The Shumaker Family’s Blog

In a former post, I mentioned the fact that the people here eat termites. They call them flying termites. I am sure you were wondering how they tasted. Well they aren’t too bad. I think they kind of taste like bacon. I was thinking that since we didn’t have bacon bits here we could just add termites to our salad and that would do about the same thing. What I really like is adding bacon bits to baked potatoes so maybe next time I will just add a few termites and see what that does. It amazes me how much of a treat it is for the people in town to get them. It is like Americans having their favorite flavor of ice cream.

Below is a picture of a bowl full of termites and then a picture of Dean Hamby, the Assistant Director of Macedonia World Baptist Missions, eating termites. Yummy!

I didn’t make it to the church services last night as my fever was really high due to the malaria.  I praise the Lord that He allowed my fever to break about 8:00 last night.  I feel better this morning.  A little worn out and tired but better.  Thanks so much for your prayers.

I had most of this written last week but never got around to posting it. As far as I know, this is the first independent Baptist Camp that has been done in Burkina Faso. That was exciting in itself. Leading up to the camp, I was like a little kid waiting on Christmas. I got more and more excited as it approached. I was expecting and praying that God would do great things and He did just that. We arrived on Monday Afternoon and left Thursday morning.

I took a group of young people from the church. On the way back to get another group, the car began to make an awful noise. We ended up being car-less for the whole camp.

Rain had fallen Monday morning. A few times a year after the rain falls, flying termites come out. So termites really disturbed the service, but God worked in spite of that. The only real benefit we got out of the termites was that we were able to eat them the next day. Yummy!

After the disturbance of the first night. God began to move in a great way Tuesday Morning. We had missionary hour, where we had two young men read a missionary biography and talk about it. Wow, it was powerful. I really want our people to get a hold of missions, so that we can give and go.

I know that I can’t talk about all that God did, but He greatly moved. We had many of the young men give ten min. messages and others preach about our theme: Joshua 1:9. Bro. Jason and Bro. Stephen where greatly used during this time. Each message was perfect and God used it. Here are a bunch of pictures of the camp:

Below is a young man studying to preach.

We formed a choir.

We had a friend visit our room. Yes it is what you think.

Bro. Stephen getting a gift from the church.

Bro. Jason is preaching, and I am translating.

We had many altar calls, and God really moved.

Here is a group picture. There were about 30 of us.

I woke up this morning and my legs were aching a little but I thought maybe that was from planting peanuts and exercising last night.  After our first service this morning, I realized what I had: yes my friend came to visit, malaria again.  I am not to bad because I caught it early and took medicine but I hope this will inspire all of us to pray for missionaries all across the world.  Its not easy suffering but I have come to realize that many times it is necessary.

I went to our main work (Cissin) and preached even though I didn’t feel good and feel like preaching.  God blessed and we had one profession of faith.  Amen!  I am often reminded about what the Apostle Paul said, “For when I am weak, then I am strong.”  I have often experienced how true this can be.  God moved in a wonderful way this morning.  Just goes to show you who is actually doing the work.  Not ME!  Amen!

We just got finished with our summer camp.  God did amazing things and I will update you in a blog a little later about that.  Bro. Stephen Knickerbocker has been a great blessing to us over the past month.  He has preached, taught, sang, taught the children, etc.  Anything I asked, he was ready to do it.  It is rare to find a young man with this type of character and integrity.  I am glad that he had the opportunity to be with us.  He truly got his hands dirty, got right into the work.

He never backed done even when things got different or strange.  He ate termites, ate sheep insides and other things.  We need more young men with a desire and a passion like this.  We would love for him to come back and work with us, but we are praying that he will follow the will of God.  Stephen the door is open for you here.

Today, I finally finished my message on eternal security. It was supposed to be one message but took three Sundays to preach it. It has been 13 years since I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Saviour, and salvation seems to get better every day. Some people said that my fire, love and excitement would die, but it has been the contrary; it has only grown. I guess when you dig into the Word and realize what we deserve and what Jesus did for us, it is utterly amazing.

Tonight, Bro. Stephen preached for us. He did a wonderful job. It is hard to believe that his last service at our church was tonight. He will preach and teach at our camp, but he will fly out on Wed. The people clapped for him and are very grateful for all that he has done here. Anything that we asked, he did to the fullest. He didn’t come just for a cool experience or for a tourist trip but to be used of God, and he was. We would be thrilled if God called him here, to work with us in Burkina Faso.

Please pray for our youth camp. We will have about 30-35 of us going to a camp tomorrow. We will start Monday evening and finish Thursday morning. God has allowed us to put together a good schedule. I believe that this camp can change our ministry and the course of the work in Burkina. Would you please say a special prayer for us? We need and want God to work. Pray that God would move, convict and call.

We held a VBS last week.  We did it Thursday night and Friday morning.  God really blessed.  We had about 175 or so on Thursday and over 200 on Friday.  Bro. Jason and Bro. Stephen did a great job teaching and some of our young men did a puppet show and helped with the skits.  I always get picked to play Goliath (I am not sure why).

Bro. Stephen climbed in a tree to take this picture:

If you ever want to come over for a trip, we will put you to work:

That is what I call slave labor. Actually, we started digging a ditch on one of our properties. The Africans sometimes think we are weird because we, Americans, like to have a sense of accomplishment. When visitors come, they want to go back home and say that they accomplished something, and if it is physical labor, that is o.k. We have dug on two separate occasions. This will be the foundation for the wall on one of our properties. Stephen and Jason really seemed to enjoy themselves.

We are hoping to start a kids club at this location in the near future. Then when God gives us a young man, we will start the church.

The Lord really blessed this morning. I preached on Eternal Security. God really moved.

We haven’t been having good numbers at Tingandogo. A few months ago, two women got in a spat cooking the Easter meal. I’m not sure who, I guess everybody, thought it was best to cover it up and not tell the pastor (me). They were afraid that I would never let them cook another meal. Anyhow, a few weeks back, on Thursday night service, tempers broke out. Since that time we have very few women left. I have tried to visit them to resolve the problem but for the moment, I’ve had no success.

The church at Cissin had a great day. We had 136 present. That is one of our highest numbers and the highest non-special day. The walking ministry is a great success. We had many children present, one of whom accepted the Lord as Saviour. God blessed the adult service as well. We had four come forward for salvation. One of them came last week, so I think he is a little confused.

We have been blessed lately in the ministry. We had about 66 adults and 44 children at Cissin. We have been steadily around 100 or more for a few months now. I am seeing a big change in some of our members.

Stephen preached yesterday morning and did a great job. He talked about being and staying in the presence of God and how all of this must come from a desire within. How true this is. We all have a desire for something or should I say, we all have a passion for something. We need to have a revival where men become passionate for God and not self. We had one profession of faith in the morning also.