Revive Liberia

The container has shipped!

admin — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 08:36:21 +0000

Praise God that RLM was able to ship a cargo container full of useful items to our brothers and sisters in Liberia. The container was loaded during the weekend of August 7th and was shipped on August 9th.

Loading the trailer

The shipment contains a donated tractor that will be used to support an agricultural project in Liberia as well as several pieces of industrial quality wood-working equipment.

The tractor being loaded.

A donated Bandsaw ready to be loaded.

Power from the grid is so expensive in Liberia that generators are needed to power the wood-working equipment. Two 30K generators are in the trailer to serve this purpose.

One of two generators waiting to be loaded.

Revive Liberia Missions would like to thank everyone who participated to make this shipment possible. God has blessed RLM and our brothers and sisters in Liberia through your work, your time and your generosity.

To view more images of the container’s contents and the load process click HERE.

Girl’s Scholarship Fund

admin — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 14:34:02 +0000

Liberia, a war-torn country on the coast of West Africa, was founded on the principals that we hold dear: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Unfortunately those basic freedoms have been denied to many of its citizens as it emerges from decades of civil war. Poverty is rampant and quality education is only a dream, especially for young women. Many girls in Liberia have had educational interruptions due to the conflict. Many of them are in their late teens and still have remaining years of high school. Unfortunately most of the decent schools are private and require tuition payments that the girls can’t afford. This is so unfortunate because educated women change not only the quality of their own lives but they also lift their families and even their communities from the crushing grip of poverty.

You can provide a quality education for a girl in Liberia.

For as little as $30 per month or about $1 per day you can purchase tuition and books for an impoverished young woman and set her on a path to a professional career. In return you will receive regular updates from your sponsored girl as well as her grade reports. You can send and receive letters with her. You can support the young woman through her entire academic career, if desired, although a one-year commitment is all that is required.

Also:

Your gift will be tax deductible
100% of your gift will go toward assisting young women. There are NO ADMINISTRATIVE COSTS.

Consider:

Supporting a young woman as a family project
As part of your Sunday School group
With your team at work
As a 50% sponsor. Another sponsor will be found to partner with you.
This is a pilot program. Only eight young women are available for sponsorship. If you want to radically change the life of a girl, her family and her community, please contact us today!

Pertinent date set for shipping container…

admin — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 05:23:57 +0000

Dear friends,

We would like to ship the next container to Liberia on the 7th of August. Please keep our work in your prayers. There is a lot of work still to be done before we ship.

We will be testing the electric machines with the 30K generators that we purchased. Items need to be boxed and packed then there is the actual act of loading the container.

Check here for updates on our progress.

May God bless you,

RLM

New Photos from Alive Liberia

admin — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 01:40:31 +0000

Rev. Richard Henah with his modified BUV

Click on the photo above to see an album of new photos of our sister organization Alive Liberia.

Next Board Meeting May 15th @ 3pm

admin — Sun, 02 May 2010 12:41:11 +0000

Here is a short update from Phil Eckart…

Dear friends,

I am sorry for the lack of communication lately. It has been a very hard winter for my business. Now things are picking up and I have had to run hard to catch up. This week I will be going to western Illinois and Mich. After that things should slow down somewhat. God has opened the hearts of some of you in generous giving for our shipment to Liberia. We are now only about $1000 short. This money is for saw blades and spare parts for the Woodmizer. There is enough money in the account to move the container to Monrovia. I called Kendell Koffman ( the Canadian guy at Smaritians Purse) to see if he had any tips on shipping. He gave me a couple of suggestions. I will be sending out a short letter to our newsletter list concerning the final needs of the shipment. We need to have a board meeting. I have set May the 15th, Sunday at 3pm at our house aside for it. If any of you can’t come let me know. We have a short video Chris has made for us. He is working on a longer one also. I can’t wait to show all of you the things we have to ship! Thank God for all of you and keep praying for this ministry.

Galatians 3:11 “The righteous will live by faith”

Phil Eckart

RLM purchases 2 X 30kw generators

admin — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 22:27:31 +0000

Revive Liberia Missions has purchased two 30KW generators for our ministry in Liberia. Both generators were Army surplus. One of them is fully functional. The other needs some minor work.

Thank you! to everyone who has been praying with us for this much needed blessing. We plan on including both generators in the cargo container that we want to ship later this summer.

One of the recently purchased generators

An update from Phil Eckert

admin — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 06:04:25 +0000

President, Revive Liberia Missions Inc.

