Newsletter Jurgen & Katja November 2024

Dear brothers, sisters and friends,

November has arrived! Our furlough in the Netherlands came to an end in the second week of October. We were taken by David Pavlotzky and Susanna Geertsma in two cars to Schiphol airport and from where we flew back to Madagascar via Nairobi, Kenya.

In this letter:

• Two Different Worlds
• Putting Everything Back in Order
• Vanya
• And lots More...

It was amusing that the customs officials treated all foreigners as French speakers, but when they saw us, there was recognition—at least in one of them, and so the staff started speaking happily in the national language. Well, where do you find that? That after such a long period, you are recognised as those foreigners who speak our language.

Putting Everything Back in Order

Even though we are now no longer living in a wooden house in a remote village, we had do some work nonetheless. The Strokap family from the Netherlands used our house for the months we were enjoying our furlough. Two weeks before we returned, they moved to the southeast, where they will spend two years helping with a childcare project. Two weeks on Madagascar is just enough to get everything nice and dusty again. October is one of the driest months, and that translates into dust, and more dust, and in the other corner of the house some more dust.

Katja was also busy arranging all our personal belongings that we had put away for so long. All got its place again. Nice photos, school books, beautiful wood carvings. On so Katja made our house into a home again!

I found myself back in the old-fashioned position of fixing everything. Fortunately not as much as we were used to in our house in the village, but still. Electricity cables that needed replacing, a water pipe that had snapped, a car that would not start despite a solar panel on the battery and so on. I often tell new missionaries that they had better learn how to fix all kinds of things as soon as possible. If you don’t know how to work with a screwdriver, duct-tape, and epoxy clue, things get complicated quickly.

Translationwork

We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the translation work printed in the Netherlands. It goes by container ship so it will take some time, but if all goes well it will arrive sometime at the end of November. There are still some extra costs involved, but I'll write about that later in this letter.

My main concern now is to figure out how to distribute the work effectively. Just travelling somewhere and giving away the booklets doesn't work. We want the material to reach hungry (eager to learn) people. That is quite a challenge!

One of the problems lies in the fact that many pastors of the established churches are quite traditionally trained. By traditional, I mean that they often received their education in the capital and were taught that only the official national language should be used in preaching. In addition, many of them are convinced that all Malagasy are perfectly capable of understanding the official language. This is not surprising either because when you preach and ask people whether they understand the preaching, they will all answer in the affirmative. This makes that many leaders have little interest in for example the translated Bible stories.

So it is a matter of finding the right people who recognise the added value in reaching people in their own heart language.

Furthermore, we are still working on the Book of Genesis. The first six chapters have already been digitised and can be checked. Actually, I had wanted to continue working on this during our furlough, but it didn't happen. This is not only because we were too busy. No, somehow the contact with our translator, Menja, doesn't seem to work out. I have sent him several messages and tried calling him, but I am afraid the details have changed. So far, then, we are having the most success when we see and speak to him in person.

Upcoming Trip to the Village

Hopefully, I’ll see Menja soon again. Lord willing, I will travel to our village on the 16th of December. I had actually wanted to do it earlier, but that would have given some little time to organise it. After all, this time I am not going alone.

Tanja Hock—you know, the lady of the aforementioned hospital—had asked in the past if I could not bring one of her employees, Tiavina. Then he too could experience what it's like to live in such an area. At the same time, he could then provide some medical care and be an encouragement to Sambivelo.

I did manage to reach Sambivelo by phone. Because of discord in the family, he now lives further down the road. Having run out of medicine and other medical supplies, he has gone back to working in the rice fields. Hopefully, Tiavina can encourage him and help him get back to some of the medical care he was trained for in the clinic.

Then the third person to come along. Neto is a young Brazilian aged 23. He is on Madagascar for a year. AIM sent him as a short-termer, mainly to learn what mission means. So Neto is going with me to see what I am up to.

In short, it will be a trip like nothing I have done before. We look forward to seeing how the Lord will work it out.

Financially

During our leave, we talked about finances as little as possible. We didn't want people to get the idea that we only came to raise sponsorship. Our sincere intention was, and still is, to encourage people with the stories of God's work on Madagascar.

Nevertheless, we cannot avoid mentioning our financial situation in this newsletter. Since our last furlough from 2020, several sponsors have had to withdraw. We are very grateful to them for all the years of support! Unfortunately, we did not get any new sponsors to fill these 'gaps.' As a result, we have an average shortfall of 500 to 1,000 Euros per month. Of course, this is not only because some sponsors have stopped. We also have to deal with increasingly expensive things like food, travel, and housing. In other words, three years ago we could do a lot more with 25 Euros than we do now.

We would like to ask you to join us in looking for new sponsors. But also to look into yourself. Ask the Lord to see if you can give a little more. After all, your donation is also subject to inflation. As we described above, three years ago your donation allowed us to buy more than we do now. It is good to bring this to the Lord in prayer.

You can find out more about support on our website:

We are very grateful for every donation!

Shipping of Translation Work

As mentioned earlier in the letter, the translated booklets are on their way. The Gospel of Luke, the book of Acts, and the booklets with 41 stories from the Bible—all in the Malagasy-Antanala dialect. As is often the case with these kinds of projects, there are unforeseen costs. To get the material to the capital, we still need an additional 576 Euros.

This was it for now

We hope that after reading this letter, you, like us, are also looking forward to what the future holds. We can make plans but one thing we know for sure is that “what the Lord intends, happens.” (Proverbs 19:21)

We feel privileged to receive so much support in our work. Thank you for your prayers, compassion, and support!

Together with you, we want to keep trusting in the Lord! Because God is good, always! And always God i s good!

We sincerely wish you God's blessing!

Katja & Jurgen
Vanya, Issa, Abbey, Dani en Simeon Hofmann.

Thank you so much for your interest in our ministry to the Antanala people on Madagascar. We greatly appreciate the love and support of the wonderful people that God has put around us. This ministry is much greater than our family, and we cannot do it alone.
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