Hey Guys!

><>Thursday Night, February 19, 2009

Earlier this week we had made an appointment to meet and study through the Bible with Beaufils (bo-feez), our friend I told you about last update. Through this he could practice his English and reading comprehension and at the same time learn truth about the teachings of Jesus. Beau is in the picture above. He's the guy sqauting in the front with the red and black shirt.

Well we just finished our first meeting with Beaufils. When he just arrived I had to take a shower b/c I just finished working out…Anyways in the bathroom I was just like okay Lord, Beau is here and I have no clue how to do this. I was like just anoint us and give us wisdom, understanding, and clarity.

You see, Emily (our HandsOn Coordinator) and others have told us about a method they use to study the Bible with the Africans. They go through stories and have the people reiterate the story over again after their told that way they learn it. They then ask them questions about the story and some lesson they have learned from it. They then ask them who that they know needs to hear this story and lesson and ask them to go out and share it.

This method is very interesting and we wanted to kinda integrate it into our meetings with Beau. I think that we kinda followed it but kinda didn’t haha. Anyways here’s how it went.

We prayed and decided that we should go through the gospel of John. Basically what we did was go verse by verse through the first 18 verses I believe. We broke up the verses into sections and just made Beaufils read the little sections over and over and over. Then I would ask him questions about but the text and what it was saying, trying to work on his comprehension. I made him explain to us what was going on in the text. It was awesome! We went verse by verse, just asking questions about who said what, what was going on, why it said that, what it meant. It was amazing the Spirit was just moving. We would make him summarize after every portion to make sure he understood it in the context of the passage. It was great because usually when he reads things he has no clue what he’s reading in English, but this time we wouldn’t move on until he had a clear grasp of what the Word was saying and why. Every so often I was like okay well that’s really good we can stop here and he was like no we must keep going, I would be like you sure? And he was positive. I did that about 3 times to see if he was really engaged. It was great. When we finished, we closed the Bibles and I asked Beau to summarize the passages we had just read and discussed. He basically went verse by verse summarizing what we just read and discussed. I told him to go home and practice because the more he practices, the more he’ll remember and understand it. So we said that he must practice until we meet next week and every time he sees us, he must explain the first half of John chapter 1. My brothers and sisters, isn’t God amazing!

Here are some things that stuck out tonight.  We went over Jesus being in the beginning with God and how He was God and how all things were made through Him. We also hung out at the passage speaking about though all things were made through Him, they did not know Him or accept Him when He came to them. Another one was when John who was a prophet called Jesus higher ranking and existing before him.  According to Islam Jesus is just another prophet, a mere man, so to hear these things about Jesus being God and the world not knowing and rejecting that was very interesting to Beau. I also asked Him why John would say that about Jesus being that Jesus was a man younger then John. Beau was like “because in the beginning Jesus was there long before any of these men”. I can’t really put into words how the spirit moved. Beau says that He was amazed at the teaching of his religion, how it doesn’t teach this truth and how what he learned tonight was the time ever for him to see and study for himself the truth of who Jesus is. He has said time and time again that He has seen the truth between both religions. He considers himself Muslim but I believe he believes in Jesus as God and the teaching of Jesus. He just has to make a decision to commit his life to Jesus.

That is the great dilemma. The social ostracizing, the family shame, the persecution, it’s all being weighed out in his mind I believe. Islam is the way of life here. It’s not just a two day religion; it’s how people interact socially. I can’t explain it. So please pray for Beaufils. Tonight as I walked him out of our compound, he said he’s going to going home and ask Jesus to come to him. I believe God is moving in his heart and it’s just a matter of time. The Word won’t return void but it’ll accomplish the purpose God intended for it. We see him almost everyday and we’ll continue to meet with him. Hopefully this meeting may expand to more people interested in the teaching of Jesus.

I love you guys, thank you so much for all your prayers.  I’m not going to write a lot about this because it isn’t necessary but we were robed last week by “police men”. Everything’s all good, we’re safe but I would like you to pray for our continued safety and also that Matt’s black berry and camera is recovered. I got the guys first name and we’re working on getting his family name right now. But pray that the whole situation can be used for God’s Glory and a witness to all our African friends who are very upset. Also thank you very much for all the little encouraging comments, you all know who you are =) but if you can’t leave a comment because you don’t have a blogger id, you can always email me @ rockykomatsu@gmail.com

Your brother in Christ, rocky

It's Definitely Tuff But God is Faithful!

I wont get to finish this blog today because the internet is acting up again.

