I don’t know what was happening with the electricity last night but it seemed like every hour or so it would blink off for a minute or two; just long enough to wake us up; one time it was off for an hour. It is hard to sleep when the air conditioning and my c-pap go off and on. Maybe tonight will be better. We will get up in the morning at 5 a.m. to leave for Tamale Airport to fly to Accra. 

Today we visited the congregation at Sakpei; east of Yendi about 15-20 miles. When we arrived, I thought we were going to worship in the small church building but thankfully the brethren decided to meet out under the Nim tree. I was pleased because there was a nice breeze blowing. 

I asked Timothy Niligrini to teach his lesson about what Christians can and cannot do at burials and funerals. Instead of having Bible class that time was added to the preaching. This worked out great because it gives the questions and answers period more time and we needed it today! These first-generation Christians have to deal with family members who are pagans and the rituals that are performed by them that Christians cannot be a part of. A good example is the ritual that surrounds the widows. According to the pagan belief a widow is not allowed to marry without repercussions until the purification rituals have been performed. The ritual includes sacrificing a fowl (type and color is decided by the soothsayer), wearing a white rope around her neck and carrying a calabash (gourd) bowl. If the rituals are not performed the Juju/fetish priest/ soothsayer tells the family if a child is born to this union it will die! If the widow has skipped the first purification rituals and becomes pregnant or has had a child and they want to protect the child from death the soothsayer will charge a bigger sacrifice; this time it will be a goat. The longer she waits to do the purification rituals the more costly it becomes. Most men refuse to marry a widow if the purification rituals have been completed. If another child comes along without performing the rituals and the widow wants to be purified the family will have to pay a sheep for the sacrifice. A Christian woman will find it difficult to remarry if she refuses to perform the purification rituals. Her only option would be to marry a Christian man. This sounds like something out of the Old Testament but it is happening today!

After we finished the questions, a male church member told Kandie he had a grinding stone he wanted to show her. He said that he knew she was looking for one but he did not know if it was too big to fit in her suitcase. You know Kandie and stones; she took the bait. Sure enough, he had a nice old stone hand grinding stone. Kandie asked me if I could tell how heavy it was. I groaned because I knew what was coming. She dickered around with the guy and ended up buying the grinding stone. 

As we were leaving the village, Joseph, one of the leaders, had me stop at his house where he loaded up the back floorboard with some very large tubers of yams. It was a very nice gift. Timothy was happy when I told him to take the yams home for his family. 

This afternoon was spent giving instructions to Mr. Iddrisu and doing as many tasks to reduce our check off list. We will keep you informed tomorrow in the Notes to let you know we made it safely to Accra. Please keep us in your prayers. 

Thank you for your continued support of this work. May God bless.

In His service,

Stephen and Kandie Taylor 

& Skeeter

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