Dear friends of Revive Liberia,

By now most of you have heard of the accident that Thomas and Hauwa were involved in. I will try to post the pictures on the web that they sent us in an email. Thomas is still recovering with a serious jaw injury. This could have been much worse. Thanks God it wasn’t. This brought up unpleasant memories for me. I was driving that suv last November when I almost wrecked it. A taxi came strait at me trying to avoid a pothole. I swerved sharply right and Bill said I missed a pedestrian by about three inches! That’s about how much room I had on the left side also. I was stressed out for quite a while over this near miss.

Our friends in Africa live this way. Here in the states we cannot appreciate what our African friends have to live with on a daily basis. Hauwa said in her report to us that an unqualified fellow (doing his best) was using a cell phone light to sew Thomas up. It was so bad that later it had to be redone. Going over there for short visits gives us a good overview of these issues but within a couple of weeks we get back on the plane. Many of our friends over there are highly educated and have traveled extensively. They know the hand they have been dealt. They remember Liberia before the war. It’s not like some of the village folk who have never known any other way because they haven’t seen it. Recently I have been under conviction because I don’t pray enough for our friends over there.

There is still much human suffering for them to contend with. Is the heart of an African believer different than ours? How do you deal daily, with someone genuinely hungry when your own family doesn’t have enough? When I first started visiting Africa I would come home and it would take me a couple of months to recover emotionally. I finally had to learn to “turn my heart off.” There is only so much you can do and then that’s it. Think if you were surrounded with this. They have my greatest admiration and respect.

Remember our sponsored pastors and those in the ministerial association that Frog and Thomas work with. These men of God walk many miles a week in the bush to spread the gospel and take care of congregations. These are unsung heroes. Only God knows what they really sacrifice for His plan. The last time I was there we went to a meeting in Bong Mines with several of them and I heard that some had walked five hours just to reach there.

We just have a couple of things to wrap up in order to ship the container. We had to make a change on the planer we were buying. This will cost us $1000 more but it will be a fully rebuilt one. The Woodmizer needs spare blades and spare parts. This will also be about $1000. This puts us about $2000 short of shipping. Any contributions would be greatly appreciated.

We have the tractor at my place now. One of the military generators is running great and is producing power. The other has a slight problem. We have countless other stuff to put on the container including about 100 pool covers and 70 or so computers. My wife has collected quite a number of shoes also.

We are in the process of working with Thomas in his transition from Samaritans Purse to his own ministry. He and Hauwa will increasingly be working with us. Part of this will be in partnership with a large church they have worked with for some time in Muslim outreach. I will keep everyone informed as to the details as they develop.

Yours in Christ,

Phil Eckart

The Shelwah family in traffic accident

admin — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 05:59:30 +0000

Thomas Shelwah and his wife Hauwa were recently in a bad car accident. Please keep them in your prayers. Below is an update sent by them telling of their situation.

Dear beloved in Christ,

Thanks for staying in touch and assuring us of your prayer support.

Please forgive me if this email doesn’t make sense because Thomas andI had a serious accident last Friday and I’m literally still in a state of shock!

We’re both at home now and gradually recuperating. Thomas’ X-Ray result was very impressive because he neither sustain any fracture in his chestbones nor bled internally. His chest is only sored inside because of the collision he had with the steering wheel. His mouth is still sored in and out but the doctor removed the external bandage yesterday and he has started to slowly speak. I’m so far so good doing very fine (though I’m having headache and body pains) and have no physical injury because Thomas sacrificed his side and took the hit in order to protect my side in the front!

Crash Scene

Regarding the little green house that our car ran into, as best as we know, there’s not yet any issue of a damaged property because the house that our car ran into only lost some of its paint but didn’t get

damaged. According to the neighbors, It is a very solid cement bricks house that was built in the 60s. The accident took place in Roberts-port (Liberia’s only Muslim dominated coastal town). Praise be to the Lord that the occupants of the house were out to the mosque for their Friday’s prayer. The house is located at the bottom of a hill that is about 200ft high. Our car brakes failed while decending this hill and was heading either into the Atlantic Lagoon or a very deep valley. But Thomas decided to head for the stairscase of the nearby green house. I was sitting by his side in the front while the director of the Family Life Ministries of Campus Crusade for Christ and his wife (Amos and Wolah Harris) were sitting in the back seat.

The Harris and I sustained minor injuries and we’re experiencing a lot of body pains but Thomas’ case was worse because he was driving and tried protecting my side from taking the collision. So he took the greatest blow and hit his chest and mouth against the Steering wheel. He is still down with the pains of a stitched mouth, chest, & neck. Unfortunately, his mouth stitches were opened and restitched at the Kingdom’s Care Medical Center in Monrovia yesterday because the local physician Assistant did a poor job at the Rural Roberts-Port St Steven Hospital and thus disfigured his entire mouth.

