Category: Blog Posts

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A New English Center

Our primary ministry in Dakar is at the English center where I teach. The center is located in the neighborhood of Point E which is in the heart of Dakar, situated close to downtown, the Corniche (a main avenue that runs along the coast) and many universities including Dakar’s largest university, Université Cheikh Anta Diop (UCAD). This neighborhood is ideal for us since many of our students attend one of the universities nearby and travelling across Dakar is often very difficult and time consuming due to traffic and road conditions.

Our current English center is a converted three-bedroom apartment. Two of those bedrooms are used as classrooms and the third is an office. We also use the salon (living room) as a classroom for larger level classes and drop-in classes. We have been located in this space for the last 15 years, however, we have badly outgrown it.

This academic year we have over 230 registered members and nearly 130 students are signed up for classes in our current trimester. Many members who are not signed up for a class this trimester still come each week to attend a drop-in class or simply to hang out or study. At several points during the week we have all three classrooms being used, which means students who are there to hang out or study are forced to sit in the hallway or kitchen. During these busy times it is not abnormal for us to have more than 50 students in our center. We praise God for this! At the same time, 50 people is a lot for a roughly 1,000 square foot apartment! We also turn away students at every registration period because our classes, which are limited by our classroom sizes, are full.

Learning English has proven to be a very effective tool to draw people in and build relationships with them. We use the Bible in every class, exposing our students to God’s Word from day 1 with the purpose of identifying “seekers” who are open to further Bible study outside of class, either in a group setting or one-on-one. From there our prayer is that God would speak through His Word, bringing these “seekers” to believe in and trust Christ for their salvation. We currently have seven weekly Bible studies (four group studies and three one-on-one studies) where our students are reading and studying God’s word. Please pray for eyes to see and ears to hear for these students; that the gospel would be seen and understood not as folly, but as the good news it is!

We want to be able to welcome more students because we know that every student that walks through our doors is going to be engaged with the Word of God and experience the love of God through our teachers. We also want to be able to offer more comfortable spaces (no more having 10 students crammed into a hallway!) where our students can come, hang out, study and experience God’s love. With these desires in mind we are writing this post to share with you a financial need we have.

During the last 15 years in this location, our rent has not been increased once. Once again, we praise God for this! As we have been looking for a new, larger facility over the last year, it has become apparent that we will likely need to be able to afford a rent that is 300-400% more than what we are currently paying. Please take five minutes to watch the video below to see and hear from our students and staff about this need.

If you would like to support this ministry through recurring support or a one-time gift, you can do that here https://avantministries.org/missionary/adam-and-selina-matzke

Until all have heard,

Adam

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Choosing to Embrace Risk

Sometimes when I talk to friends who are missionaries on the field I’m struck by the crazy situations we encounter in a cross cultural setting. These crazy stories can often be ones filled with disbelief and laughter; just the other night we were joking with friends serving in another West African country that their 10 passenger car could actually be considered a 20 passenger car since piling as many people into a vehicle as possible is a pretty common sight to see in West Africa.

At other times though there are stories filled with disbelief and sadness, anger, frustration, fear and trauma of various kinds. Whether it’s from robberies, health scares, tense political situations or miscommunications in a second (or third!) language, it is easy to come across situations in a foreign country that push you towards complete physical or emotional exhaustion. It comes with the territory.

For example, a friend and I were commiserating recently about the fears we often have to surrender to the Lord living in a place with limited health care. In reality we have some of, if not the best, health care access in West Africa. That being said, it is still limited, especially in relation to emergency responses or intensive care for a more serious illness. In my case, I reflected on all that we experienced with Evie right after she was born. When she came down with a fever and was septic as a two week old we hit the cap of what could be done here medically. By God’s grace this was enough and she made a full recovery without needing to be medically evacuated elsewhere. My friend has been walking through terrifying breathing issues with her youngest son for about a year now and they have nearly exhausted all the resources here to determine why this is happening. When the moments of crisis with his breathing hit they have to hope the emergency response teams are able to come quickly (traffic in Dakar doesn’t always allow this) and aren’t occupied elsewhere.

For other friends serving in Africa there have been plane or car accidents, having their homes broken into, various other illnesses or injuries, getting mugged on the street or navigating countries being ravaged by military coups. In fact, in between drafts of this very post I heard about several friends having to evacuate their country of service due to political unrest and of another friend who was serving in Africa and had to fly to a different country emergently to get a much needed surgery which uncovered a cancer diagnosis.
In other parts of the world (and in parts of Africa too) I know these stressful experiences can involve being watched by the government, persecuted for sharing the gospel, getting evicted from homes with little notice or even getting kicked out of the country.

