When the Boarder Closes….

We wake up at a quarter to 4 in the morning to hit the road.  We are driving down to the southern part of Senegal.  I bring the boys out to the car in their blankets so that they can continue to sleep.  Being the morning person in our family I take the first round of driving so that Joel can continue to rest.  I watch the road closely as I drive as there are very few road signs and it is dark.  This is my first time to actually drive these roads without Joel telling me where to go.  We are leaving this early because we need to be down to the boarder of Senegal and Gambia at 8 am, when the boarder opens, so that we only have to wait a few hours hopefully rather than 5 or 6 hours to get across.  We drive all the way there for 4 hours and arrive just a little after 8.  The last hour and a half of the drive was on dirt roads that were pretty bumpy.  We arrive there only to be told that the boarder has been closed because of a disagreement between the two countries.

Closed?  Was that possible?  Had we driven all this way for nothing?  What now?  What do we do when the boarder is closed?

Well… we turn around and drive back an hour and a half to rejoin the main highway and begin the 10 hours drive around Gambia to the other side of Senegal.  To be honest we were surprised for only a little and then we gulped at the reality of the drive ahead of us, got back in the car and started the trip again.

For me this was a good illustration of what travel is like for us here.  What will go wrong?  We never know, but usually there is some hiccup in the road or plans that need to be changed.  Tomorrow we set off another drive, one day for me and 3 days for Joel with 3 boarders.  Pray for us as we face expected unexpected challenges.  Pray for patience when the days lengthen and endurance with the sun beats down.

Looking forward to sharing with you all what God is at work doing all over West Africa!