"And He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly therefore, i would much rather glory in my weakness so that the power of Christ may dwell within me. Therefore I am well content with weakness, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, and with difficulties, for when I am weak then I am Strong." 2 Cor 12:9-10

If you are reading this then i know you are praying for us, this means that i can be pretty personal. This has definitely been the weakest i've ever been in my life. This is comming from the guy that gets homesick after being a couple days in San Fran! There is no way to explain just those times in the week where you just feel homesick. Think about it we're half way around the world from home (sometimes i feel like i'm not even on the same planet), we're away from our islands, our homes, our families, our friends, our culture, our language,  pretty much everything that we know and love also with minimal communication. It can be hard, very hard. I'm not trying to throw a pitty party at but i just want you to know what it's like. I feel like i've never been so weak in my life ever. Yet, at the same time i have never been more strong and in utter dependense opon the presence of God, upon the authority and activeness of His Word, upon the annointing and empowering of Holy Spirit. God has been extremely Faithful in my brokeness. God's faithfullness through speaking through His Word and just our day to day activities has been sustaining for me. I don't know why i shared this but I just wanted to share the testimony of my nothingness and brokeness and the magnifisance of His grace and His power to lift me up. Thank you for you're prayer because ministry has been great and personaly i just wanted to share what my prayer life looks like day to day morning by morning. Beggin God to get me through the day. Some of you guys (scrubs! haha) may read this and be like ha what a weakling suck it up, well good i am weak so that He makes me strong, but either way thanks for praying and now you have an indepth look at what is probably the most important thing to pray for me about. 

Quickly though, D is doing good, we had many talks that just turns into theological discusisons. He definitely sees the truth of Jesus. Now it just comes time for Him to answer to the question Jesus asked His disciples which was "who do YOU say that I am?". So now we are just waiting, praying and loving on Him and when the moment occurs for a seed to be sown hopefully being ready. He is a very good friend of ours so we'll keep you updated as we continue to spend time with him. thank you very much for continuing to pray for him.

We’ve made very good friends with our neighbor who we play basketball with down our street. He’s heard my testimony and I’ve shared bits and pieces with him. He’s 25 and He just has a fond place in my heart. His name is beaufiles (handsome in French). He owns a little shop on our street that is right in front of his compound. The other day I was able to pray for his wrist that was sprained and the next day it was healed. The other night he took me into his compound and introduced me to his mother and aunt. That was a privilege. This kid is open and is broken with no hope in life, just eat sleep and ball, over and over again. The reoccuring theme of his life is no hope, no joy, no hope. It's so sad, my heart is connected with his somehow the Lord has done it. He came over for dinner Thursday night with his little brother. We had a great time playing eating chicken/corn/rice. Matt and I played worship with our ukulele and guitar. Then we had a good discussion with Beau. He said many interestesting comments but the one that stuck out the most was that He didn't like Islam. So i asked him and he said essentially their fake and that there's rules that don't make sense. He also said that he loves christians more and Jesus because they are loving (This would be the third muslim that told us they prefer Christians over Muslims). So then I asked him why he was a muslim and he said that if not he will be rejected and called crazy(persecution and social ostrisizing is very common here). But the most interesting thing he said was that he watched the Jesus film long ago and that he saw the truth about Jesus. We talked and responded to alot of these with many words from the Lord (i believe). Just pray for Beaufils, he is going to start comming over once a week to practice english reading comprehension using the Bible. We'll read stories and then ask questions and make him resite the story. Please pray for this guy, the harvest is ready. Sorry i can't share the whole convo it'd take forever just know that the Gospel was glorified. So please please pray for beaufils.

Also there are a bunch of guys that hang out over there. Probably about 30 or so but we’re getting to know about 10 of them pretty well. The basket ball rim is in front of beaus store so guys hang out there all the time. Just the other night one of the guys that my heart is just breaking for caught malaria and I asked to pray for him before I went home. The next day The sickness was gone! but the messed up thing was that i got really sick two days later probably from holding his hand when praying now i know is not good.  Keep praying for this minsitry oppertunity.

We go to Kan Kan (country/villages) in two weeks. Upon returning we'll start working at the two universities untill May. I love you guys thank you so much for everything.

rocky><>

UPDATES UPDATES UPDATES

 I’m sitting in our house writing this blog on Word because I don’t have wifi access. I want to try and update you all as much as possible but it’s very difficult. The weather here is beginning to turn into Conakry weather. It’s just beginning to be very hot and sticky! Yuck!