These things can feel overwhelming. Why choose to serve in places like this where there is so much risk, where the reality of walking through some sort of trauma feels more like a “when” than an “if”?

This reality is obviously not limited to overseas missions. Those choosing to enter the military are choosing a life with great risk. Those choosing to go into the medical field will very likely experience things that are very stressful or traumatizing. Even the simple choice to love another person is fraught with risk, knowing that our lives are fragile and we may lose our loved ones to illness or tragedy.

The list goes on and on for things that we choose to be a part of (or don’t choose, but endure anyway) in this fallen world that we know will be wrought with darkness and sin. And if it’s not from external situations then it’s from the internal battles we face with our own sin. The reality of life in this world is hard.

As a follower of Christ, however, we can choose to do things or go places that carry risk without grim determination, but rather with exuberant hope. Yes, we will face trials in this life – whether at home or abroad, but we don’t face them without this great hope. The One in us has already overcome. He has already won. The end has already been determined and we are on the victorious side. The darkness will be banished forever, the King reigning on His throne. No more tears, no more sadness, no more anxiety, no more trauma, no more battling my flesh.

We have this hope to share with our friends, family and neighbors who will inevitably walk through their own trials, but don’t have to do so without hope. We have the answer. We hold the key. His Name is Jesus and He changes everything. Our paths may lead to dark parts of the world, to hard situations and to places we never wanted to walk. We may even actively choose to embrace some of these risks, dangers and discomforts for the sake of following where God leads, for His glory and for the opportunity to share the good news with others. 

In all these things we cling to hope and to a God who is good and will preserve us, maybe not in these mortal bodies, but certainly in our faith.

2 Timothy 2:3;8-10

“Join with me in suffering, like a good solider of Christ Jesus…Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained. Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they too may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.”

– Selina

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Digital Fast

Selina and I have been talking for a while about the role of technology in our lives and in our family habits. Whereas the world as a whole (this seems to be one thing the majority of cultures and nations can agree on!) is embracing technology in more and more settings, we have felt a growing discomfort with this. We have tried to be intentional with our family’s use of technology and in particular have tried to put significant limitations on the amount of time our kids have in front of a screen, especially at such young ages. Before leaving the States, we even bought a “phone jail”, much to the chagrin of our extended family, to be used at family gatherings. Despite these efforts, we have felt like screens, in particular our smartphones, have still grown to occupy a position in our lives that we don’t think is warranted or desired. So in January we decided to start a digital fast.

I first heard of this particular version of a digital fast while walking home from the English center and listening to a podcast. Perhaps if Alanis Morissette ever does a sequel to her song “Ironic” she can use this as an example 😀 The basic tenants of the fast come from a book written by Darren Whitehead titled, The Digital Fast. Here are the steps we’ve taken to limit the amount of time we spend in front of screens:

  1. The first step is to take your smartphone and turn it into a “dumbphone”. This means that we went through all of ours apps to determine if each app is something useful that helps us be more productive or something that distracts us from being productive. Anything determined to be a distraction was deleted. Examples for us included Youtube, all social media apps, ESPN, LinkedIn, Facebook messenger (for me), and streaming services apps.
  2. The next step was to look through our remaining apps and identify any that while useful, help us to do something that we could do on our laptop instead. We admit that we modified this slightly from what Dr. Whitehood suggested which includes deleting your web browser. I also still have some banking and credit card apps on my phone that I wanted to be able to access while on the go. But the big one (at least for me) was deleting email off of my phone.
  3. After dumbing down our phones, we also made some further restrictions on our smart phones such as:
    • As much as possible, place our phones on a shelf in our living room rather than being kept on or near us, thus creating a temptation and a desire to check them.
    • For me I moved my phone charger away from my bedside table and instead placed it across the room on our dresser. The goal is to “put my phone to bed” prior to putting myself to bed and encourage more reading (of a physical book!) before going to sleep.
    • Limiting the times we might listen to a podcast or audiobook in order to create more quiet time and natural space to reflect or pray.
  4. We also committed to no TV or movies, including family movie night. The kids were surprisingly on board with this! Instead on Friday nights we are trying to do a special family activity together like playing a game, reading books or being outside together.
  5. While using our laptop, no “entertainment” sites are allowed. Again this includes things like Youtube, Yahoo News (this is mostly junk news so I’ve turned to Aljazeera for staying up-to-date during this fast) and of course social media.

