{"id":20,"date":"2008-01-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-01-04T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2008-01-04T21:50:27","modified_gmt":"2008-01-05T02:50:27","slug":"a-surprise-visit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/2008\/01\/04\/a-surprise-visit\/","title":{"rendered":"A Surprise Visit!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Becky,<\/a><\/p>\n

It was 5:00pm on Monday, November 12, 2007, when I heard Darryl excitedly greet some people outside his office. Going outside I saw my very best friend Sokobe and her husband, Saarun.<\/p>\n

They had hiked barefooted from Wantakia to visit us … leaving at 6:00am … only an 11 hour hike! It had been over a year since I had seen Sokobe. She came because she was “lonely to see me”. (Imagine hiking 11 hours because you are homesick for someone!) She brought me two gifts. She had picked some beautiful flowers and some wild mushrooms along the jungle trails. She had wrapped the mushrooms in a leaf and tied it with tree bark. <\/p>\n

Since this was an unexpected visit, I immediately thought, ‘what in the world was I going to feed this tired hungry couple?’ The wheels started turning and I decided on pancakes and fried potatoes. We had an interesting visit over dinner while they, carefully and slowly, consumed about a dozen pancakes each and a kilo of potatoes.<\/p>\n

But I think the real treat for them was Darryl’s hot steaming coffee with milk and sugar! Sokobe would never have enough money for coffee, milk, sugar, flour, and potatoes! Or a store to buy them! In the past year, I had sent Sokobe two packages by visiting Wantakians and found out that she had received none…only my letters! What a disappointment to both of us! <\/p>\n

After dinner I gathered together some used clothes for her and her three girls. Previously, Sokobe had written me asking for pen and paper but she had not received them either so I put together a plastic bag with pen, paper, needles, thread, and soap. Soon it started to rain. Beating loudly on our tin roof, we had trouble hearing each other so we retired early. <\/p>\n

As I laid in bed, I pondered ‘why did God send Sokobe to us now?’. Then, I figured it out! Tomorrow 19 believers from our church were going to be baptized in the cold river. Each one would give a long testimony of why they were being baptized and what the Lord meant to them. Sokobe lives in a remote tribe where there are no missionaries and no way for her to hear the Gospel. So it was a perfect time for the Lord to bring her to  our village so she could hear in a similar dialect to her language clear testimonies! <\/span><\/p>\n

As I laid there all night under my warm blankets, the rain kept waking me. Finally at 3:15am, I woke up and wrote some letters by my solar lamp. I thought about the baptisms. ‘Would the rain stop? Would these
believers get pneumonia in the cold river? Would we cancel?’

When Darryl arose, I shared my concerns about the rain. He said “You know why it’s raining don’t you?” <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I said, “No, why?” <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

He replied, “The believers prayed for rain because the water in the river was not high enough for the baptisms. The Lord answered all right! We haven’t had this much rain all year! Four inches in two days!”<\/strong><\/span> <\/p>\n

By 11:00am the rain stopped! The Lord blessed us with a wonderful baptism service! Yes, it was His plan to answer the humble believing prayers of the villagers. <\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

         \"Becky<\/a>     \"Becky<\/a> <\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

For three hours, Sokobe and Saarun listened to the testimonies of the believers.<\/span> <\/strong><\/span><\/strong>Afterwards, the villagers invited them to the “mumu”. Their friendliness was a living testimony of God’s love.  Please pray for their salvation!<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

(See more pictures of the baptism in our Photo Gallery under the category Baptism 2007 new.)<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why would a barefooted woman hike 11 hours in the rain over the mountains and through the valleys to visit Becky?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/darryl-jordan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}