was so far from any city or town...we didn't. Think we were ever gonna get there...Ha! When we finally arrived a couple hours after dark the children of Luabo were standing in the muddy road waiving an Iris flag waiting on us! Their faces lit up with joy when they saw us! They ran beside our vehicles about a mile to their village singing and dancing. When we pulled into their little village all the people gathered in front of our headlights to sing praises the  Lord and dance!! All the people of Luabo were more than excited and so blessed to see us. The Pastor of the little Iris mud hut church in Luabo said no one had been to visit them since 2003! Many of the young children staired at us in bewilderment as they had never seen white people! We had a blast sharing Jesus and passing out large bags of rice & beans to the people who have suffered from the cyclone!  Now that we are here in Tete, we've found out that there are some changes in our plan. The land that we were planning on building on isn't in the best place, we were informed that during the rainy season it stays under water. Also it's in the desert! There's not a tree in sight so there's not a bit of shade and it's HOTT here in Tete! We are in the process now of finding a piece of land to purchase! Please be praying for us during this upcoming week...We have a lot going on. We actually found a beautiful piece of land just a little way out of town that has 3 HUGE beautiful Boabab trees (Boabab's are also known as "The Tree of Life" because they are used for so many resources. Boabab's bark is used for cloth and rope, the leaves are used for condiments and medicine. The fruit is called "monkey bread", is rich in Vitamin C and is eaten. The trees are capable of storing hundreds of litres of water, which is tapped during dry seasons. Some Boabab's are dated to be over 2000 years old, so they've been around since Jesus walked the earth!) I find it funny that the tree is called the "Tree of Life" and there's THREE on the land that we would love to purchase...Boabab's are few and far between here in Tete so we were shocked to find three together on one piece of land! We are praying for Papa to show us if this land is our inheritance!  We will be purchasing our DIRE's (Residence Permit) on Monday, once we have those we will be meeting with the Municipal Government to propose our plan to build Shekinah Healing Home to rescue homeless and abandoned children from the streets of Tete. Once we propose our plan to the government they will let us know whether or not the land is available and how much of it we can "purchase". Here in Mozambique you can't actually buy land...you buy the rights from the government to use the land. We are praying for favor! We are also meeting with the Governor's wife to propose our plan as well. We're praying for favor with her as well. We will hopefully be meeting with a large coal mining company to make a proposal for our program as they sometimes use tax money to assist in certain "public service projects" so they could be a great help! Pray with us! We know God has gone before us and already paved the way. We're excited to see what the Lord has in store for us these next few weeks and we hope to have a piece of land and start building Shekinah Healing Home soon! We will also start our program with our boys soon! So pray for us as we begin to disciple and love on them!  Papa touched me when i read this scripture the other day... "Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! If I preach voluntarily,  I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. What then is my reward?  Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so make use of my rights in preaching it. Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible." 1 Corinthians 9:16-19 We're so blessed and honored to be here in Africa sharing the love of Jesus with everyone we come in contact with. "I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in it's blessings." 1 Cor.9:23.  It's truly a blessing to share the love of Christ with those who have never experienced it. There is no greater joy that I have yet to find.  We love each and every one of you and we're so thankful for your prayers and support! We pray God bless your offerings and continue to pour out His extravagant love as you seek a deeper revelation and knowledge of Him!  Blessings, Grace & Peace in Him,  The Boyd's