A House AND a Kreesha

So... there's been so much that's happened since my last post, I'll have to do this in stages.  First and most importantly, God found us a house!  It's a nice roomy three-bedroom house with a bathroom already installed, tiled floor to ceiling, which is really rare around here.  There's a big backyard with tall trees, a stream, a raspberry patch and room for a garden, as well as a little summer house we can use for guests, with a beautiful grapevined porch and a full kitchen!  It has a diesel furnace AND a coal furnace already installed with a THERMOSTAT (unheard of), so the heat should be strong and consistent during the freezing winter-- another big answer to prayer.  Also, there's space to install a huge water tank so we can have continual running water, instead of just a couple hours a day.  And our landlords said they would pay to install a hot water heater for us!  We only have to pay $150 a month for all this, and we can sign an initial contract for 2 years with the offer of longer if we want, exactly what we've been praying for.  

The best part of all of this, though, is that the house belongs to the former mayor of our village, who isn't living there anymore because he was promoted to second-in-command of the entire region, and therefore moved to the bigger town nearby.  He and his wife (both the minority group we're reaching-- another answer to prayer) came out personally to show us around the house, and they were so friendly and down-to-earth, easy to talk to.  He told us how they built the house themselves in '83, and they loved living there but it just doesn't work anymore with his job.  They're happy for us to rent it because they know foreigners are reliable, and they're glad to have someone trustworthy living there to keep an eye on things.  This connection is a huge answer to prayer, because our company has been specifically praying for high-level government contacts to be our "kreesha" or covering in this place, and this is a perfect open door.  

Thanks so much for praying!  We will keep you posted and I'll put up pictures as soon as we have some.