Monday, June 28, 2010

Is God at Work in Africa? part 2

So as I continue my "Is God at work in Africa" theme, I went back to the very beginning of our trip and pulled out these photos. In my previous post most of the images that I shared focused on the work of the Zimmerman's in Ghana. This post is going to revolve around the ministry that the Butlers have in Ghana. As I said before it is hard to photograph God at work but I hope these images will shed a light on how missionaries are God's hands and feet on a daily basis. I also hope that all who read and look at this blog will realize that though these are photos of missionaries in Africa, they represent the same things that God expects from all Christians regardless of where we live.
Martin in the foreground and his brother working on Martin's house. Martin is one of the guards employed by the Butlers. Chad and I were able to help put a roof on Martin's house.

Marnie introduces Kelly to one of her friends at a church in Dzakpo on our first Sunday in Ghana.

Head and shoulders knees and toes during a Sunday School hour with the children of Dzakpo village. Have you considered working with the children in your church?

Chad preaching in Dzakpo village.

A great opportunity to share Christ is at the local market. Making friends with the vendors at the market gives you a weekly opportunity to get to know someone. Here in the U.S. we don't normally have a market like this to visit daily or weekly but we do have Wal-Mart and Kroger.

I mentioned cell phone charging in my last post. This lady would regularly bring her cell phone to the Butlers to charge it. This gave them an opportunity to get to know her and will hopefully open into an opportunity to share Christ.

Wednesday was game day in Kodzobi village. Another great way to show God's love to the children. Lead a child to Christ and you have an in road to leading the whole family to Christ.


I hope that I have given you a better understanding of what missionary life is like and hopefully showed you that you don't have to be a missionary in Africa to be used by God.

Gary Phillips

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Is God at work in Africa?

I have been asked by some to share images that show what God is doing in Africa. As I look back through my photos and thought through the things that happened during our trip, I decided on a series of images that I am showing in this post and if I don't get sidetracked will continue to show in the next few posts. I also realized how hard it is to photograph God at work! I mean sure it is easy to photograph the moment that someone is being led to Christ or the time when someone is being baptized. Those are obvious God at work moments, what is hard to photograph and document are those subtle moments. The moments when a missionary gets a phone call because someone in a village is sick and needs a ride to the hospital. Or the times when they have a person into their home to share a meal. How about the times when a neighbor who doesn't have electricity brings you a cell phone and asks you to charge it for them. I could go on and on listing little ways that God is at work using the missionaries He has placed in Ghana and Togo but you would just get tired of reading so I won't go on. I was blessed for 4 1/2 months to get to experience seeing God at work firsthand through many different missionaries lives and I can honestly say that God is at work in Africa. I hope that the following images help you see that.


To start this series of photos I decided to go back to Ghana and work my way through the images. On Sundays the Zimmerman's would have an afternoon outreach to the children of Ho.


A game of Volleyball with a giant ball to start the day off for the older kids. You will notice some young men in the photos. These are local young men from the church in Kodzobi who volunteer to help the Zimmermans.


This lady spent the afternoon watching the festivities from the back of her home.


For the younger kids a jump rope session of sorts started their day.




Jump rope turned into get the rope.


A game of tug -o- war,

A drink for the little ones,

Now it is time to head in the building for the lesson.

The building is one room about 15'x15', they were able to squeeze 75 kids into this small room. It was very hot to say the least.

Well that is all for today, I hope you enjoy the photos.



Gary Phillips

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Critters

Before I go on about the following photos, I want to let everyone who reads this in on a little secret. Many of you may already know this but for those of you who don't after reading this you will. I am making this blog post from the comfort of my own La-Z-boy recliner. We arrived home on Monday evening and have been trying to get back into the swing of things in the good ole USA. Kelly and I struggled with the decision to come home early, we were at pretty close to the end of our funds and were trying to decide if we should stay and try to make it or leave before we ran out and incurred some debt. It was when we found out that our son was struggling with being here on his own that we realized it was time for us to return home. If anyone has any questions or comments I will be happy to address them in person, in the mean time I would like to continue the blog and post the photos that I was not able to while in Africa. The lack of good Internet made it very difficult to keep this blog going. I would like to finish now while things are fresh in my mind.

Now onto the Critters! These grasshoppers were everywhere and they were more than willing to pose for me.

This is a great image to represent the circle of life, not sure what kind of bug we are looking at but I am glad they are not bigger than me!

Now that he is finished with lunch he is looking for dessert, glad he can't see me behind the camera.

There were also a lot of these caterpillars around.

This lady bug reminded me of home!

This guy is just plain UGLY!

Well I hope you enjoyed the photos, I have more that I will be posting soon. I am now having trouble with my Internet here at home. Hopefully I will be able to get it working proper soon.

Gary Phillips -AKA- Photoman

Welcome to our blog.

This blog is an attempt to chronicle the things that God is doing for us and through us both here at home and while we are in Africa. We will be updating this blog weekly while we are home, Africa will be a different story. Due to unreliable electric and Internet we are not sure how often we will be able to but we plan to update daily if we are able.

If you would like to support us financially for this trip to Africa you can send checks to us through our church. Make Checks payable to Emmanuel Baptist Church with a note for West Africa Missions Outreach. Mailing address is 1120 S. Detroit St. Xenia, Ohio 45385 Phone is 937-372-5887.