We put a few other limitations in place as well but this is the bulk of them. We’ve committed to this fast for 40 days, ending 3/14/25. Some of these things we know we are limiting just for the 40 days (e.g. family movie night) while others, especially pertaining to our phones, we hope will lead to permanent changes in our habits and technology usage.

We are writing this post both for accountability (please ask us how it is going!) and in case any of you are interested in doing something similar. Selina plans to write another post at the end of the fast to share some of the things we learned from it.

To finish, I want to share a few resources we’ve used that have helped us think more about technology in our lives:

  1. Habits of the Household by Justin Whitmel Earley
  2. The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose for an Age of Distraction by Justin Whitmel Earley
  3. The Techwise Family: Everyday Steps for Putting Technology in Its Proper Place by Andy Crouch
  4. The Battle for Your Time: Exposing the Costs of Social Media – This is a TEDx talk by Dino Ambrosi that I used as the basis for a conversation class at the English Center. He shares some very interesting and sobering statistics!

– Adam

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Made Alive

Over the last couple of months Selina and I have been studying the book of Ephesians with two other couples. When studying Ephesians 2, I was struck anew by the language we see in verses 1-5. These verses are as follows:

“1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins 2 in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient. 3 We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of his great love that he had for us, 5 made us alive with Christ even though we were dead in trespasses. You are saved by grace!” (emphasis mine)

As human beings created in God’s image, we are capable of absolutely incredible things. Mankind has created means of transportation in cars, trains and planes that make trips that used to take months (or years!), able to be completed in just hours. We have created phones and computers that allow us to talk (even with video) with anyone, anywhere in the world with essentially no delay. We have created programs that allow real-time translation so even language barriers can be overcome. We have built spacesuits and rockets that have allowed humans to travel outside of our atmosphere and even land on the moon, and then safely return again to Earth. We have created medical equipment that allows surgeons to remove someone’s defective heart and replace it with a working one. Amazing!

As human beings we have accomplished some truly incredible things. We invent, create, build and construct. We fine-tune, adjust, renovate and improve. We fix, repair, resolve, remedy and restore. We can even mend, cure and heal with the right equipment and medicines. However, despite all of these things that we can do and have done, there is still something we can’t do. We can’t make that which is dead alive. No human has ever made life. That which is dead, remains dead despite our greatest ideas, achievements and creations. To “make alive” is the work of God.

You may have heard it said that humans have a sin problem. We do, but to say it like this doesn’t necessarily communicate the severity of the situation. We don’t have a sin problem like we may have a mouse problem in our basement. A quick call to the exterminator or a few mouse traps and our problem is resolved. There are solutions at our disposal to solve that kind of problem. Ephesians 2:1-5 tells us, rather, that our sins have made us spiritually dead. Not sick from sin. Not injured from sin. Not beset by sin. We are dead because of our sins. And the thing about being dead is that once you are dead, there is nothing you can do. It’s just like with our physical lives. While we are sick or injured we have means to try and get better. Once we are dead, there is nothing we can do. It’s over. There is no hope left.

And that is our spiritual reality apart from Christ. We are dead in our sins. There is no amount of good deeds, asking for forgiveness, making amends, praying, tithing or anything else we do that we think brings us favor with God, that can make even one iota of difference in our standing before God. We are already dead. We are dead and without hope in and of ourselves.

Thankfully, we have a God who has the power to make alive that which was was once dead. And that is exactly what He has done in Christ. Even though we were dead, we have been made alive in Christ. And verse four tells us that God makes us alive not because we have earned it, but because of who He is. The God of the universe who created the heavens and the earth is rich in mercy and He loves us. He loves you. He loves me. He loves the people of Senegal. It’s God’s love that motivated Him to send His Son to die and receive the judgement for our sin, and then to raise him back to life, conquering death. And it is only because of this act that we can go from spiritually dead to spiritually alive. By ourselves we are dead and without hope, but in Christ we are made alive and the hope of our salvation is secured. Praise be to God forever and ever!

– Adam

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Africa Eco Race

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to take Mia and Desmond to watch the final stage of the Africa Eco Race which finishes at Lac Rose, about an hour outside of Dakar. If you have never heard of this race, you are in good company. We knew nothing about it before moving here.

This year there were 156 racers in 121 vehicles (motorcycles, quads, cars, SSVs and trucks) that departed from Monaco on December 28, 2024 with the goal of navigating the 12-stage course through the deserts and dunes of Morocco, Mauritania and Senegal, arriving at Lac Rose on January 12, 2025 (picture below).