Matt and I have really enjoyed our meetings with D. He’s been over quite a few times for diner and we’ve enjoyed long talks about various topics. So far our past two Saturdays have been spent with D. Together we’ve been exploring the city, trying African foods, shopping, and even working out. We also met his aunty who is a big shot radio journalist who travels the world. We spent about 3 hours in her court yard with her family just conversing. She and her family were very kind to us and invited us over for a special African dinner sometime. Well as we’ve been hanging out, there has been numerous times where we’ve gotten to share little testimonies of Gods Grace in our lives. Usually when he’s over at our place he asks a lot of question concerning Christianity. He often explains Muslim beliefs and traditions. One night as we were chatting over dinner, I asked him to explain what he believes about the after life, sin, and the way to salvation. He explained very clearly what the Koran taught about paradise and hell, sin and forgiveness. The whole time we were praying patiently waiting for the right time to explain the true gospel. After about 20 min of Islam doctrine, he finished off by asking the question, “So I heard that some Christians believe that Jesus was the son of God?” and the door was opened for the gospel. 

I shared that night like I’ve never shared the gospel before in my life. We went from the fall of man and everything that encompassed, to the law then into the high priest on the Day of Atonement in detail. Then we talked about the prophets and the 400 years of silence which lead to John B then to Jesus. Explaining to the best of my ability who He was as fully God and fully man and the reason why God Himself needed to come down to satisfy His wrath against our sin. Then we talked about the cross and went back to the Day of Atonement with the high priest, talking about how the whole bible points to the coming and the work of the messiah and how Jesus was that fulfillment. Then to the resurrection and how that proved that it was finished, God’s wrath was satisfied and now to all who repent and believe in this Jesus can have forgiveness of sins and a new life. It was pretty intense. Praise God! The spirit was moving and gave me the utterance. For Africans they love to listen and tell stories so I told it like one long story and Matt even said that it looked as if he was just engaged in the conversation. Almost always when a person’s phone rings here during a conversation even an important one, they’ll excuse themselves out of the conversation especially if it’s the person’s girlfriend. D’s girlfriend must’ve called about 4 times during it and He didn’t flinch. Later he told me something that he’s never said before and that’s that he still has lots to learn. He doesn’t know which way is the truth. He is a Muslim but he doesn’t know if it’s the true way. We then shared that he needs to find which way is the true way. That He cannot accept both teaching as truth which most Muslims ignorantly do. It is either Jesus and his teachings or Islam. He said he must discover more and that convos like these are very important. Please pray for D. I know the spirit is speaking to his heart.

We’ve been taking Conakry by storm! Haha well not really but we’ve just been exploring our area of the city which is called Kipe and the surrounding areas. We walk down to the main road which is about a four minute walk. When we get there we can go shopping at the many boutiques (little food and random item stands) or jump in taxis to go further down Kipe. Recently we’ve been testing out the taxi service here. There are seven people to a taxi (even if you’re a bigger guy like me). The other day I felt so bad because I was smashing, well actually every time when there’s four in the back seat I feel bad because I’m smashing everyone;) but their very nice about it. “c’est bon” it’s good, they say. The taxi fare ranges from about 500gf (around 10cents) to 5000gf (aprox $1) depending on the distance you travel. Last week we went all the way down to Medina market all by our selves and met up with J. That was a great feat for Matt and I being that Medina is about a 30 min drive away from our house. The Guinean people are extremely friendly to us. I’ve been to four different cities in west Africa now and Conakry is by far the friendliest. They are always greeting us with big smiles, cava or bon jours (how you doin or good day). We are learning that it’s very important just to stop and try to make conversations with people we meet. We have met so many people thus far and we’re hoping for chances to share the truth about Jesus with them. We had our first taste of Guinean food last week. It wasn’t bad, they eat a lot of various types of sause with rice. My favorite dish so far is Poulet Yassa (chicken with an onion sauce on rice) which is served at this Senegalise restaurant 10 min from my house. Speaking of cultural encounters, we attended our friend’s wedding this past week. Mr. K is the head of the English department at the school we’ll be working at. It was the civil ceremony not the traditional which is held in the mosque. It was very interestering… oh and did I mention it’s starting to be hot and humid.

Le lessons du francias est tre difficile pour nous d’ici a ma maison, mais pas que nous somes American et mes amie de Barak Obama nous pouvons plus faire! I think that says the French lessons are very difficult for us here at the house, but because we are American and friends of Baraka Obama, we are more than able to do it! Haha, you French speakers sorry if I slaughtered that. So anyway we’ve been doing the French lessons 2hrs in the morning and 2 in the afternoon. I failed my French midterm last semester but for some reason the Lord has been just brining it all to me haha. Matt is also picking it up, it’s all just a matter of time. Oh my goodness the humidity is something else!

We appreciate all your prayers, emails, and notes, rocky

Prayer Request:
Salvation for D and the others we make contact with. Jesus often comes in dreams to Muslims.
Continued unity, brotherhood, and selflessness among Matt and I. Division will destroy the mission.
Ps 27:4-5-Abiding in the Lord. Acts 1:8-The Empowering and anointing to be His Witnesses.