August 2017

This time, from Ryan:

The last several months have been very encouraging for us. In this letter, I’m going to share just a few of the things for which I thank God.

I am thankful for the Fairview Team from Missouri that came out. They provided two teams of experts. The first team assisted with a construction project on the church that we attend. I had the privilege of leading the work team as we gathered supplies and built new walls and structure. We also wired fans and lights. The second team consisted of optometry experts who saw patients at the ABWE hospital. This directly affected many of our workers as they were able to get the treatment that they needed to help with some of their vision difficulties. I was very encouraged by the attitudes, actions, and gracious donations of the men that I worked alongside over their two weeks with us. We also received many unexpected gifts like pepperoni, candy, work gloves, and carpenter pencils, not to mention, a new set of treasured friends.

I am thankful for my colleague, Joe Gelatt, and the encouragement that he and his family have brought from Ghana to Togo on more than one occasion this year. Sometimes it’s nice to sit down with a fellow aviator and talk pilot-ese. We have been able to accomplish many tasks in the hangar together, including fixing our aviation push mower and my household generator, as a result of his ability and know-how.

I’m thankful for two teams sent by from Grace Bible Church in Virginia. During these teams’ short visits, I received help in ways that I couldn’t and probably wouldn’t have normally asked for. With the first team we were able to completely dismantle two tractors and begin work on several vehicles that belong to my colleagues and me. This was a huge blessing to me as many hands made light work of several very large, time consuming tasks. Problems on the vehicles and tractors were discovered, parts were ordered, and the second team brought out parts to repair and finish these projects. I was especially blessed with a new friendship with, Ernie, who came out with the first team and stayed here for eight weeks and left with the second team.

Ernie is a recently retired auto technician who has been a tremendous encouragement to me and my family. He became “Uncle Ernie” to our kids. It has been fun to have a work companion and we appreciated working together on several projects. His knowledge, know-how, and friendly demeanor have been instrumental at greatly increasing my understanding and confidence in auto and tractor maintenance. We’re promised he’ll be making a return trip with his wife in the future and we all look very much forward to it.

I’m thankful for my sending church, Edgewood Bible Church. As our plane is now nearing re-arrival to Togo, needs have arisen for the airplane and its ministries. They have recently raised more than $3,400 toward some last minute needs such as a new hangar push mower, tires and parts for our Kubota, and several other miscellaneous items that will be sent to us on the airplane’s shipping container.

I’m thankful to an anonymous donor. Last year, the aviation team was given a small size Kubota tractor. This tractor has needed a lot of repairs. This donor was ready to donate up to $5,000 for a new pull behind finishing mower to go with the tractor. As it turns out, we were able to order the mower deck and all necessary extra parts for much less than that amount. The Kubota will be used to mow the area directly around the hangar where we will do run ups, taxiing, and refueling.

If you have been counting, I have mentioned in this letter three different lawn mowers that will be necessary to mow approximately 7 acres of specified land for our airstrip and hangar area. When your landing strip is grass, it is important to have the right tool for the right job, and now we will be fully equipped.

I am thankful for store owners and corporations across the US that have given us huge discounts on parts, pieces, accessories, and even clothing items. The sales representative at Danner Boots, Inc. gave me a 50% discount on the order of a new pair of waterproof boots to replace the pair that have disintegrated due to the trauma I have put them through over the past four years. Their one request in return was that I send them a photo of my new boots being put to use. My creative juices are flowing as to what dramatic African photos I can produce for their amusement.

I am thankful for all of the people at JAARS in Waxhaw, NC for their hard work on or airplane over the course of the last two years. They have worked faithfully and diligently on repairing our aircraft to completion. Their expertise has been a tremendous help and there have been many people that have volunteered their time to lower overall costs. The airplane, will at last be headed back to Togo this September.

I am thankful for two Liberty University instructors and five Triad Baptist Church volunteers who traveled down to our airplane container in Waxhaw last weekend. They sorted and organized all of the miscellaneous parts and pieces that came off of the plane, and disposed of whatever would not serve a purpose to us here in Togo. It was a big, dirty, and probably confusing task, but they did it above and beyond our expectations, and saved us another costly trip to the States.

We are always thankful for care packages, letters, cards, and Facebook encouragements that are sent our way. American chocolate and pepperoni are a huge blessing!

I am thankful also, to have the privilege to work alongside my Togolese brothers in the Lord in the ministry here in Togo. The G family is growing in faith and learning basic doctrine and the Toussie evangelistic project is slowly progressing also. My national partners are instrumental in teaching, translating and sometimes transliterating what we are trying to communicate from God's Word. 