We knew some other missionary families that attend this event each year so I thought it would be fun to bring the two big kids to it since they really like a show called Blaze about a monster truck who often does races. I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect, but it ended up being a very neat experience!

The final stage of the race has the drivers driving down the coast right on the ocean. We were sitting right at the corner where they come off the beach and turn inland toward Lac Rose. As each vehicle type comes through the leaders are followed by a helicopter which is filming from above. This ended up being the highlight of the day! One time, the helicopter came in super low and even dragged its tail through the sand, which could have ended very poorly if the pilot hadn’t recovered so well. There is a picture and video of this below!

The other highlight of the trip for the kids was simply playing in the dunes. While I enjoyed watching all the vehicles come through, Mia and Desmond spent half their time just playing in the sand. Over the last week and half the kids have not stopped talking about the outing, and I have not stopped finding new piles of sand in our car 😀 We definitely hope to attend the race again in the future!

– Adam

The tail scrape!
Picture of the tail scrape!

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The Bible in my language…I’ve never heard of that!

I have been meeting with Pape (not his real name) for over a year now to study the Bible in English. While Pape has a very good level in English, his mother tongue or first language is Soninke. The Soninke people group are primarily located in Mali but are represented across West Africa, including some 400,000 people here in Senegal according to Joshua Project.

For Christmas I wanted to get Pape some Scripture in Soninke. I started asking around for where I might be able to find this and was connected with another missionary, who I will call Bill, who has been working amongst the Soninke people for the last 30 years. While Bill lives in another city in Senegal, he was currently in Dakar along with some of his Soninke colleagues in order to do a final reading and revision of the Soninke New Testament translation.

So Bill invited me to come over and meet him and some of his colleagues and I asked to bring Pape along. As we were driving over, I told Pape about the translation work being done. He told me that he had never seen or heard of a Bible in Soninke and was very interested to see what this meeting would be like.

Bill and his team warmly welcomed us and told us about the work they were doing. We spent about 75 minutes together talking and looking through the printed Scripture resources they had. Pape was able to meet Bill as well as three Soninke men working on the translation, one of whom is a follower of Jesus. As far as I know, this is the first Soninke believer that Pape has ever met! Pape chose several of the Soninke resources, including the Gospel of Matthew to take home. They also shared with him several online resources in Soninke, including the Jesus Film.

It was a truly incredible experience! The whole time we were there you could see the joy on Pape’s face as he interacted with other Soninke men and looked through several Bible texts written in his own language. After we left, he just kept telling me. “A Bible in Soninke, I’ve never heard of that!” and told me he is going to show it to some of his family and friends. Bill also invited Pape to come back over the following two weeks to join them as they read the whole New Testament out loud in Soninke and make their final verifications.

Growing up as an English speaker, I have never had an experience like this before. The Bible is, and always has been, so easily accessible to me. To see the joy it brought Pape to read God’s Word in his own language for the first time is not something I will ever forget. Please join me in praying for the following things:

  1. That as Pape reads God’s Word and watches the Jesus Film in his own language, that God would reveal Himself to Pape in a way that He has never experienced.
  2. That Pape would share these Scripture resources with his family and friends and that other Soninke people could experience God’s Word in their own language for the first time.
  3. For an ongoing relationship between Pape and the Soninke believer. This believer lives in Mali, but they did exchange phone numbers. Please pray for a friendship to form and for Pape to see that following Jesus is not just for Toubabs (the Wolof word used here in Dakar for white people).
  4. That Pape might go back and spend more time with the translation team, listening to the reading of God’s Word.
  5. Ultimately, that God’s Spirit would work through His Word, drawing Pape into a relationship with Himself.
  6. Please pray also for the two Soninke men who are not yet followers of Jesus but are working on the Bible translation. Pray that their eyes would be opened to who Jesus is and that they would choose to follow Him.

– Adam

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More Driving (and Ticket) Fun!

Driving here in Dakar continues to be a deep well of opportunity for cultural experiences. A few weeks ago I was heading home from some errands with the kids when I was once again pulled over by a traffic cop. It is hard to explain this here, but I was pulled over for crossing between two paved roads through this little packed down path of sand about 5 meters long. This path is well worn down because (and I don’t think I am exaggerating here) thousands of cars drive over it every day. There is no sign saying it is illegal to make this cross over. It is not paved, but most roads here aren’t so that doesn’t mean much. And you can see the worn in path because so many people drive it. If you are familiar with the term “desire path”, “social trail” or “cow trail” this is much like that, only with vehicle traffic rather than foot traffic.

