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Africa
Lessons Learned as an MK
By the Bohman girls
Africa was a foreign country to our
parents, but for us—their children—it
was home. When our parents arrived
in Africa, it was a whole new world to
them; it was the mission field to which
they had surrendered. On the other
hand, having been born in Africa, we
did not think of surrendering to live
there—we actually preferred it. It was all
we knew and we loved it! Living on the
mission field has been a blessing to us in
many ways, and we would like to share
a few reasons why we are thankful to be
missionary kids (MKs).

innocence, we greeted her with smiles
and hugs when we saw her. Since she
did not feel intimidated by children, she
started talking to us each time we would
go into her shop and soon a friendship
resulted. On certain holidays we would
make her cookies and enclose a Gospel
tract. Slowly, seeds were planted. She
would sometimes ask us to pray for her
or for a problem in her life. Those “seeds”
were watered. Although we never saw
her salvation before we left that town,
we saw that her heart was tender and her
mind apt to receive the Gospel.

One incredible blessing was the knowl-
edge that God could use us in ways He
could not use our parents. Our family
ministered as a team, yet, even at young
ages, we understood that God could
use us individually. There are several
stories we could tell, but here is one: the
manager of a store we frequented was a
Muslim lady. At first, she did not want
to talk to our parents about religion or
even form a friendship. However, in our
God used us individually and also
blessed us personally. One of our earliest
memories of this occurred when we were
very young. Where we lived at that time,
crayons were hard to come by. Since the
African children did not have crayons
at home, coloring was an activity the
children looked forward to each week in
Sunday school. One week, we noticed the
Sunday school crayons were worn down
to stubs, and the Lord placed on our
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