I am thankful to God for my family. God has given me a wonderful wife of faith and three beautiful children on this journey. We have many adventures and new experiences together. But even through difficulty and sickness, God is faithful to lead us through as a family.

By the grace of God we, all of the people mentioned above, as well as you, our prayer and financial supporters, are working together with a heart to reach the nations, specifically, Togo, with the gospel of our Savior, Jesus. May we all, myself included, remain faithful to the task to which we are called.

In Christ,

Ryan Buczak

April 2017

Coffee: Each morning Ryan and I wake up, make coffee, and discuss what how we are going to navigate the day’s tasks. Christian sits, or runs around rather, in his walker pulling things off shelves, and his sisters straggle in one at a time for their morning bowl of oatmeal with brown sugar. Eventually, we have our plans in place and we scatter hoping to get some things done.

This morning, I wish you could join us for a cup of coffee (or tea if you prefer), so that we could update you on all that the Lord has allowed us to be a part of. 

We would talk about:

• Easter Sunday’s Resurrection service and bar-b-Que that we had a blast hosting at our house. There were probably around 40 people crowded into our living room singing to Jesus and celebrating His resurrection from the dead that proved power over death and the grave.

Bible lesson in Toussi

• We would tell you about our continued discipleship with the Gnamssa family, how one recently changed his name to “Redeemed of God” rather than “Sold to the spirits.” How we hope to deepen the level of discipleship we’ve been doing with them, and to possibly prepare them for baptism.

• We would tell you about the project in Toussi, where the chief is already searching out land for a church even though we’ve only had the chance to show the Jesus film and start lessons in The Story of Hope.

• Ryan would tell you about how he’s been teaching guitar lessons, but it’s been a challenge trying to teach new rhythms to young people who basically know one rhythm and have a very hard time learning how to break out of the old in order to learn something new.

AnnMarie is our fashionista.

• He would tell you about the drama of trying to teach people about airstrip safety, and trying to explain to them why they can no longer cross the runway even though they don’t see an airplane and can’t understand why their pathways in the airstrip are dangerous for pilots and airplanes. How our makeshift bamboo barriers have been vandalized EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. for the past several weeks; how one government-hired scout has been beat up trying to keep people off the runway, and the perpetrators sent to jail; how Mr. Gnamssa might have been one of those perpetrators before he was saved, but has now become extremely helpful to us. I will say, however, that given his handicap from his stroke, it has been difficult for him, too, to walk the extra 4,000 feet to get around the runway. God has allowed his salvation and discipleship to help us in communicating with those who live around the airstrip that we are not here to just be big meanies who don’t want to share our land, but that we really do have a life-saving message to share.

• We would tell you about how the airplane is scheduled to begin test flights THIS WEEK! And how it actually is truly likely that we will have it back here on Togo soil THIS SUMMER!

• We would tell you about how homeschooling has its ups and downs, but how we are pleased that a teacher has agreed to come out and teach the missionary kids next school year!

• How God has allowed us to be part of the lives of woman and her 5 kids while her husband is away searching for work.

Leslie got her hair done in braids.

• We’d tell you about some of our frustrations with learning this culture, and even some of the Kabiyé language.

All of these things we would love to tell you in great detail in person, and we would want to hear your stories, too. We want to hear about your family, your busy schedule, what God is teaching you, and about what God has allowed you to be a part of. We would share life with you, all over that hot coffee (or iced if you were here and don’t want to begin your day drenched in sweat).

For now, we will resort to communication by email and social media. I'm so glad that for those of you with whom we share a common bond in Christ Jesus, we have a future hope of spending eternity together sharing our stories and glorifying God for all he has done in, through, and for us. I can't wait! Until then, I’ll leave you with three specific prayer requests. 
 

•  Please pray that our mission will be able to get NGO status before the airplane arrives. NGO status is granted by the government of Togo to non-profit organizations and it gives us certain tax cuts that will make it much easier to get our airplane back into the country without having to pay astronomical taxes. 
•  Please pray that God would help us to grow in grace so that that grace flows through us as we handle all of the different challenges that come our way each day; be it within our family, with our neighbors, or with the one who would like to see us fail.
• Pray that God would continue to guide us in wisdom as we work in Toussi and Agamé to share the gospel and disciple new believers.

We are ever thankful for you and for your support of God’s tasks for us here in Togo. May God bless you as you learn more and more about His grace today and into the future.

In Christ,

Ryan, Stephanie, Leslie, AnnMarie, & Christian

January 2017

We’re getting back into the swing of things with our life here in Togo. Thank you for praying for our hot water situation. We were pleased to have had our first warm showers on Christmas Day!!! Our water flow is good now and soon we will be installing a good water filtration system for the entire house.