Anyways, on this particular day there was a cop sitting right next to this path and he pulled me over and was insistent that what I did was illegal. As I sat there I counted more than 25 cars drive past me on the same path, but that didn’t deter him. So he wrote me a ticket and took my license which meant I would need to go downtown the following day to get it back. I will admit that it was one of those days when I was just feeling frustrated with some of the everyday struggles of living in Dakar, particularly with driving. So after this happened I confess I was far from being in a cheerful mood or having an attitude of gratefulness.

Anyway, the next day I went downtown after work to the police station to get my license back. This is the third time I have done this and each visit has been a totally unique experience. This time when I walked in, the place was practically empty. Usually there are about 40 guys sitting in the lot also trying to get their licenses back, but this time I saw only one other guy there. So I walked up to a police officer and asked him where I needed to go. He pointed me in the direction of an office, but before I could go another officer came up and asked me for my ticket. This is a rough recollection of how our conversation went from there:

Cop: Ahh, the athlete!
Me (while laughing totally confused): Huh, who is saying that?
Cop: I am!
Me: (still laughing uncomfortably while having no idea what he is talking about) Ah ok. I do try and stay in shape.
Cop: Yeah I see you running every morning.
Me: What? Really?
Cop: Yeah in Hann Maristes (the neighborhood where we live)!

From there he went on to tell me how he also lives in Hann Maristes and regularly sees me out running in the morning near his house and near where he takes his taxi every morning to come to work. In a city of more than three million people these types of encounters are very rare as you’d imagine so I was totally shocked. We ended up chatting for a few minutes and exchanged names and I told him to yell at me next time he sees me out running!

He then went into an office (a different one than where my license had been the previous two times so I still have no idea what their system is) and brought me back my license and told me I didn’t need to pay anything. All in all I was at the police station for probably less than 10 minutes which absolutely smashes my previous record at this station!

This experience felt like such a pointed gift from God after the mood I had been in the day before. I left the police station thankful for having the opportunity to be there that day and make this new connection. It’s a good reminder to me that God is at work in all the small details of our lives and that when I hold too tightly to my expectations/desires/timetable, I risk missing what God has for me in that moment, whether that be something to learn, an opportunity to grow or a new relationship to form. I am thankful I serve a God who doesn’t rely on me getting it right in order for Him to accomplish His plans. And I am sure I will have another opportunity like this (i.e. get another ticket) in the not too distant future 😀

– Adam

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Grace Upon Grace

I had a very wise mentor remind me a couple months ago that God gives us “grace upon grace”. She was expressing this as something the Lord had been reminding her of at the time, but also as an encouragement to me. At the time of this conversation I was entering the first trimester with baby no. 4 while also tackling being a first time homeschooling mom living overseas. As a seasoned homeschool mom herself she was speaking from experience that there is certainly a learning curve to the homeschool life just as there is with anything. Given our life circumstances she was offering it as an extra encouragement to rest in God’s grace, especially when things didn’t go exactly as I planned or hoped with homeschool. A big part of this seems to be weighing out my expectations for myself as a teacher, for my kids as students, as well as what we can reasonably accomplish each day with a 1st grader, preschooler and a 1 year old.

“Expectation” is a theme that just keeps popping up as I can find myself trying to “measure up” to expectations in other areas as well such as who I should be as a missionary. Whether it’s from assuming our supporters have certain expectations of me or comparing myself to the other missionaries whose newsletters show up in my inbox it can be a vicious game and one that does not take into account God’s grace or sufficiency in my life. In each area of life I am guilty of playing this game – mother, wife, teacher, homemaker, language learner etc. etc. etc.

Suffice it to say that I need to be regularly (like daily? or hourly? or minutely?) resting in the Lord, who He is and who I am in light of who He says I am. I am a chosen, adopted child of God whose sins have been forgiven. I’ve been given new life and a new identity. My worth is not measured by how well I’m meeting expectations or by what I can contribute (a truth I often forget –> I’ve contributed nothing, Jesus contributed everything). In this God has been reminding me to abide in Him, to rest in Him, to find peace in Him. And in this I’m also being reminded that I can’t do everything, but I can be faithful in the areas God has called me to for each season of life.