This is very embarrassing to mention but I’m very sad to say that there was no functional surgical Light in the Emergency Room. So, right in my presence, the Physician Assistant stitched my husband’s mouth using the light of a borrowed cell-phone but I was too helpless and still in the state of shock to have done anything about it. I knew he wasn’t doing a good job, but Thomas was losing a lot of blood and that was the only medical care he could have received at that time.

Crash Scene

The car in question is the same car that nearly took my life about a month ago when I was driving and the Ball-Joints and front shock absorbers broke. So I parked it in our garage and vowed not to drive it again. But when this stubborn husband of mine ha ha arrived from the States, he got a local quack mechanic to patch it up and there he was driving it around town again. I don’t even know why I allowed him to persuade me into ridding that car again. He also wanted us to take Matea (our five year old daughter) along but I vehemently objected to the idea and he grudgingly let go!!

He has been discharged from the hospital but still doesn’t speak freely because his mouth is still sored and is also complaining of chest pains!

Attached are photos of the wrecked vehicle that were brought to us today by the Samaritan’s Purse Tow Truck Driver who helped us did the towing to Monrovia!

Please keep us in your prayers!

Thank you!

Hauwa

Revive Liberia Newsletter Spring 2010

admin — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 06:05:06 +0000

Follow the link to download Revive Liberia’s latest newsletter.

Spring 2010 Newsletter (pdf format)

An update from Phil Eckart

admin — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 22:28:43 +0000

Here’s a recent update from Phil Eckart, President of Revive Liberia…

Dear friends,

My neighbor ( a former Sunday school student of mine ), is in charge of servicing backup generators for schools, hospitals etc. I have had him looking for a 20K unit for us. He told me this is their most common model. So far he has had no luck save one deal. Ruth Lilly died recently. Apparently she had a 150K generator on her estate. Someone didn’t want it there after her death and it was returned to the manufacturer. My friend said it may be available for us since they have no money in it. I just talked to him and he told me it consumes about 20 gallons an hour at full load. At light load about 8 to 10 gallons are used.

I had lunch with Amos yesterday, he told me to get my hands on that thing no matter what. It is of great value over there either on Roberts Field Road or Buchanan. As of this morning I am contacting the right people for me to meet about this. Please keep this in your prayers. This could be a really big contact.

Amos has been a good friend to Revive Liberia and is currently helping us with several different facets of our operation. Please keep his efforts in your prayers.

Kurt and I went to Indy this week to meet a fellow who sells stainless steel surgical tools cheap. These are not defective in any way. It is 5 to 10 cents on the dollar of retail. After this situation is resolved with the hospital this can be a really good resource for us. The newsletter is finished and is on the web. It will be “mailed” out email very soon. We are about $2000 short of shipping the container and another $1500 or so short when it arrives for dutys. We are still looking for an industrial (or older) jointer.

One last point. I am so grateful to God for all of you. When God called me to this work I felt so unqualified. Though I have had more real life experiences than most I find myself surrounded by people with such deep skills and or education. I still feel unqualified. God has moved so many hearts of people with such depth of skill and character to help I am forever grateful to Him. I mean this about every one of you. Remember Danay’e in your prayers. She has been through so much and is now going through more physical pain. The doctors don’t seem to have a handle on it. She needs our regular prayers. I will be posting regular updates on the web, at least once a week, to keep everyone informed about events concerning RL.

Many of you know that Thomas is here in the states. Unfortunately because we are saving for the container we were not able to get him to us. He is in Colorado and will then go back to South Carolina before returning to Liberia. We have decided to let his supporters send their funds through Revive LIberia. Danay’e has spent some time on this getting it just so with the tax laws. Thomas has been a great help to our ministry. Even as we speak Frog is working with Andrew Bosh ( Thomas’s understudy) in pastor training with SP. We hope never again will we have such a friend to Revive Liberia in the states and not be able to see them!

I received an email a month or so ago from a church in Dallas. I think they are associate with Dallas Theological Seminary. The fellow I talked to Googled Liberia agriculture and our web site came up. They have a fellow they have supported for 10 years in Liberia, building churches and training leaders. Low and behold I found out this fellow is working with Thomas, SP, and knows Frog well. This may very well lead to some synergy in all of our works.

Thanks and remember, ”Thanks be to the Lord, who daily carries our burdens for us, God is our salvation” Psalm 68:19

Phil Eckart

President

Revive Liberia Missions Inc.