Monday update

As I sit here writing this blog entry the temperature is plummeting. It was about 6 degrees about zero when we woke up this morning and now is about 6 below zero. The sun just went down and I expect that we are in for a cold night. Praise the Lord for a warm apartment! One weather report says tomorrow's high will be 19 above and another says 3 below. But no snow is forcast.

It's been a busy week for all of us. Usually, I am gone quite a few nights each week, visiting families and teaching Bible lessons in people's homes. Kristie often is at home with the children making sure that they get into bed at a decent hour. One of the reasons that I feel more comfortable than Kristie speaking and hearing Mongolian is that I am around it so much more.

Recently, however, that has all changed. You may remember that we live in a twelve story residential building. (If you haven't looked at it before check out my blog post about finding it on Google Earth. It's the bottom blog entry for August. Click here and go to the bottom of the page.) One of our neighbors whose name is Mongoo is a teacher. We had met her and her husband before, and everyone was friendly; but we had just never spent much time together. Two weeks ago while schools were out for a short break, Mongoo came over to visit Kristie. I wasn't home that night, but Kristie had a good talk with her. At least it must have been a good talk because she returned the next evening. When she found out I was gone again, she asked, "Isn't your husband ever home?"

One thing led to another and we're quickly moving past the acquaintance stage with them. I returned the visit with my wife the next evening only to discover that her husband, Vantchaa, was playing basketball with a group of workmates. So we finally all got together early this week. They have three children, ages 10, 6, and 1; and our children enjoy playing with their children. Several times this week, they have come to our house, or we have visited them.

This is an answer to prayer. Many of you have been praying along with us for help with the Mongolian language. It would be nice if one could absorb Mongolian in his sleep, but reality is that to continue our language progress, we need to speak and listen to the language. In the past, Kristie especially had trouble getting out of the house to speak and hear spoken Mongolian. After all, someone has to put the kids in bed at night. But in answer to our prayers, God has brought more Mongolian speaking into our house. Not only Mongoo, but another neighbor whom we know better, Batmaa, has also began to come over regularly. In fact, this previous Saturday, first we went to Batmaa's apartment for an hour or so, then immediately following that Vantchaa and Mongoo came to our apartment for a couple more hours, and later that evening Batmaa returned again to stay for a while.

Sunday morning, two of Mongoo's children and two of Batmaa's children came with us Sunday morning and attended Sunday school. With seven Mongolian adults, we had a total of fifteen Mongolians on Sunday which is another good turnout. As I've mentioned before, our desire is not only to reach the children but also to reach their parents. Please pray for Vantchaa's and Mongoo's salvation and for Javkhaa's and Batmaa's salvation. And if you can't remember the names, just pray for the salvation of our neighbors.