In the woods, in the city

We had a good visit with the COMINAD group last weekend in Silver Spring, MD at a huge African American church (see www.TPCBC.org ). At least seven of those who have made the pilgrimage to Kayes were there so it was a mini reunion, too. we attended the annual conference of COMINAD and tried to find ways to redynmize the organization so as to help the African American Christian community in its unique role of misions. I'm even suggesting to the director of COMINAD, Brian Johnson, to join UWM as a mobilizer of black churches; this would help UWM and also him in support purposes (like Tom Telford of ACMC), and thus free up his ministry of trying to find cash for his salary. He'd have to find support, of course, but I think it could work out.

Before that we spent few days helping the Christian community Center in West baltimore, known as the 'Mission' at their youth camp in the woods of Harford County. We enjoyed helping Tom & Cindy Homans in ministry to the 40 youth who came. I enjoyed swimming, hiking in the beautiful woods, and games with the kids. I was asked to speak so I focused on God who with amazing power created a diverse landscape and yet one who loves us. Even tho the 'awesome God,' as Muslims loves to say, He is reachable. I wanted the kids to also have some appreciation of the outdoors which so many rarely get to know. I used poison ivy and peanuts as my hook and then taught from Gen 18 and Ps 121.

Ruthanne has finally accepted a college in Ohio, Bluffton Univ., so we'll be taking her there soon for an orientation day and visit of some friends along the way. We'll go down to Roanoke before that to help Susanna visit Rachel Hall, her pen pal at the Calvary Memorial Ch. Benjie and Sus leave Aug 11th, so we're buying & planning for that and trying to do memorable things for them. We managed to get Ben connected with a school chum from his Parkville MS days that he's kept in contact with, too.

Jim's Journal from Aug 4th, 2006 -Contacts with COMINAD

I’ve had some great contact this summer with several African-American pastors and churches. This is in regards to getting the Beninois pastors to come to MALI as missionaries. We stayed in Detroit with the director of COMINAD, Rev Brian Johnson and his wife Ruth. This is the partnership of churches that is seeking to effect reconciliation in Africa and to wake up the black churches of America for more involvement in missions. One of their key ideas is for a local American church to adopt a small village and to build a relationship with them. We are hoping that Duduya, near Kayes, and Assoum, further north, will be adopted in the near future.

We met with leaders from three churches in Detroit and another in Chicago. And just this week Bishop Robert Winn and his wife Mattie, of California, came and spent a couple days here in Baltimore with us talking about these ideas. It was wonderful to see several who have already been to Kayes, such as Ethelyn Taylor who came just last Oct ‘05, and to meet her pastor Everett Lindsay of Christ Temple in Chicago. We also met with Rev. Walter Godfrey, of St Paul Church in Detroit who also came last fall. It was neat to see a poster board displaying the pictures of every one in the village in Bénin that they have adopted. Each picture was displayed with the name of the church member who is daily paying for the person! Then I had the joy of seeing again Rev. Charles Oliver and Rev George Washington and the wives and congregations in Detroit. Both had come on the first COMINAD visit in 2001! In discussions with Rev Godfrey, Rev Johnson, and then later with Rev Winn we worked on the agreement between COMINAD, the Church of Christ Holiness, the UWM, and the UEEB churches in Benin. Brian Johnson is currently in Ghana and Benin and has met with the church leaders again to further plan this process. It looks like several will visit again in late October and probably work on the actual adoption in Duduya.