Pray for the Congo

We are asking you to pray for the Congo. Starting in mid-October some fighting began about 50 miles West of Gemena (the city where the Elikya Center is located) among fisherman. Here is an excerpt from an E-mail we received today from Dr.Tom Cairns from Reachglobal:

"The fighting which began with some local tribes fighting over fishing rights in the southern reaches of the Ubangi has escalated significantly. At least 90,000 people have fled their homes, many to Congo Brazzaville across the river. Others are living in the forests. President Kabila flew to Gemena last week and promised immediate action to end the uprising. He has sent into Gemena several thousand soldiers with weapons who have gone on down to that area to resolve the situation. Some are being brought back wounded and getting care at the hospitals. The problem is that the presence of soldiers instills fear and reminds people of the violence of the previous war. As a result people at Tandala have all fled into the forests except for the doctors. People in Gemena are making plans to flee. Some have fled and are being encouraged to return to their homes, including President Bosokpale’s [president of the local Free Church] wife, Jeannette. The church leaders are figuring out ways to hide valuable equipment and records. President Bosokpale has been in Kinshasa for church meetings. He hopes to return Wednesday"

Gemena is currently a secure area, however most people are responding in fear and fleeing to the forests. These are people that we know and love. Our hearts are heavy over this and we ask you to join us in prayer for peace throughout all of the Congo. We don't want to overwhelm you with details, but to ask you to pray and we will update you as soon as we know more information.

Insects and Snakes and Mice...oh my!

We thought you might enjoy some photos of the wildlife in the Congo

This viper was found in our garden one day and a couple of the local guys killed it for us. Whew! Apparently it is good luck if you have a snake in your garden, so the locals were excited for us.

These beetles liked to hang around our porch. They were harmless. Sarah's facial expression is just for show.

The mouse looks cute here...but they are quite a nusance!

Sam killed a few of these huge spiders that got in our house.

This is called a pangolin. It is an ant eater. Michelle and Aaron found it in their ceiling one night and kept it for a day. But they decided to let it go back in the forest after many people told us we should cook it up. It is a totally harmless animal and very interesting. It feels like a pinecone.

These guys were everywhere! The crawl up the outside of our house and on top of our ceiling all day. They often were our wake-up call at about 5AM when they were trying to get away from the crows.

Someone gave us this chicken as a gift. We ate it

Elikya Center Photos

Here is everyone who is currently working at the Elikya Center or in the program right now. It is about 35 people...teachers and students.

Young, unwed mothers learn how to sew. Mami is sewing a simple school bag to be given to orphans who are sponsored through the Global Fingerprints program.

This is the first step in soap-making. Lili and Ariete are boiling palm oil that will be used for the soap.

Mama Susa oversees all the sewing and soap-making at the center. This day she was teaching some of the widows how to make soap. It is about a three day process to make the soap. They sell it in the market and it is a very good soap.

These are the carpentry students. Older orphan boys (at least age 18) come here to learn carpentry and masonry skills. The guy in the overalls was a student in the Elikya program earlier this year and has been hired back to teach carpentry to the new group of students.

The boy in the back of this photo walked about 150 miles to come to the Elikya Center and learn carpentry. He told us the he had never heard about God before he came to Elikya and now he knows about God.

Our African Home

We are finally a little more settled here at home. Forgive us for not posting more often. Now is the time for us to post photos for you to see that we were unable to post when were in the Congo because Sarah forgot to pack the USB cord for the camera. (Ugh!)
Today we are going to give you a tour of our new house. The house is small, but exceeds our initial expectations. We even have a toilet as you will see. And we even have room for a guest or two. So start making your Congo travel plans now and we will be happy to have you.



This is our duplex. We live on the right and the Larsens live on the left.


Our bedroom...air matress and mosquito net.


The living room. There is a large closet off of this room as well we forgot to photograph. It is large enough to be another small room...perhaps our guest room.


The dinning room and kitchen. We do all of our cooking outside but we eat and wash dishes inside.


The bathroom has a gravity-fed toilet.

Back to School

For those of you who live in Rockford, you may have been wondering to yourself, “I know the Snyders are back from the Congo, but where have they been? I haven’t seen them yet”. Let us tell you. Four days after we returned from the Congo, we packed up again and drove up to Minneapolis for a little over a week. In Minneapolis, we attended “Pre-field Training Live” with ReachGlobal. All of the missionaries preparing to work with ReachGlobal are required to attend this training…kind of like missionary school. It was a very beneficial time for us. We met many amazing people and learned a lot from the various sessions we attended during the training. We even have photos to share with you.

Our team back in the classroom


We even did group projects


It only took one week in the States and we gained back some of the weight we lost in the Congo


Including the day we had squid for lunch


Group shot of all the missionaries, some of their kids and the trainers who took part in "Pre-field Training". It was a joy to spend the week with all these people and we are excited for all the different ministries awaiting each person in the countries they are headed.


We are now pleased to announce that we are home in the Rockford area! We are especially pleased to no longer be living out of a suitcase. We attended our home church, Harvest Bible Chapel, on Sunday morning and were grateful to reconnect with some of our friends. We have now begun to plan the next steps of support-raising and are arranging to meet with friends and family we haven’t seen since August. We look forward to hanging out soon!

Meet some people!

We safely arrived in the USA last Friday night. Our journey went well…long and tiring, but it went well. And since we are in the states we have our camera cord. So let us begin sharing our photos. We first want to introduce you to a handful of people we spent a lot of time with while in the Congo and will work with when we return.

Edison: Our chauffer in the Congo was Edison. He also speaks some English and often took opportunities to teach us some Lingala while he drove us around. He works for the local Free Church and drives the president of the Free Church's land cruiser.

Mowa and Luta: Mowa is the director of the Elikya Center. We will be working closely with Mowa and we spent a lot of time with him. Plus, his house is right behind ours…so we are neighbors. His wife Luta spent even more time with us. We ate lunch with her every day and had fun swapping our favorite recipes with each other.

Robert and Michelle: Both these guys are such hard workers. Robert cooks some of our food and helps wash our clothes and teaches us how to make Congolese foods. When Sam was a kid, Robert was the house worker for his family. Michelle is Robert's cousin and he is very kind and helpful. He spent a lot of time planting grass around our home and has such a gentle spirit.

Selenga: He is kind of our boss. J Selenga is the president of Reach Africa and our ministry falls under his authority. We are really looking forward to working with Selenga and enjoyed the brief time spent with him and his wife, Claudine.

Francoise and Mama Lopango: These are two amazing women that we came to really enjoy and respect. Francoise does the accounting for PEASIT, a program that helps combat AIDS/HIV through education and prevention. Mama Lopango is the coordinator of Global Fingerprints, an orphan sponsorship program run through the local church in coordination with PEASIT and TouchGlobal.