Gueckedou, Guinea Bear Valley Bible Institute Activity Operations Report for November 2020
The Director, Staff, Student body and all of us who make up the Gueckedou, Guinea Bear Valley Bible Institute are pleased to submit and share this “Activity Report” for the month of November to you all, our supporters and friends. There were a hand full of activities which occurred during the month under review and for the most part the results were successful. Here are the summaries of those events outlined below under subheadings.
Classroom: There were 3 majour courses covered during the month of November. These were: Old Testament 2; Life of Christ 2 and Old Testament 3a (Job). Due to the act of unfaithfulness on the part of one students’ wife – a matter still on course, 16 of the 17 students returned from their second quarter – October end break. These are the ones who took the aforementioned courses and the results were very good.
Evangelism: As we went out into various villages strengthening the new congregations, our students especially with the help of Niouma 2 Kamano, a staff member were able to convert a total of 6 persons - 3 of which were baptized in Gueckedou.
In addition, we had gone out into new villages not only to evangelize, but to pre-announce a special gospel campaign surrounding the village of Bandalo-leh where the Niceville church had put up a worship hall - scheduled for inauguration on Saturday, the 21st November. The outcome of those special combined events are detailed in our next subheading namely-
Campaign/Worship Hall Inauguration: Preceded by a 2 days preaching in and around the village of Bandalo-leh where the church was planted since May 2018, the Bear Valley team along with the church members succeeded in assembling an audience of some 250 invitees for a public preaching and the inauguration of the worship hall in that village. There were 3 speakers for the following topics: (1) Why Should One Be a Member of the Church of Christ? (2) How can one be Saved According to the New Testament? And (3) How Should We Acceptably Worship God Today? Each of the preaching was followed by a question-answer period. Finally, we concluded by a brief act of inauguration. The program was successful and 6 of those who worshiped with us the next day, Sunday, the 22nd of November 2020 were baptized!
Agriculture Update: Even though all the preliminaries had been put in place there were still some obstacles hindering the progress of the agriculture work. Healing Hands had introduce us to Ebenezer, the brother in charge of the training and we have been in contact to settle nearly all that is required before the training. But until now the border closure due to the Covid - 19 pandemic followed by the high tensions of presidential elections in our country in September and especially October were the main obstacles.
However, the well itself which had been drilled since last May is being used to serve the nearby community. One Madam Youmbouno and her family who live some 200 kilometers are the main beneficiaries who fetch the water. Also we have just received the Agric-kit from the trainer who has planned to later visit Gueckedou after a virtual workshop this December.
Dining Hall Repair: Our dining hall is a temporal – wooden shelter built on wooden poles which are often eaten by termites thus demanding changes. This time around it has become a necessity and we were obliged to replace the sticks with at least 2 iron ones.
Vehicle Repair: During November we had a lot of movement also with the vehicle especially during the campaign – the pre-inauguration week. And with the bad roads, vehicle repairs were necessary and successfully done.
Conclusion: The month of November had some obstacles hindering some of our activities, but because of your prayers and material support all of it came up successful. Our special thanks and appreciations to the Niceville, Florida CoC through the benevolent hand of Brother Ken Stanley for the worship hall constructed at Bandalo-leh where a graduate of our first batch is serving. Let the Niceville church be sure that Brother Michel and his congregation at Bandalo-leh are most grateful! That inauguration exercise together with our evangelism efforts resulted to a total of 12 conversions in November.
May the Lord heal, protect and bless us all.
Francis