So what does this season of life look like? It’s a season of finishing well and preparing for change. As I type this we are coming to the end of our first term here in Senegal. We have been away from the States for 3 years. We have made two international moves, had a baby in Africa, started homeschooling, learned (*are learning) a new language (we’ve discovered this is a process), made so many connections with Senegalese people as well as our expat community here, discovered how long and slow cultural acquisition is, grown lots in our marriage and parenting, learned more about who God is by seeing Him through the lens of other cultures and also seen our faith get deepened tremendously through trials and triumphs, homesickness and creating a home, high highs and low lows. We’ve barely scratched the surface on what it means to do ministry and life cross-culturally and we are so grateful we get to walk this, at times heart wrenching and exhausting while simultaneously beautiful, life.

We are excited for our upcoming time in the States to be close to family, to share about the past three years with those who have invested so much for us to be here, to have our baby, to rest well, to get further equipped for the work ahead, to show our kids the city and state we grew up in and love and so on. We are also already so excited for our return to Senegal at the end of the year! What will our second term hold? Each season in it’s time.

For these final three months before our first home assignment I am seeking the Lord for what He has and am resting in His goodness each day. May I walk faithfully the path He has – all glory be to Christ my King.

– Selina

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50 Newsletters!!

God is truly faithful. I am a big journal-er and one of my favorite aspects of it is getting to look back on how God answered prayers or taught me things or just reminded me of who He was regardless of what I was going through. I know God is faithful, but what a gift to see this SO tangibly through journal entries of pouring my heart out to Him and seeing how He responded. Our newsletters (and now these blog posts) are like a form of journaling and have proven to yield the same awe of God that journaling does. When I look back at where we started as brand new parents just seeking out which agency to choose to joining Avant to taking a vision trip to Senegal to departing for language school to arriving in Africa to having our two week old hospitalized for sepsis to this point of having lived for nearly two years in this beautiful, challenging place, I am amazed. God is faithful.

We have prayed for leading and He has led. We have prayed for Him to grow us in Christlikeness and painfully, tenderly He has. We have prayed for relationships to share the gospel and He has brought them in ways we never expected. We have asked Him to provide – finances, friendships, peace in heartache, a home, a car and on and on – and He has provided, in His timing. We pray that He is glorified in our lives and that we would be willing vessels for His purposes for the sake of His Name and the eternal state of the people of Senegal – we know He is and will faithfully do this.

Reading through old newsletters I thought I would share some of the entries that made me smile and reminded me of God’s faithfulness. Notes added today are in italics.

Newsletter 5, August 2020

“…we had planned to go to a training in Kansas City [with Avant] last month and, by God’s grace, we were able to attend… and are delighted to share that as of July 17th we were officially appointed with Avant! Praise God for His timing and providence in leading us to this awesome organization.”

“Since returning from our training we are jumping into developing our ministry team. …We are excited about the prospect of connecting with many different people to share our heart, vision and plans. It is a new season of life and one that is interesting to balance with Adam still working, having two small children and dealing with a global pandemic. We are thankful though for God allowing us to walk this journey during this time as He teaches us to fully rely on Him. To Him be the glory!”

Newsletter 6, October 2020

“We had originally planned to take [our vision] trip early next year, but about three weeks ago Adam and I were challenged to more intentionally seek God in prayer which made us realize that when we had talked about a vision trip in the past we had simply assumed that trying to go in the fall was not possible. Convicted that our assumptions were not something to base decisions on, we began to seriously pray about moving the timeline up. God has been so faithful to open the door from plane tickets to childcare to time off from work for Adam. We are even going to be able to attend an English camp during our time in Senegal which will give us a neat look at the ministry we would be joining! 

This trip is really important in our missions process because it is one of the biggest things that will help us finalize Senegal as our location. It will allow us a glimpse into the culture and everyday life of Senegal. We will also be able to meet and get to know the team who is currently there and they will get to know us.  And as an added bonus to going in October – we will get an idea of whether or not we can handle the hottest month in Senegal 🙂 (Adam isn’t sure that this qualified as a bonus) *this line is especially poignant as I type this on October 3rd and the heat is ramping up

Our prayer is that God will give absolute clarity about if this is where we should be headed and, if it is, that He will begin to grow in us a love and passion for Senegal and the people there.  This whole process has been one of seeking Him and trusting that He knows where we will end up and when. In that, we have such peace and anticipation for how He will lead! What an amazing God He is!”