We have been praying about what ministry paths we should follow for this term. The Lord has been pressing on our heart for some time to begin learning the Kabiyé language. We have found a curriculum created and used by the Peace Corps, and we have started using it with some of our Kabiyé friends here. We have also requested a teacher who could come to our house once a week to tutor us. Please pray that the Lord would bring the right person along to help us.

There is a small village not far from us who has asked us to come and teach the Story of Hope. Ryan will begin visiting this village in the next week or so to survey this possibility. Please pray that the Lord would open those paths if He would like us to pursue this ministry.

We continue our work with the Gnamssa family. We met last night with the pastor and pastor-in-training we have been working with about working further back in the Agamé region where the family lives. Please pray as certain obstacles have presented themselves. Please pray for wisdom on the patience for all those involved. We believe that the people in this region are open to learning the gospel and that God has a plan that involves using us and these two pastors there. We also intend to use this as a discipleship tool with the family to train them in evangelism.

We had the privilege of visiting Ghana earlier this month to lay down the rough draft for the West African Aviation Policy Manual. Those meetings went very well. We are pleased with what was accomplished and thankful for an encouraging time with our teammates. On another aviation note, our airplane is scheduled to be shipped out to us by the end of this month. Please pray for its safe passage. Please also pray that when it arrives in the port here, that the container will not be tampered with and that the taxes to get it released from port will be straight and reasonable.

The girls are doing well. Leslie is about to finish 2^nd grade and AnnMarie is plugging along at learning to read. They enjoy playing together and visiting and playing with other missionary kids their age. Christian eats well, sleeps well, grows well, and smiles well. He’s a joy to have around. Please always pray for us as parents that we would have what it takes to disciple our Children’s hearts to love and follow after Jesus. Just because we fall under the title of missionaries does not mean that these things come easy for us.

There are other ministries that present themselves to us frequently. Please pray that we would balance our time wisely and always seek to honor the Lord first in our lives. We chose the word “serve” as our family’s theme for the year, 2017. Please pray that we would have servant hearts like Jesus and do all of these things for His glory alone.

We love you. Thank you for sending and keeping us here. We love our job!

In Christ,

The Buczaks

PS. Our internet connection is SOOO slow. To see recent pictures, visit us on Facebook.

December 2016

Replacing the old with the new

We arrived in Togo on December 2^nd and are happy to be back where we believe we truly belong at this stage in our lives. While life is certainly different, what is foreign to us is also becoming more familiar. So thank you for helping us, preparing us to get back to Togo. We feel stronger and more equipped for the work that the Lord has sent us here to do.

There are many tasks on our house we have come back to. Our water system is still a confusing issue with the hot water heater working, but hot water not coming out of the faucets. We hope to fix the issue with the pressure system we got in the capital. Setting up our internet is also in the works. Thank you for being patient with us as we have not been able to communicate as much as we would like. Word has it we should be back online today (this message was sent from outside of our home. There are other minor projects that we work on as time allows so that we can start focusing more on work outside of our gates.

We have been twice to visit the Gnamsa family and plan to visit again today. On Sunday, Pastor Ali taught out of 2 Corinthians 5:17. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” When asked, they explained that the old for them is animism and the new is Jesus and His teachings. Our friend Yawovi also reminded them, that the old includes our daily bad habits such as bickering, complaining, etc. This passage in Corinthians is very familiar and I’ve heard it a thousand times, but hearing it taught to new believers reminded me that I, as a longer standing believer still have old that is being worked out of my life. I’m so thankful Jesus doesn’t just get rid of just the big and obvious old and leave the less obvious old in our lives. No, Jesus is still removing the old from my life and molding me more into the likeness of Himself.

We were privileged last week to attend the marriage of two very special friends. We met Komi on our first trip to Togo in 2007. He was the one who first put us in contact with the Gnamsa family. Upon our second arrival here, we met his beautiful fiancé, Essohanam. Words cannot express our joy for them as these two godly friends start their life together. Unfortunately for us, they are moving far away up north to be missionaries of sorts at the new hospital there. Though we are sad to see them go, we know that God has wonderful plans to use them up there. God bless you Komi and Essohanam, and God bless the North Team. You guys are getting some quality gems!

You have been in our thoughts and prayers as well as we contemplate how incredibly strange it is that just a few weeks ago we saw the beginning of a “normal” cold Christmas with you all and now we are about to celebrate our very first Christmas in a very hot climate. We want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year as you seek to serve the One who “came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:28b

In Christ,

The Buczaks