Burkina

i'm finally there.

29.1.15









so you know that relieved feeling you have after you've been on a long trip, and have finally made it back home and unpacked and started settling back into life?  when you can just take the time to sit on the couch and read and journal or casually browse Facebook without a purpose?  well, i'm finally there.  after eighteen months of living life halfway, i'm ready to completely unpack.  and it's a little scary, finally deciding that you are gonna dive in headfirst, even when you don't completely know what's gonna come.  but one thing i do know, is that He is going to do amazing things.  and he already has been, because these beautiful people have already made their way into my heart. 

Africa

au village

7.6.14


9 women, 2 dark & 7 light, with the mission of serving Christ.
1 flat tire.
5 hours of driving.
1 very hard jump-seat (one of the very few times that i wished i was only 5 feet tall).
1 long day teaching others of Christ.
25 women learning to care for their families.
1 out of the innumerable villages.
small steps, little by little, piece by piece.
expanding the kingdom of Christ.


i have discovered that even when it's melt-your-face-off hot, it's never too hot to hold a baby.  especially when it's a doll with her eyebrows and eyeliner done...


this little guy reminded me so much of one of my little cousin. 
he would walk up to me, talking baby-babble in Jula and look at me expectantly to answer.  
when i didn't, he would babble on, clearly frustrated that i wasn't responding.  
so i tried French, which got me no where.
leaving me wishing i knew more Jula and him confused as to why i couldn't understand him...



even when it's 106, we drink hot tea.
why?  well because it's just the way it's done. 



tô (pronounced toe), fish sauce and sauce made from the leaves of a baobab. 
a meal lovingly prepared for hours that morning. 
offering the best that they had to their guests.
(baobab leaves,  when cooked, offer the consistency of, well i can't think of anything like it actually.  but let's just say slime, really slimy slime.)




one of the men tells me that it hasn't rained there yet, the ground is thirsty and the little vegetation that grows is disappearing.  
and without the rain, they cannot plant their crops.  
the well, he says, is only 2 meters deep.  the water becoming less and less as the earth dries out.





little ones that we wouldn't consider ready to care for themselves already have the responsibility for another.




Lord, use me to bring the love of Christ to these people whom i have learned to love.  
make me a city on the hill.  
open my eyes to those who need your love and give me the words to do it.

Africa

one in five.

9.5.14

one of five children die before their fifth birthday.
a statistic that has so easily fallen off of my tongue in the past.


standing by a table with prayer cards, pictures and information, i would tell people of the poverty and hunger.
of the short lived lives and the high mortality rates, that one in five children die before their fifth birthday. 






i don't fully realize what those words meant.
i tried, but i couldn't completely wrap my mind around something that big, that heart wrenching.
maybe it was to protect my heart, 
maybe it was because i was distracted in the rush of things, 
or maybe it was because i couldn't.
i didn't have a way to wrap my mind around it, i had no "box" to put it in yet. 


but now looking at their sweet, dirty little faces, my heart breaks. 
knowing that it's possible  probable for one of these five kids to die before their 5th birthday.
it makes me cry
life is so precious, so fragile.
i reminded of it here daily.






i hear about friends who went to the hospital because of a stomachache,
why go to the hospital for only a stomachache, we wonder.
ad then we hear of the people who died after having a stomachache and not going.
the numbers now have faces and personality.
the statistics names and preferences.


how do i begin to deal with it, grapple with the weight of it all?


life here has no happy ending. 
there is no light at the end of the tunnel,
except for The Light.
the only One who can provide any hope in this dark, dangerous world we live in.

Africa

Sunday Afternoon

26.1.14


The whole street in front of our house is tinted red from all dust into the air.  Mom and I sit on the side of the road where the boys are playing football, watching and waiting to see who the Lord has for us to talk to today.  Instead of tall people, little ones come instead.  Slowly, shyly they come up in pairs, running to catch up with each other.  They stand behind us waiting to see what we will do.  Talking and pushing each other towards us.


I draw a smiley face and try to hand the pen to her.  She just stares as I draw another face.  I take her hand and place the pen in it, guiding her hands to draw, first a circle then two eyes and a smile.  She looks up at me and smiles as she copies my picture.  The others slowly gather around, waiting for their turn.  I hand out sticks to everyone and show them to draw on the hard, red dirt.  They all plop down in a circle around me, each with stick in hand drawing smiley faces in the dust covered ground.


The boys come, ready to play football just like every Sunday afternoon.  They come two here, one there, some walking up to watch from afar.  The broken cinder blocks are set up 3 feet apart for a goal on each end and the game begins only to be  stopped by a moto going down the road or a mother carrying water on her head and a baby on her back.  


The ball, once white, is now a rusty red.  Bare feet run over rocks, sticks, glass and broken stone.  The dust cloud grows larger the longer they play.  The ball is kicked and chased, caught and scored.  Young ones run from the sidelines to help fetch balls gone out of bounds, thrilled to be able to play with a real ball instead of a wad of plastic.  


The sun sets, making all the earth look red.  Nowhere else can you see a sun like this.  Big, hot and red.  The light filters through the dust and life is slowing down.  The kids start going back to their courtyards as everyone starts to settle in for the night.  We say goodnight to the boys we have been getting to know and put away the cinder block goals for next week.  I look up at our new neighborhood and can't wait to see what else the Lord has in store for us to accomplish here.