“Since our last newsletter we have been keeping busy with meeting people and building our ministry team. God has brought so many people into our lives who are not only partnering with us prayerfully, financially and with connections to others, but who have been pouring into our lives with such excitement and encouragement! We continue to see God’s faithfulness as He develops this team…We are also super excited to share that we have officially passed 50% of our monthly budget raised! This is much faster than either of us expected, especially with Adam working full time still! We are praising God for His provision and for the generosity of so many people. Once we return from our trip we plan to jump back into meeting with people.”

Newsletter 7, November 2020

“After getting the approval needed from our agency and the team on the ground, we are now officially assigned to Senegal! Even as I type this it feels a little surreal.”

“While we have always been open to the idea of homeschooling, we are super excited to have [Dakar Academy] as an option for schooling down the road, as well as a great place to build community.” *thankful for the year and half Mia spent at DA and to now be a homeschooling family and definitely thankful for our Christian community through DA!

Newsletter 19, December 2021

“In 26 short days we will be boarding a plane to move to France! This past month has been a frenzy of selling things, spending as much time as we can with people, organizing, selling some more, packing and…more selling…..We wanted to share all of that to try and relay how we are doing in this final month in the States. My mind often feels scattered and yet amidst these ups and downs and many emotions in trying to leave well, I see God’s steadfastness. I am so grateful for this experience. Through it I feel I’m seeing a side of God that is so tender – my heavenly Father holding my hand as we walk through the unknown and the grief of so many difficult good-byes. He truly is so worthy.”

Newsletter 23, April 2022

“We are officially less than one week away from our first [French] exams! While we envisioned a couple weeks of pretty intense studying leading up to our exams, our productivity has been severely limited due to more illness. Adam had a stomach bug last weekend which knocked him out for a solid two days. The day after he started to feel better I began to feel sick and then both kids came down with fevers and coughs which we are still dealing with (poor Desi is on day 6 of a fever). Thankfully Mia seems to be coming out of it and we anticipate Desmond won’t be far behind her. This round of sickness was especially stressful since it was compounded by anxiety over the upcoming exams and heightened homesickness (mainly for Selina).

This round of sickness has also brought a clearer picture of how dependent we are on God and how we want what He has for this time, even if it seems at odds with what we think is best (i.e. studying). With those thoughts we have felt a lot of peace and have been able to enjoy lots of extended snuggles with the kids when they weren’t feeling well. While we have still been studying whenever we can and have plans to study hard these final days leading up to the exams, we are grateful for this perspective shift and we entrust the outcome of our exams to the Lord.” *if this doesn’t sum up language school I don’t know what does

Newsletter 30, December 2022

“Somehow it is December and we have only 18 days until we move! The next time we send out a newsletter we will be living on a new continent! That’s wild!

Our final stretch of school has not looked the way we expected as we have battled various colds and illnesses for over two weeks which then culminated in positive Covid tests for Adam and I this past Saturday.” *see what I said about sickness defining language school?

“…we are thankful that God is not at all surprised by any of this. He has always known what our time in France would look like, including our final weeks. We trust His plan in all of this as well as what He has for each remaining day in Albertville. We also continue to praise Him for the community He has placed around us here. We had so many sweet friends who generously provided meals, groceries, baked goods, coffee, toys and activities for our kids and encouragement during our quarantine. We will truly miss the friendships we have here!”

“We recently found out that our housing in Dakar has been approved with the landlord!! This is such a huge answer to prayer – thank you for seeking the Lord on our behalf for this.” *and we just received word that our landlord approved us to have someone live in the house during our HMA next year!

Newsletter 35, May/June 2023

“Evie Grace Matzke joined our family Tuesday, April 25th. She weighed 8lbs 13oz and made a memorable entrance via unplanned home birth! Since her birth she has had two additional hospitalizations…The most recent one was quite scary as she was very sick—her initial bloodwork upon being admitted revealed she was septic…Thankfully, after five nights in the hospital, she began improving and has since continued to make a full recovery at home. 

In addition to Evie’s illnesses, everyone else in our family dealt with fevers and other maladies in the first few weeks after Evie’s arrival. Her initial three weeks was honestly one of the most physically, emotionally and mentally exhausting times our family has ever experienced.

Yet we are SO grateful. Amidst all that I just mentioned we felt the Lord’s presence – sustaining us, encouraging us and providing for us as He always does. And we have been so blessed by all of you! Thank you for all of your prayers and encouraging messages. Your ongoing support of our family is a continual way in which we feel humbled and encouraged. Thank you!”

