Thanks to all of you who prayed for our visa appointments last week. Here's a quick update of how your prayers were answered:

On the morning that we left for Abuja, I felt it was quite apt that my Bible reading was from Acts 27, where an angel appears to Paul to encourage him during his long, hazardous voyage to Rome. It was as if God was giving me strength for our journey too, saying that this is just one of those things that we're going to have to endure for now, although there will be encouragements along the way. And that was indeed the case! A newly arrived contact at the British High Commission (who just happened to be ex-UK Visas and Immigration), helped us get our Friday appointment moved to the Thurs, so that we could submit both children's applications together - which was just as well, as it turned out.

When we finally arrived at the submission desk after several hours of waiting with increasingly restless kids, we were rather surprised that they wouldn't accept any of our supporting documents; instead they told us that we had to post them all to the UK ourselves, unlike previous years, when they had scanned everything. But who should arrive in Abuja that afternoon, but a colleague from Jos who was travelling to the UK on Friday morning, and who was happy to carry and post our documents for us. Not hard to see the Lord's goodness there!

It's a huge relief to have finally submitted our applications. Now comes the long wait (perhaps 3 months) to see what they say, so your prayers for a favourable outcome are still very much appreciated.