1. Living out Ecclesiastes 3 “God will never give you more than what you can bear.”

2. In the evening we gathered together for our usual devotional time. But Les was so ill that most nights Dr. Sam had to give him something to make him sleep. One particular night I sat on the edge of our bed holding Les’ hand. He said to me, “I’m sorry, Honey, that I’m not the religious person that you want me to be.” His statement stunned me! I loved Les with all my heart and prayed for him daily. I had never said a word to him or had given him any reason to say those words to me! But what he’d said to me confirmed in my heart two things: the first was that this trip was all about what God was doing in Les’ heart; the second was that the headaches and general malaise that Les was experiencing were indeed indications of spiritual warfare. “What if I’d given up praying for Les and for his spiritual walk with the Lord? And what if I’d not taken Les seriously when he said that he wanted to go to Ethiopia?”

3. There are several things that a person would need to know if he/she intended to live in a nipa hut. To me the first and most important one becomes apparent after dark. A person would need to know that lighting a lantern inside the hut allows anyone outside to see through the bamboo walls; they become virtually transparent. I was reminded of an old movie I saw starring Clark Gable and Ava Gardner. The movie was called Mogambo. One particular scene shows Ava Gardner going into her tent where she begins to undress. At that point, only ONE thing kept that movie from being “R-rated.” Just as she was about to undress, a lion strolled through her tent; she froze as she watched in mortal fear! For some reason, that scene has been burned into my mind forever. Maybe it’s because I had lived in Africa and I already knew that living in the jungle presented problems of its own; things just don’t stay PUT at night!