Newsletter 42, January 2024

“We have officially lived in Senegal for a year! And what a year it has been. God is SO faithful…We wanted to say a massive Thank you to all of our supporters. As we reflected on our first year in Africa we were blown away by God’s provision through the highs and the lows. You are a huge part of that provision. Your prayers, emails, messages, physical letters sent with Adam’s mom last month, time spent reading our newsletters and blog posts as well as your financial support are all means for us to be here and to continue on. We feel that our first year was one not just of surviving, but of thriving. Thank you for all you have done on our behalf and in response to God to make this so.”

If you’ve read this far, kudos to you! Do you sense a theme? God is faithful. May this blog post be an ebenezer marking His faithfulness. Excited to reflect again at 100 newsletters!

Much love,

Selina

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New Friends in the Neighborhood

If you’ve followed along with our journey then you know that we have a heart for our neighborhood and long to connect with our neighbors, but have found this more difficult than we expected. Culturally it’s been hard to figure out how to connect, especially on a deeper level than brief conversations on the street.

This has been a huge prayer point since we moved here. Fast forward to last weekend when our neighbors had a party. Parties here go all day and late into the night and involve a big tent in the road, load music, drums and plenty of dancing. At one point the dancing was in the road right outside our house (see the video below) so we watched from the porch for a bit.

Some partygoers got a kick out of our kids dancing on the porch and it apparently drew the particular attention of some kids who were at the party. Funny enough this was actually our first security breach as Mia had been the last one in once we were done watching the dancing and I (Selina) had forgotten to double check that she had bolted the door securely. She had not. So you can imagine my surprise when, at 7:30pm, after one ring of the doorbell six or seven young girls in fancy dresses walked right into the house wondering if our daughter could come out to play with them! At this point our kids were already in bed so I told them to come back the next day. In all reality we didn’t think they actually would return, especially because we weren’t sure if they were from the neighborhood or had travelled to the area just for the party.

The next morning was a Sunday and we ended up staying home from church after Adam had had some really strange heartburn through the night and wasn’t feeling well (side note: he’s totally fine now!). Around 10am (a time we would have normally been at church) our doorbell rang and a little nine year old girl (we’ll call her G) from the neighborhood asked if she could play. At first I just had Mia and Des play on the porch with her, but eventually asked if she wanted to come play inside. She ended up spending five hours with us that day!

G came back the next day as well and even brought a friend at one point. We ended up being so grateful for those two days with her, especially after finding out that she was leaving for a month for a trip to a village outside of Dakar. We pray she comes back to visit when she returns!

We thought at that point that perhaps that would be the end of our visitors for awhile since G was clearly the most comfortable about coming in and hanging out with us, but apparently word got around and later in the week two more young girls stopped by asking to come play and one even brought her two year old brother! It has been so sweet to see our kids playing with these Senegalese children as this is something we have longed and prayed for, but have struggled to establish. We are prayerful that these friends will continue to come back to play, that our kids can build relationships with them and that we can also get to know their families. 

Three things of note:

  1. These opportunities have been plausible mainly on account of us homeschooling. We have the availability and the flexibility to grow these relationships, especially since we know our time with these kids will be more limited once October comes and their school starts back up. We had prayed that homeschooling would allow greater opportunities for ministry as a family and already God is answering this prayer in cool ways!
  2. Mia in particular has been very anxious about interacting with kids who don’t know any English. We think some of this anxiety may be connected to the year she spent in French school when she was unable to communicate at all. Even at our church she gets quite nervous to be around the Senegalese kids and has no desire to go to Sunday school since it’s either in French or Wolof. By God’s grace, and again in response to lots of prayer, she has had no hesitation at all being around these kids even though they only speak Wolof and a little bit of French.
  3. I was talking with a friend from Ghana who noted that the way these neighborhood kids (even the two year old) are comfortable being out and about and in our home is largely connected to the culture. In this we are so grateful to have found a way to open up our home to neighbors even though it is not something we would have thought up on our own!

Please pray with us over these relationships. For wisdom when interacting with the kids, opportunities to share the gospel and also for connections with their parents. This last point is a particularly interesting one as we’ve had four different kids over and have only met one parent so far, G’s mom. She was super nice, but only spoke Wolof so communicating was basically impossible past initial greetings. At least we gathered that she didn’t mind G being at our house, but we would love prayers on how to navigate this wisely.

-Selina

Dancing outside our front door around 6pm (the party had started in the morning).
The party still rolling at 11pm 🙂 Thankfully our kids are used to these noises and aren’t bothered!