The Final Countdown!

We leave for our furlough in less than a week! GULP!

We will be in South Africa for a week from the 23rd to the 30th of October, and then we take the journey to America! We return with lots of stories, a couple of wooden animals and a brand new baby 😉

We will be Stateside for just over 90 days. Ninety glorious days filled with grandparents, family holidays, church families, the missionary convention, and CHIPOTLE!! We plan to spend most of November in Missouri, we will be at ICOM, and then December and January will be spent in Colorado.

Let us know if you want to get together and eat Chipotle with us our schedule is filling up quickly but there is always space for friends and Mexican food.

Be in prayer for us as we sprint to try and finish everything on our to do list before Thursday, and then pray for traveling mercies. For us, and for the poor souls who will be flying directly in front and behind our gymnastic toddler and opera singing baby.

And of course the obligatory baby picture.

Sandy’s blogging! Check out what a week looks like for us at 3 Measures. http://…

Sandy’s blogging! Check out what a week looks like for us at 3 Measures.
A week in 3 Measures. | 3 Measures – David and Sandy Echols
www.3measur.es
A week in 3 Measures. Posted on October 13, 2014 by david We thought you all might like to see into …read more    

Buried in Christ…

…and raised to walk to newness of life.

Yesterday I had the absolute privilege of baptizing a young woman into Christ. Please be in prayer for her as she embarks on to this new journey of faith! We chose to keep her identity private as her choice could lead to persecution from her family.

It was absolutely priceless to see her light up after she came up from the water. God is good.

A week in 3 Measures.

We thought you all might like to see into our week, to see what our schedule is.

Our week begins on Sunday with the Thrive Bible study. We attend a local church in the morning and then we do some grocery shopping before heading home. At around three we head back to the office. The whole family shows up for the first part of the night, for the social time. Each week is something different. A few weeks ago I killed it at Karaoke night. David sang “play that funky music white boy,” none of our group had ever even heard the song!! They cracked up at the white boy part. AND I have heard several of them hum the song since them. So I guess we brought back something old school.

I then take our two rowdy boys home while David stays to lead a discussion based Bible study. The group picked several topics at the start of the year and they have been working through them. They include things like Alcoholism, Death, the nature of God, Anger, Baptism, and Salvation. When we took over this group almost two years ago we worked really hard to establish a community and a feeling of unity with them. It is safe to say that these young men and women are at a point where they really love and care for one another.

On Monday David leaves early for the office and gets a few hours of work in before he had to be back on the farm for an elders meeting. David has been in the Elders for a few months now. They meet once a week to discuss issues and pray over the work being done here. The meetings last at least two hours, after that we rush back to the office (our office is located in Katutura, it is about 20min from our home) for Hope Cafe. Hope Cafe is the internet and coffee cafe that was made possible by the Pikes Peak VBS and CCCB summer team. It usually goes from 5-7. We just bought a coffee maker, so I am trying to figure that all out. Luckily people prefer tea 😉
We then head home to get dinner made and the babies to bed.

On Tuesdays David spend a lot of time in the office. He prepares for the Bible study, works on communication, does home visits, works on IT stuff, and a whole bunch of other things I am sure I am leaving out. On Tuesday nights I attend the YWAM family meetings. Those change from week to week, there are some song service nights and some teachings. Some weeks the family meeting takes place on a Saturday and is more casual. They are talking of doing a volley ball day. It sounds awfully dangerous! Balls flying at your face and all.

On Wednesday David heads out early to spend a few hours in the office before he has a meeting with Brian, the Director of YWAM Namibia. We then meet in town to run some errands before David meets with the tennis group. The tennis hours change depending on the weather. It gets incredibly hot here, and playing tennis on the surface of the sun is less than appealing. David is usually home by sevenish.

Thursdays are for more Bible studies. David has been working with some of the needle work ladies for the last few weeks and will meet with them a couple more times before we leave for furlough. He has been sharing with them specifically about salvation. This group meets at 8am. He then spends a few hours working before heading out into the community to meet with a family in their home. I will be joining them tomorrow! I’m pretty excited actually. It is a family that has expressed interest in learning about God and the Bible, but their work schedule stops them from attending anything too strict.
At one David has a Discipleship group with the young men who he baptized earlier this year. They are a close knit group, it’s been a privilege to hear about how they have grown and matured in the last few months.
We like to ave people over for dinner on Thursday nights. It’s been a while, but I really want to get back to it!

Fridays are family days. I fiercely guard our Fridays. We have a lazy morning and we usually have lunch at a child friendly place with a playground. The weeks can become utterly hectic, and on Fridays we get to slow down and recharge before it all starts again.

Saturdays are for projects and an other needs that my arise. The house we moved in to was a dorm for many years. So needless to say it has needed a lot of work. We have painted, replaced ceiling, put in new flooring and we have even started working on the outside of the house to make a safe place for the kids to play.
This coming Saturday David will be doing a first aid training in one of the very rural areas near our home. He is expecting to have 37 students, so be in prayer for that!

Then Sunday comes back around so we take a deep breath and plunge in again!